October Update
The water has been turned of for some time now so I have called SWWater and given them a 'customer reading' of 328. The accurate reading as of 13:00 17th October is 327.6279.

It seems the pipeline does indeed hold some 350Lt and most seems to get used and does not leak away whilst the mains tap is closed and their is no pressure.

I have just written a new page on the main site detailing the amount of water used over the preceding years. This has been brought about by doubts about neighbour use and careless or accidental damage to the pipeline resulting in a noticeable leak.

Steve and I checked the meter yesterday and discovered 100ml per 30 seconds usage with taps off. This equates to a litre every five minutes (12Lt/Hr : 288Lt/Day : <35CuMetre/Quarter). A cost of some £55 per quarter.

19th May
Yesterday evening on my way to the village I turned off the water at the mains. Water was leaking at 100ml/25seconds. The reading was 0325/1656. Intend to check again this evening. Next reading

The last official reading of 311m³, an estimate, was on 23rd March The current figure is 325 so that's a use of 14m³ in 4 weeks. At that rate it will be 56 for the quarter. At £1.57 that's £88 + the standing charge.:`(

20th May
100ml/25 seconds -> 1Lt/250s -> 10Lt/2500s ->
100Lt/25,000 -> 1000Lt/250,000 sec
or 1 cubic metre in 2d 21h 26m 4s
That's 54.2592pence per day. Averaging over £49 per quarter

I am keeping the mains switched off until water is wanted and will get the next reading proper, then be more specific in calculating usage/leakage.
Method to Estimate Leak

22nd May
From the above figures, the estimates next bill of £88 + standing charge and the leakage at £49 there's still a usage of £39 which equates to nearly 25cubic metres of water. This figure maybe high due to the last reading being an estimate.
For example a 3cum under estimate will mean that the current months usage will be 3 less and then the figures for the next quarter will be reduced by 3 per month of some 9cum. Sadly I won't be able to assess this accurately as the mains is off so the next reading will not account for the same amount of leakage.

Assess the quantity of water in main pipeline:
There are two way of doing this.
1. Estimate the internal dimensions of the pipe and
2. Measure the amount by draining a full pipe.

Whereas the second is more accurate I am not in a position to store the water, or easily measure it.

So the first option will hopefully provide me with an approximate figure of how much storage I would need to keep the water from the drain of a full pipeline.

Estimate
I 'think; the pipe is Imperial 1.25 inches with an internal diameter of 1". This equates to 12.7²x 3.142 = 506m² >> 1 metre contain about 0.50Lt -> 100mm 50Lt.

Updated Length 24May 09:49
Best estimate from 1:25,000 OS map is 675m Updated

That's 338Lt. So if I get storage for 400Lt that should be fine. However in the past I'm sure there was more than 400Lt.??

If the pipe is 1.5" with approx 32mm inside diameter that would give 16x16x3.142 or 80.4Lt/100m or a total of approx 543Lt.

The later figure seems more likely, so will check the pipe diameter again, then when convenient, drain to confirm.

The extension I have fitted is MDPE 25mm SDR 11 which should have a minimum wall thickness of 3mm, giving a max of 19mm ID, so that's 2.8356sqcm and 28.356Lt/100m. This equates to some 45Lt in my extension. Check it!

 
10th June 12:24
Turned the water on basically to fill the pipe. The reading when turned off again was 326.305 minus the previous figure of 325.1567 is some 1.148 cu.metres, which is lot. I was expecting 400 to 500 although Vera may have used over 100. I used 10Lt before leaving. Will check with Vera later.

11th June 17:12 Vera has used about 200 lt and I have drained the pipe to the caravan of about 47lt. This latter measurement is in line with my estimate and I'll check it again. However that leaves about 900lt in the pipe??? -:- 12th June Vera used another 60lt.

13th June I managed to get only another 22.5 lt since Vera last opened the stop-cock.

14th June 10:53 Taken another 10lt so that means Vera has opened the stop-cock and sued more water maybe.??? Call her later.

15th June 09:16 Vera can't get any more but I have taken another 45lt.

Total taken so far: 395Lt(Me:135 Vera:260)

18th June Whilst Vera monitored down-line I opened the mains tap and let 295lt into the pipe. Vera then took 95lt and I took 185. (280lt total) Meter reading is now 326.5900

21st July Opened mains until the meter stopped and got 345Lt in the pipe. Vera took 115 LT and I have about 150Lt
17th Oct By time I opened the tap again, today approx another 60 lt have been taken. The summary being that about 325 Lt have been taken from 345 recorded.

March 16th 2009 The final hearing results were that the claim was dismissed. The judge did overturn Judge Griggs' view that there was no contract, which means that the claim was valid and I can ask for expenses.

1. Stop using the water. Already sorted
2. Remove the extension. Bad wording on my part. The judge pointed out that the contract only required that they disconnect their extension, not remove it. He decided that it would not be in neighbourly interests to do more as the pipe was shortened, capped and buried. I think he actually said, given May Gurney's quote of some £1200 that it wasn't financial prudent to expect them to do more.
3. Pay £60 for excess waterJudge pointed out that I didn't provide any evidence of the water use. Although I did have at the hearing they should have been provided at the start of the claim.
4. Was awarded the £70 cost for getting the police incident reports. Judge went o great lengths to explain to the Townsend's that their attempts to colour me were inappropriate and a waste of time.

January 8th 2009 Have a directions hearing at 11:05 Monday 12th.

Yesterday I drained the water from the pipe in anticipation of Craig Townsend working on capping 'his' extension. The amount of water I extracted from the tap before it emptied was about 45lt, not the best part of 400lt as I was expecting, suggesting that any leak is just before the pipe enters our land proper.

Obvious places of concern are a) where the pipe goes under the track and b) the extension and t-junction just before it leaves the Townsend property.

Today at approx 11am I was invited to see the capping, that Craig did to the Townsend's extension, outside the shed. From what I could tell the work was tidy and there was no leak on first inspection.

I was hoping to ensure he covered it over properly, but he left to get sand and didn't want me to stay on the land. I returned, but Craig told me the sand had been laid and wouldn't allow for me to measure the position of the pipe nor its angle towards the mains, from which would I could have estimated of the position of the junction.

On the water leakage
By time I had turned the tap off some of the recorded 419.8 litres were lost or stored (328.0572 - 327.6379). However the fact remains that the pipeline is full and if it isn't used for a few weeks or a month I may be able to estimate the position of the leak.