Do you have a hot and cold fill washing machine, but only have a cold water supply available to connect it to? Well, you can still connect it up and use it, but you will need a y-piece connector. If you just connect the cold water hose to the cold water tap and leave the hot water hose unconnected, then some wash cycles may not work.
The y-piece connector is a plastic connector shaped like a Y. It splits a single water supply into two. You may be able to buy this part from a DIY store like B&Q, or Amazon – y-piece connectors (affiliate link).
This photo shows two washing machine hoses connected to a single tap using a y-piece connector. The tap shown is hot (red), but ignore that. You need to connect to the cold (blue) tap. Connect the single section of the y-piece to the cold water supply tap. Now connect the hot and cold water hose pipes to it and your washing machine will work on all wash cycles.
What if you just leave the hot fill hose unconnected?
You could just connect the cold water fill hose directly to the cold water tap, and leave the hot fill hose unconnected. But without a water supply to the hot valve, some wash programs may not work. This is because on a hot and cold fill washing machine, some wash cycles may only fill with hot water. So with no hose connected to the hot water valve, the cycle will fail, or produce an error code.
Some cycles will work without a water supply to the hot valve
Some washing machines may work OK with only the cold fill hose connected. You could always try it and see. It may be that some programs work, but others don’t. The worse that will happen is the washer could either stick on the odd wash programme or may abort with an error on some. This would happen if you select a cycle that only fills up with hot water. But if you only use one or two wash cycles, and not the 60 or 90 degree cycles, they may work OK.
The washing machine may now use slightly more electricity, but it shouldn’t be significant unless you use a lot of 60 or 90 degree washes. This is because modern washing machines use very little water on wash.
Try to use a y-piece connector
It is better to use a y-piece if possible so that water is supplied to both valves as designed. The washing machine will not know the difference between hot and cold water. It won’t know there’s no hot water coming in. But as long as water is coming in, it will just heat up the cold water to the correct temperature.
Cold fill washing is usually better
Manufacturers argue it’s more efficient to fill with cold water only, and to slowly heat up the water. Especially on the most common wash cycles at 40 and 30 degrees. You can see a detailed explanation of this in my cold v hot water article below –
Spares
Spares4Appliances is a spares company run by repair engineers who understand all about spare parts for appliances.
Comments Policy
Comments must be on topic with the article
Comments are closed.
Comments must be on topic with the article