The great "can't fix that" racket

[Nick Jones]

I have written on the subject of Saniflo before.  I don't like them.  I especially don't like one in my house.......

...... but.... there is one in my house...... and it's a flight critical component of our en-suite facilities.  SM likes her en-suite, so if the Saniflo misbehaves, I'm in the shit.  Literally.

5 pm yesterday.... the house cyclist has been out and got very sweaty so needs a wash before we go to the pub.  He prefers our ensuite because the "shower actually has water coming out of it".  He exaggerates.....

So the shower has water coming out of it.  It's even warm today.  This is good.  Our cyclist is happy.  But wait...... the water isn't leaving.... the shower tray is filling up...... is full..... Shiiiit! To be fair, he did turn the water off before there was total disaster, and the bloody Saniflo was making a noise like the water should have been leaving...... but it was only kidding.

Eventually he gave up waiting for the water to leave and called the cavalry.  Me.

If you have a Saniflo, you need to keep an Aquavac handy.  I have no idea how you'd cope without one.  I emptied the shower tray.  I emptied the loo. And the loo tank.  The whole lot has to be moved to access the bastard Saniflow.  

This then has to be carefully wriggled out of the wall so I can get the lid off and empty that too.  Not very nice in there, but not as nasty as the last time I fought with it......  Nothing obvious......  Decide to completely remove it so I can deal with it properly.  Then get a deep bucket so I can prod the non-return valve and empty the riser.  There's best part of 5m head behind it so it's a fairly high energy procedure - and stinky..... 

That was last night.  SM was displeased that her facilities were non-functional all night. 

I couldn't find any obvious reason why it was running but not pumping.  I couldn't this morning either.  In fact this morning I was able to prove it did pump with some outdoor trials.  So I filled it up with citric acid and went out for the day.  This evening I've swilled it out again, carefully reassembled it and put it back in place.  It works perfectly (within it's many limitations!)  I have no idea why it didn't yesterday......

If I were paranoid I might think it did it to piss me off.  If it did, I'm afraid it worked......

One comfort is that I'm not alone.  Lots of people hate them.  This man especially

Peter Parry wrote (on the Subject of the Saniflo)

Warning: people of a sensitive disposition might care to venture no further.

Angus asked:

My recently installed Saniflo does not behave as described in the user manual. On flushing the WC it's supposed to run continuously for about 15 seconds, mine pulses on-off 3 or 4 times for about 2-3 seconds duration. Any ideas?

Peter replied:

Sell the house, failing that give it away, if that doesn't work pay someone to take it or burn it down. To give you a clue - these ghastly instruments of the Devil are French. Add the French and lavatorial engineering - now see why I say get out while you can. Moreover this particular Frenchman was a lunatic with strong Anglophobic tendencies and a bad case of corrodible.

I am quite sure the designer was also an ex-submariner Frenchman who missed the strangled screams of seamen who had got the valve sequence wrong in the submarines toilet and just been rinsed down with a few gallons of seawater (and the recently donated contents of the bowl).

They break down at the slightest opportunity. The only thing you can actually guarantee about them is that they will break down - very frequently. Basically the only way of maintaining the slightest semblance of serviceability is to impose on pain of repair the same rules as for a small yachts sea toilet - if it hasn't passed through you it doesn't go in the bowl.

They have an interesting design. The motor has poor starting torque and the macerator lots of tiny teeth. Ergo anything that has strands in it catches on the teeth and stops the motor from starting. Things with strands include anything with cotton wool (including cotton wool buds) and anything with cloth. Females in particular must not be allowed anywhere near these devices. If you were unfortunate enough to have the added misery of a sink (oh dear - you were warned) then add hair, strands from woolly pullovers and almost anything else that's at all fibrous.

When they break (which they will - that's an absolute certainty) their endearing characteristic is that you are left with a bowl full of whatever which you have to empty back the way it came and more importantly many feet of 40mm pipe still full of minced whatever. When you disconnect the pipe I'll give you one guess where its going to go. Repairing or unblocking them is the most thoroughly revolting job.

Now to get to specifics - the pulsing is a fault in either installation or the pressure switch. Does it pulse with just the cold water tap running from the sink? The way they work is a low pressure trip switch switches on the motor when the small holding tank is full. This tank remains partially full all the time. If its pulsing either the switch has too low a hysteresis or water isn't getting into it fast enough. The motor should remain on for a few seconds after everything has emptied so that pulsing you are seeing shouldn't be happening.

As the failure rate of these diabolical things is worse than that of a F104 Starfighter I'd suggest you get the installer back (preferably to remove it forever). If it was installed by yourself then self flagellation with a few lengths of barbed wire and a call to the Saniflo people might be in order.

Angus asked:

Also, my system is a Sanitop with the outflow from a washbasin going into the top of the unit. I find that running the tap for a few seconds activates the Saniflo. Is there any way of adjusting the sensitivity of it so that it will only run when a reasonable amount of water has gone into the unit?

To which Peter replied:

No, but if it's oversensitive this might be related to the pulsing you are seeing.

Angus:

I don't see why the washbasin water cant just bypass the cutter/pump internally.

Peter:

Because these horrors are designed to be installed pumping upwards - the raving idiot who designed them thought it would be pretty neat to have something you could stick in a downstairs cloakroom and run the pipe upwards to join the soil stack in the bathroom. If that's how your installation goes cut out the selling the house bit - just burn it now. When it fails there is 10ft of pressurised whatsit just waiting for that final turn on the drainpipe.

The other reason the sink must go through the pump is that the outlet of the thing is at some pressure. Connect the sink a bit downstream and every time you pull the chain the contents of the loo make a pretty little fountain out of the sink plughole (I've seen one plumbed like that - the owner kept a sandbag in the sink on top of the plug).

Some models have an interesting feature - on the top is a reset switch, under the top cover is a screwdriver slot on the top of the motor drive shaft to allow you to clear the (frequent) blockages. However to get the top cover open to get at the drive shaft to free it - you've guessed - you have to disconnect the drain pipe.

How they can be called Saniflow when they are anything but sanitary (as you will soon find out) and rarely flow is beyond me.

As I said - sell the house.

Peter Parry.

[Hamish]

that's funny 

[Escadrille Ecosse]

On 7/1/2021 at 1:23 PM, Hamish said:

that's funny 

Part of the problem though is that plumbers - or most other tradesmen - don't design their installations for maintenance.

I treat the house utilities as process plant and try to install maintenance isolation and 'process release' provisions to help deal with the breakdowns.

However there is always something new popping up to confound the best laid plans

 

[Nick Jones]

4 hours ago, Escadrille Ecosse said:

I treat the house utilities as process plant and try to install maintenance isolation and 'process release' provisions to help deal with the breakdowns.

That’s what I would do if building a new house or doing a “full resto”. However, the “trades” absolutely don’t get this. They’ll be out of the house and up the road before anything breaks….. so what’s the problem? Someone else’s 

[RogerH]

A couple of years ago my Saab car key (remote) started to disintegrate. 

I spoke to the servicing garage and they suggested  it would be lots of £££££.

Last month I wrapped it in sellotape to make its last longer.

The other day my lad saw it and was annoyed his dad had a tatty key.

Yesterday he turned up with a new key body. 5 mins later the innards were swapped over.

£9.50 

So what is with the £££££££'s

 

Roger

[Nick Jones]

“Something bad has happened”. Not words that you wish to hear before you’ve even climbed out of your pit in the morning…..It likely means any plans you had for the day are history

“The fridge has died. The light doesn’t come on and the stuff in the freezer is starting to thaw”.

I hope something had just tripped that ring main. It hadn’t. I hope the fuse in the plug had blown randomly. Nope. Turned out the bulb had blown, easy fix, but the important bits remain stubbornly silent…. Two faults… simultaneously…. That’s taking the piss 

Fortunately, we have another freezer and it was empty, so got switched on and loaded. Immediate crisis averted. We do also have a beer fridge, off and empty, but I figured I had time to have a bit of breakfast and do a bit more fiddling before going there.

Dragged the fridge out from its corner. It’s been in situ about 5 years….. behind it is reminiscent of a scene from the hobbit involving spiders. Big spiders.   I enlist my little red mate Henry, he’s ok with spiders luckily.

My patient is about 12 years old in human years. Probably considered elderly in fridge years. It’s been pretty faithful thus far. Just occasional incontinence when the drains block (could happen to anyone), and an interesting range of intestinal gurglings, which we mostly find amusing.

Unlike MiL’s hellish device previously mentioned in these pages, it’s not a frost free device and consequently is blissfully free from heaters, fans, flaps, stepper motors, control boards and any other bollox that has no business in a fridge freezer. Just the compressor, the thermostat, the light and a door switch. There’s also some sort of starter relay and a capacitor. Obviously the capacitor is a suspect….. But twiddling the thermostat provokes no reaction at all.

I figure out how to extract the thermostat (it lives in the light housing) and test that it’s switching. Seems it is. There’s another switch also. Dunno what it’s for, but it works too. While there I borrow the light bulb from the oven (because it’s the same as the blown fridge one). I have to apply power to test that, and as soon as I do, not only does the light come on, but the compressor fires straight up….. Eh? Unscrew the bulb in case it’s a factor (I know it isn’t, but….). Compressor runs on happily. Twiddling the thermostat right down stops it - as would be expected, but turning it back up does not bring it back to life. Ah ha. Thermostat dead(ish).

Retire to the kitchen sofa to google for spares. They vary from £6 (eBay might-fit part) to £60 for the “real thing” from Siemens themselves…. Then the fridge fires up all by itself, just like normal. Hmm. Maybe I’ll just watch it for a bit. Rest of the morning it seems to behave normally.  I go out and buy it new bulb (because I can buy one in Screwfix while I’m buying new wellies and new garage boots, both of which have completely fallen apart). It’s still working when I get home, so I put all the covers back, fit the new bulb and put it back in its corner. Still working, but I’m a bit suspicious of the thermostat….. possibly a little lazy….. Ransom Spares in Yeovil offer a claimed genuine one for under £20 so…. might get one in….

To be continued maybe.

Meanwhile, having abandoned all hope of any local boiler repair man ever returning my messages/emails….. I’ve invested in some service parts for my oil fired boiler as it’s not been done for about 3 years. If a chimp can do it, shouldn’t be a problem for an Orang…..

Started on that rather later than intended due to the bloody fridge, so it’s still in bits. Fair to say it DID need a service. Must have got a good kilo of ash out of it, not counting what poor ol’ Henry got to deal with…… which was probably the same again. Just got to clean the filters and service the burner head with a new nozzle now. Hope it works after……. 

[rogerguzzi]

Hello Nick

                This why we went LPG route x years ago  as they are dirty and need regular service were as our boiler is 29 years old and had a thermosat and thermocouple thing and the odd clean!!!

lpg is clean and they all cost a lot but we have a gas hob and oven(not the best combination )

Roger

[thebrookster]

1 hour ago, Nick Jones said:

Just got to clean the filters and service the burner head with a new nozzle now. Hope it works after……. 

You've got the main components, nozzle and filters. Depending on type of filter, if it has been 3 years think about at the least investing in a spare?

The other main area to pay attention to is the ignitor. Make sure it is clean and the gap is set correctly, ignitors do have a habit of inexplicably moving for no ascertainable reason!

[Nick Jones]

Thanks Phil. I have a proper copy of the manual that details how to set the electrodes and will follow that.  It also gives detailed “commissioning” instructions, to be repeated after every service…… This involves a fair bit of fancy gadgetry, which I don’t have, so I’ll be leaving well alone. I know the last “pro” to work on it didn’t do anything like that.

Its a Grant vortex condensing boiler with a Riello burner, so decent kit.

i do have new filters btw….

[Nick Jones]

It still works.  Seems happy.  Starts reliably and no visible smoke of funny smells. It's got to feeling better for its enema!

SM has a colleague whose other half is a boiler engineer (trying to retire, not taking on new clients) - maybe he can be convinced to come round with his test gear and check it's running right......

[thebrookster]

1 hour ago, Nick Jones said:

It still works.  Seems happy.  Starts reliably and no visible smoke of funny smells. It's got to feeling better for its enema!

Should be fine. Usually the tech guy will run off some emission tests after completion, however if the nozzle is a direct replacement for the old, not an "upgraded" part you rarely get issues.

The "pros" who did my boiler last year installed a new nozzle that was an "upgraded" part. Should have seen the clouds of smoke that it started belching out upon firing 

The look of amazement on their faces when I simply glanced at test data, asked if they had fitted a bigger nozzle and then told them to reduce the fuel, which sorted it all out.

But yeah, no visible smoke and no smell of unburnt fuel, you're good.

[Nick Jones]

Nozzle is a direct replacement.  I went by the data plate and manual (which actually agreed), though three options are given for each burner size to give three different power outputs.  I went with factory standard and happily that did turn out to be what was actually fitted, so no worries on that score.  Even the same make (Danfoss)

[Escadrille Ecosse]

All these things that make our life easier. Which they do really, until they don't.

Reminds me that I need to think about replacing our central heating boiler (mains gas) before the powers that be ban them.

[Nick Jones]

Al this talk about banning natural gas appliances….. kind of irrelevant to me as no gas connection…….. but there are now quite large amounts of renewable bio methane from anaerobic digestion being injected into the the grid.  

Still proportionately tiny I assume, though I’ve failed to find any figures for it. You’d hope the National Grid might know, but their information says the first such connection to the grid was in 2020 when I know for a fact that the plant up the road was connected in 2018….

[Nick Jones]

On 6/30/2021 at 11:25 PM, Nick Jones said:

I have written on the subject of Saniflo before.  I don't like them.  I especially don't like one in my house.......

...... but.... there is one in my house...... and it's a flight critical component of our en-suite facilities.  SM likes her en-suite, so if the Saniflo misbehaves, I'm in the shit.  Literally.

5 pm yesterday.... the house cyclist has been out and got very sweaty so needs a wash before we go to the pub.  He prefers our ensuite because the "shower actually has water coming out of it".  He exaggerates.....

So the shower has water coming out of it.  It's even warm today.  This is good.  Our cyclist is happy.  But wait...... the water isn't leaving.... the shower tray is filling up...... is full..... Shiiiit! To be fair, he did turn the water off before there was total disaster, and the bloody Saniflo was making a noise like the water should have been leaving...... but it was only kidding.

Eventually he gave up waiting for the water to leave and called the cavalry.  Me.

If you have a Saniflo, you need to keep an Aquavac handy.  I have no idea how you'd cope without one.  I emptied the shower tray.  I emptied the loo. And the loo tank.  The whole lot has to be moved to access the bastard Saniflow.  

This then has to be carefully wriggled out of the wall so I can get the lid off and empty that too.  Not very nice in there, but not as nasty as the last time I fought with it......  Nothing obvious......  Decide to completely remove it so I can deal with it properly.  Then get a deep bucket so I can prod the non-return valve and empty the riser.  There's best part of 5m head behind it so it's a fairly high energy procedure - and stinky..... 

That was last night.  SM was displeased that her facilities were non-functional all night. 

I couldn't find any obvious reason why it was running but not pumping.  I couldn't this morning either.  In fact this morning I was able to prove it did pump with some outdoor trials.  So I filled it up with citric acid and went out for the day.  This evening I've swilled it out again, carefully reassembled it and put it back in place.  It works perfectly (within it's many limitations!)  I have no idea why it didn't yesterday......

If I were paranoid I might think it did it to piss me off.  If it did, I'm afraid it worked......

One comfort is that I'm not alone.  Lots of people hate them.  This man especially

Peter Parry wrote (on the Subject of the Saniflo)

Warning: people of a sensitive disposition might care to venture no further.

Angus asked:

My recently installed Saniflo does not behave as described in the user manual. On flushing the WC it's supposed to run continuously for about 15 seconds, mine pulses on-off 3 or 4 times for about 2-3 seconds duration. Any ideas?

Peter replied:

Sell the house, failing that give it away, if that doesn't work pay someone to take it or burn it down. To give you a clue - these ghastly instruments of the Devil are French. Add the French and lavatorial engineering - now see why I say get out while you can. Moreover this particular Frenchman was a lunatic with strong Anglophobic tendencies and a bad case of corrodible.

I am quite sure the designer was also an ex-submariner Frenchman who missed the strangled screams of seamen who had got the valve sequence wrong in the submarines toilet and just been rinsed down with a few gallons of seawater (and the recently donated contents of the bowl).

They break down at the slightest opportunity. The only thing you can actually guarantee about them is that they will break down - very frequently. Basically the only way of maintaining the slightest semblance of serviceability is to impose on pain of repair the same rules as for a small yachts sea toilet - if it hasn't passed through you it doesn't go in the bowl.

They have an interesting design. The motor has poor starting torque and the macerator lots of tiny teeth. Ergo anything that has strands in it catches on the teeth and stops the motor from starting. Things with strands include anything with cotton wool (including cotton wool buds) and anything with cloth. Females in particular must not be allowed anywhere near these devices. If you were unfortunate enough to have the added misery of a sink (oh dear - you were warned) then add hair, strands from woolly pullovers and almost anything else that's at all fibrous.

When they break (which they will - that's an absolute certainty) their endearing characteristic is that you are left with a bowl full of whatever which you have to empty back the way it came and more importantly many feet of 40mm pipe still full of minced whatever. When you disconnect the pipe I'll give you one guess where its going to go. Repairing or unblocking them is the most thoroughly revolting job.

Now to get to specifics - the pulsing is a fault in either installation or the pressure switch. Does it pulse with just the cold water tap running from the sink? The way they work is a low pressure trip switch switches on the motor when the small holding tank is full. This tank remains partially full all the time. If its pulsing either the switch has too low a hysteresis or water isn't getting into it fast enough. The motor should remain on for a few seconds after everything has emptied so that pulsing you are seeing shouldn't be happening.

As the failure rate of these diabolical things is worse than that of a F104 Starfighter I'd suggest you get the installer back (preferably to remove it forever). If it was installed by yourself then self flagellation with a few lengths of barbed wire and a call to the Saniflo people might be in order.

Angus asked:

Also, my system is a Sanitop with the outflow from a washbasin going into the top of the unit. I find that running the tap for a few seconds activates the Saniflo. Is there any way of adjusting the sensitivity of it so that it will only run when a reasonable amount of water has gone into the unit?

To which Peter replied:

No, but if it's oversensitive this might be related to the pulsing you are seeing.

Angus:

I don't see why the washbasin water cant just bypass the cutter/pump internally.

Peter:

Because these horrors are designed to be installed pumping upwards - the raving idiot who designed them thought it would be pretty neat to have something you could stick in a downstairs cloakroom and run the pipe upwards to join the soil stack in the bathroom. If that's how your installation goes cut out the selling the house bit - just burn it now. When it fails there is 10ft of pressurised whatsit just waiting for that final turn on the drainpipe.

The other reason the sink must go through the pump is that the outlet of the thing is at some pressure. Connect the sink a bit downstream and every time you pull the chain the contents of the loo make a pretty little fountain out of the sink plughole (I've seen one plumbed like that - the owner kept a sandbag in the sink on top of the plug).

Some models have an interesting feature - on the top is a reset switch, under the top cover is a screwdriver slot on the top of the motor drive shaft to allow you to clear the (frequent) blockages. However to get the top cover open to get at the drive shaft to free it - you've guessed - you have to disconnect the drain pipe.

How they can be called Saniflow when they are anything but sanitary (as you will soon find out) and rarely flow is beyond me.

As I said - sell the house.

Peter Parry.

11 months later….. and here we are again. The old “running but not pumping” bollocks.  
 

Actually it did deign to shift a couple of flushes worth this morning after total refusal late last night, so I’m hoping that tipping some warm caustic solution into it and leaving it for a few hours will break up the hair that is undoubtedly wrapped around the impeller preventing it producing enough pressure to open the NRV. 
 

Hateful thing….. but unfortunately necessary.  If I ever meet the “plumber” who installed it, he’s going get some serious abuse!

[Escadrille Ecosse]

Fingers crossed on that one....

[Nick Jones]

1 hour ago, Escadrille Ecosse said:

Fingers crossed on that one....

Thanks.

Hoping I don't have to do it right now, but as the thing is at least 10 - 12 years old, it's probably is entering the zone where replacement might be the smarter option than battling to keep it alive, though to be fair, human hair even defeats the proper industrial stuff.

As it has a number of design stupidities (additional to the installation stupidities) I'm checking out the competition. Seems there are some:

Current incumbent - Saniflo Plus (WC plus 3 inlets, two of which in use)
Cheaper alternative - Saniwaste claims to match and improve on the Saniflo
Higher class (?!) and bit more expensive - Stuart Turner Wasteflo WC3
Higher class (?!) and quite a bit more expensive) - Grundfos Sololift2 WC3

The last two claim to have a "better" maceration device and to be able to more completely empty themselves.  My experiences out in the industrial pumping world suggest that the "better" macerators might actually struggle worse with human hair, especially once worn....

Anyone have any direct experience with any of the above?

(BTW, if you can avoid having one of any of this type of device in your house - do!!)
 

 

[Nick Jones]

Ended up having to remove and strip it again. Third time in 33 months…… boring!!

This time I did work out what the issue is, not that it helps as if it does it there’s no choice but to remove and strip it.

Pic shows the pump with the impeller housing removed. The white elbow is the outlet pipe and there was nothing wrapped around the impeller or blocking the outlet…..

However, this close-up of the outlet contains the answer. The blob of fibrous gak points like a battered arrow to a small hole just to the right of the main outlet. The gak was pulled out of that hole and was thoroughly blocking it.

Why does this matter….? Well, it’s an air relief hole that lets the impeller housing self-bleed. This particularly matters in my application as the pump is operating near its maximum head and it can’t achieve that head and push the non-return valve open unless all the air is out of it…..

Easy fix if you didn’t have to dismantle half the damn bathroom to get to it 

While I was in there I swapped the rubber level switch diaphragm for a new one

The old was still keeping the water out (just) but perhaps not letting the switch move as it should.

It all works properly again now….. for now.

So there I was, tidying up, feeling marginally less grumpy after some success, using the Vax, which had been functioning perfectly well to that point suddenly started making odd noises and belching smoke…. So that’s bolloxed then 

Then outdoors to mow the grass…. Whereupon, about a quarter of the way through, that made some odd noises and billowing what smelt like tyre smoke before coming to a halt. Engine running fine, blades turning fine, no motion. Super. Smashing. Great.

It could have been further from the repair area, but fate has allowed for that by rendering the disengagement lever for the hydro-drive inoperative. So it was like dragging a very reluctant donkey. Took the combined might of myself, SM and a passing neighbour who was kind (and unwise) enough to volunteer to drag it 60m or so back to the garage.

The drive belt is of course completely smoked

And had got the wrong side of a couple of pulleys.  The mower appears to have been designed by some git who went to the same school as the TT designer. Damn, but you have to do alot of dismantling to get the belt out. So many fasteners…..

Along the way it becomes obvious that the blade drive belt is almost as bad. Machine is just 10 years old…. OE Mountfield belts are around £100 for the pair. EBay came up with a pair for half that. The machine doesn’t look like it has another 10 years in it….

Not my best day…..

[PeteStupps]

What a way to spend your Saturday Nick! Sounds bleak.

I know almost nothing about macerators except I had one in a flat-share for a year or so. Only blocked twice in that time, and wasn't my job to fix it thank goodness. But the noise the bloody thing made when it was working was enough to wake everyone in the flat, and it would burst into life randomly when you walked past the bathroom. Your descriptions have done nothing to dispell the negative view.

[Escadrille Ecosse]

Ahh. Shouldn't laugh. 

Character building day

[Nick Jones]

9 hours ago, PeteStupps said:

But the noise the bloody thing made when it was working was enough to wake everyone in the flat, and it would burst into life randomly when you walked past the bathroom.

Yep…. Signature behaviour. Horrible things…… but without it, no bathroom. At least not without the eye watering expense of doing the plumbing properly.

Hopefully today will be better…… though it contains parish council related bollox. I could have a very long rant about that…… but I better not.

[Martin]

… now I know why I rejected the wish of my management to have a loo in the cellar. 

[Nick Jones]

1 hour ago, Martin said:

… now I know why I rejected the wish of my management to have a loo in the cellar. 

Good move!!

To be fair, I think the shower is the problem, because that’s where the hair comes from, even with a hair trap at the drain.  If there was no one in the  house with long hair……

[Escadrille Ecosse]

6 hours ago, Nick Jones said:

Good move!!

To be fair, I think the shower is the problem, because that’s where the hair comes from, even with a hair trap at the drain.  If there was no one in the  house with long hair……

Hair and showers don't make happy partners even without Saniflos. Not a problem I can contribute to in our household I can honestly say.

The other elephant in the room here though is the conditioner that goes with the long hair and glues everything together. I regularly have to clean out the shower trap and short section of connecting pipe to remove the buildup of conditioner gloom. Yuk.. However I realise I am on a hiding to nothing on that one.

[Nick Jones]

Ah yes, conditioner. As you say. Also, it contains silane compounds. These cause problems for biogas plants that process sludge from waste water as the silanes get into the gas stream and when you burn them in IC engines (reciprocating or turbines) it turns to glass/sand. This is bad for you engines….

Meanwhile, the dear Saniflo seems happy enough (it’s version of it anyway).

Also the mower is fixed. A few other faults were found and fixed along the way. It seems I have the blade belt tensioner set too high as engaging the blade almost stalls the engine. Seems a bit of belt slip is needed to cushion the shock…..

The Vax….. I’m still ignoring. I’ll get to it. Probably a post-mortem though.
 

(Fun fact, iPhone is CONVINCED that “mortem” should be “motel”. It’s taken some effort to get that word in there twice! Smart phone? Pah!)