Plumbing in Shirehampton

Shirehampton sits on the north-western edge of the city, between the River Avon and the Blaise Castle parkland, with Avonmouth just beyond. It was a village in its own right until it became part of Bristol in 1904, and the older streets near the High Street still have some larger nineteenth-century houses, a few of them since split into flats or turned to other uses. Shirehampton Park, now a golf course, and the woods above the river give the area a greener feel than its position next to the docks might suggest. The railway station and the Portway link it to the city centre, and we reach Shirehampton regularly from our base in St Pauls.

Most of today’s housing, though, came after the First World War, when the city built a large amount of council housing here. Those homes have had the best part of a century of changes: new kitchens and bathrooms, combi boilers in place of loft tanks, and supply pipes renewed in some houses but not in others. Where a downstairs toilet or an extension has been added, its waste often joins a drain run that was never designed for it. Hard Bristol water then adds limescale to taps, valves and shower heads. In older houses it is also common to find a stop tap that hasn’t been turned in years and won’t shut off fully when it is finally needed, which is worth checking before there is a leak.

Common Shirehampton jobs

• Stop taps that are stiff, seized or leaking
• Blocked drains and outside gullies
• Toilet cisterns that run on or won’t refill
• Cold radiators and leaking radiator valves
• Weak showers caused by limescale or older pipework

Gardens, outside taps and gullies

Plenty of Shirehampton homes come with a decent garden, and that brings its own plumbing. An outside tap with no isolating valve indoors is easy to forget about until a hard frost splits it. We can fit a new outside garden tap with a valve inside the house, so you can turn it off and drain it before winter. If the gully by the back door keeps backing up, the cause is usually silt, leaves or kitchen fat rather than a broken pipe, and high-pressure water jetting will normally clear it. Where a blockage keeps coming back, a closer look at the pipe will usually show whether there is a crack, a dip or root growth that needs a proper repair.

Plumbing services in Shirehampton

• Emergency plumbing: burst pipes and serious leaks, aiming to arrive within the hour
• Blocked drains: sinks, toilets, gullies and manholes
• Leak repair: pipes, joints and appliance connections
• Radiators and heating: valves, cold spots and system pressure (no gas work)
• Taps and toilets: drips, running cisterns and replacements
• Bathroom and kitchen plumbing