Cold water in Mpls., MN

[kenmore71]

Some of you may recall that last winter we had a discussion about "how cold it too cold?" in terms of water temperatures. As part of that discussion I tested the temperature of the incoming cold water here at my condo building in south Minneapolis. As i recall in was in the 38-40 degree range. We, as with the rest of the country, are experiencing a bit of a heat wave so I decided to check the temp again. This evening, the incoming cold water is 72 degrees! That is certainly warm enough to get good rinsing action with detergents and might even be acceptable for washing lightly soiled clothes.

 

[thomasortega]

A little advantage on EURO machines is...

The control panel!

Why do we americans (North and South America) insist on the same mistake? Why the indicators on control panels say "cold, not so cold, warm, luke warm, a little bit warmer, almost hot, perfect for tea, hot, very hot, almost boiling, a little bit more than almost boiling, so hot that water can explode, etc"?

Wouldn't be MUCH easier if the machines simply displayed the temperature options in C or F?, like european washers?

"Cold" water at 78 degrees can come out of my taps, perhaps, during the coldest winter night here in my region.

During the summer, at noon, after passing through the chiller, the cold water is 35C (95F) or even hotter.

That's the "cold" water i'm used to.

 

[arbilab]

95F would make your ice makers a little expensive to run, eh Thomas? Our summer "cold" is just over 80F. It gets hotter in the storage towers but loses most of it running through the ground at 65F. Winter, it stays ground temp, 65F though the towers get colder overnight.

 

[tomturbomatic]

I measured my tap cold last week and it is up to 80F. I disconnected the cold water tempering valve so the 4 front loaders now fill somewhat faster if two or more are filling at once. This should be an interesting summer for the tap cold readings with the record warmth. In the past few summers, the tap cold has been so warm at times that, in addition to using Cheer for Dark Colors, I have actually drawn water and let it sit to cool somewhat before using it for washing. It is usually cooler late in the day when it has not been sitting in the mains for hours absorbing heat from the ground like it does overnight. That's another reason I wear more dark clothing in the winter; that and light clothing is cooler in the sun.

 

[mrb627]

Water Heater

I just turned my water heater down 2 notches this past weekend. I figured it only needed to be hot enough for bathing. So far, only noticed a minor difference in showering.

Malcolm

 

[davey7]

In Chicago our lake water has gotten up to 76 F - it dropped last weekend after the seiche (like a lake tsunami). Since this is our drinking water, it's fairly warm now (however, the intakes aren't right at the surface and are a couple of miles out into the lake - even so my Boston area cousins complained once about it being too warm to properly make martini's compared to their tap water). In my building, we have a tank up on the roof inside the elevator penthouse to provide some of the water pressure (it's an old building, new buildings, at least in Chicago, just have pumps, we also have circulator pumps etc), which does heat up as it bakes in the sun. However, it hasn't been unpleasantly warm.