No cold water

yankeeNH

So here's the situation:

We recently purchased a small condo in a high rise building in downtown San Diego. The building is about 5 yrs. old. To the best of my knowledge, we don't have a separate water heater--but we do have a heat exchanger for our air conditioning/heating in the unit--and I'm not sure if that could be part of the problem.

In the morning in particular, there is no cold water from the taps. Later in the day there is, but never really cold.

We initially had problems getting the A/C to work, but finally figured out the heat exchanger polarity setting thing in the thermostat (O/B) and we now have A/C. So I'm not sure if these two are somehow related.

Any guesses?

Scuba_Dave

High rise...what floor are you on ?
Sounds like the water in the pipes is warming up overnight

The Engineer

Dave is right, cold water is whatever the temperature of the water coming in from the street is at. So the water sits in the mains over night and brings the water up to room temperature, so in the morning, your cold water is 70 degrees. This is a very common occurance in high rise multi unit buildings, and you will get cold water only after the main has run for several hours flushing out the warmer water.

yankeeNH

17th floor out of 20...though there's cool water first thing in the AM (standing in pipes).

Kinda creepy having hot water in your toilet. I'm just sayin'…

LateralConcepts

So is it "hot" or just room temp?

If it's hot there could be a major problem with the water heater. Potentially dangerous and you should call someone about it immediately!

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Brad Penske, Operations Manager - Coeur d'Alene, ID
LateralCONCEPTS,LLC - Sewer & Septic Line - Video Inspection, Locating, Consulting
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The Engineer

If the water in the toilet is "hot", like over 100 degrees, then the problem is the toilet was connected into the hot water system. Not a problem with the heater, just a problem with the piping. He doesn't have his own water heater from what I gather from his first post, his hot water is created in a central mechanical room in the building that provides hot water for the entire building. Probably three 600 gallon tanks either gas fired or off a boiler water heat exchanger depending on the number of units.

LateralConcepts

Could be that or thermal expansion. I would find out if there are expansion tanks installed on the heaters. 5 years old and they've probably never been serviced/drained either

__________________
Brad Penske, Operations Manager - Coeur d'Alene, ID
LateralCONCEPTS,LLC - Sewer & Septic Line - Video Inspection, Locating, Consulting
(208) 818-8241

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jogr

I had hot water in the toilet once. It turned out that the sink faucet (single handle/cartridge design) failed somehow and would let hot water flow over to the cold side. When first turning on the sink in the morning the cold water would be warm.