Common Plumbing Issues Demystified: Key Insights
Common Plumbing Issues Demystified: Key Insights
Blog Article
MOST COMMON PLUMBING PROBLEMS IN OLDER HOMES
Galvanized Pipes
The galvanic process means coating an iron pipe with molten zinc to prevent the iron from corroding. The zinc lasts a while, but not forever. As the zinc erodes, the exposed iron begins to rust. This can cause pipes to fail, but the warning signal is easy to spot: Your water will become discolored from the rust in it.
The answer is to have galvanized pipes professionally replaced by modern alternatives, such as copper or PEX (Cross-Linked Polyethylene). A well-trained plumber and assistant can perform this work in relatively short time, ensuring a constant water pressure, no odd taste or color to your water and no leaks.
Pipe Bellies
As your Phoenix home rises and falls in its surrounding soil, the pipes leading into your home will rise and fall, too. When they buckle or bow, they form a pipe belly, a low spot that defies gravity’s pull on sewage. While this settling occurs slowly, you will eventually notice poor drainage, slow-flushing toilets and, ultimately, a clogged sewer line.
Similar to pipe bellies are pipe channeling, where hard water carves its own channel in the bottom of a sewer pipe, rendering it very weak.
Polybutylene Pipe
Once thought of as a great water pipe product, polybutylene pipe (PB) was used from the late ’70s into the early ’90s because of its low cost and easy installation. It breaks down with exposure to water and water’s dissolved solids, so it is not acceptable anymore. As time goes on, homeowners experience more and more polybutylene pipe problems.
If you have an entire house piped in PB, you need the services of an experienced local plumber to replace every run, every elbow and tee, and every connection to fixtures throughout your house. Otherwise a leak could destroy furniture, furnishings, flooring and more.
Sewer Lines
Sewers and sewer lines are definitely at the top of a lot of people’s old house plumbing problems. Sewer lines take your home’s gray and black water from drains to the sewer main, where it travels on to a municipal treatment plant. Sewer lines are always wet, so they attract tree roots. Cast iron pipes are particularly susceptible to cracking and intrusion by tree roots, which can completely clog a line.
Professional plumbers can send a camera into your home’s sewer pipe to diagnose channeling and bellies, and they can find and fix tree roots that clog your pipe. This is a much more affordable option than the disgusting and expensive issues created by a sewer backing up.
Drains
Fifty years of draining water, soap scum, sewage and shampoo can take a toll on your older Phoenix home’s drains. Clogs develop in pipes in all drains, but toilet, kitchen, and bathroom sink drains are particularly prone to clogs.
Toilets are infamous targets for children, fascinated by the disappearing act. While you may never know a small action figure or toy car went down the toilet, you will know a backed-up toilet when it strikes. A small item could start a very slow-building clog.
Kitchen sink drains also tend to accept things that should not go down the drain, like kitchen fats, bits of food that should go through a sink strainer and even bone. You can do your part, of course, by keeping waste out of the kitchen sink or having a garbage disposal installed, but in an older home you will not know what others have stuffed down there before you.
Original Fixtures
While some original fixtures are notably sturdier and of better quality than their corresponding modern fixtures, many older ones simply wear out with time. Washers and valves degrade and cause leaks. Stems and handles break. If your home still has its original spigots, faucets, handles and valves, you may not notice the tiny leaks that lead to higher water bills and unpleasant smells.
A worry spot in any home is the shut-off valve for a toilet. This little-used valve attaches where the rigid pipe exits the wall, down below the tank, and a flexible metal and plastic tube connects the water supply to the tank. That shut-off valve can get stuck in its typical, open position, so any attempt to close it may actually cause it to leak. A trained plumber can replace not only the flexible tube to the toilet tank, but the antiquated or stuck shut-off valve. This means you never have to worry about turning off the water to the toilet should a bowl clog cause your toilet to back up.
https://www.acehomeaz.com/blog/common-plumbing-problems-older-homes/
Exactly How to Fix Common Household Plumbing Issues
Some plumbing concerns are more typical and can be quickly dealt with. Doing the repairs yourselves on these simple plumbing issues can save you tons of money. As a property owner, you will certainly run into several plumbing issues that periodically make an annoyance. Take a look at 5 of one of the most typical ones below:
Low Tide Pressure
Is someone from your household whining that there's low water stress from the sink? First, examine if this issue affects both the cool and also warm water lines. If yes, after that the issue is the aerator within the sink which might have a lot of sedimentation causing low tide stress. This is really simple to fix as you just need to take it out and also scrub away the mineral deposits.
Running Toilet
You might have experienced a running bathroom, which can be quite annoying because the tank won't fill up. At the same time, leaving it alone equates to wasting water and also increasing up your water costs. For beginners, find out what's triggering it to run. You may require to change any one of the complying with toilet devices:
Toilet fill valve
Dripping flush valve
Bathroom flapper
Malfunctioning Garbage Disposal System
This annoying trouble is likewise high on the list of usual plumbing problems. If you lose it, you will need an Allen wrench to take care of the problem. You have to go under the sink and also look for the area where you can place the secret.
Slow Draining Sink
This is the most typical problem of property owners, with the sink accumulating a lot of hair, oil, debris, and also other substance gradually. The only way to get a smooth streaming drainpipe once again is to clear the debris. Initially, you can utilize a plumbing tool for angling out the debris. From there, you can make use of a store-bought drainpipe cleaner to clean the lines.
Slow Tub Drain
This is one more pesky annoyance considering that the bathtub is among the most pre-owned fixtures in your washroom. Much like the sink drain, hair, soap scum, dead skin cells, as well as various other cruds pool in the drainpipe typically. You must pop open the drain cover as well as use a bathtub claw to remove the particles. Do this ASAP before the drainpipe clogs up totally. After using the claw, you can put drain cleaner to rejuvenate the drain lines.
You can always call in a plumber to get expert help if all of these audio tiresome for you. Looking for specialist aid indicates conserving effort and time. You may even wind up conserving cash in the long run because you can rest assured that your easy plumbing issue will not rise. Simply make sure you call a trusted business with licenses as well as certifications since you will certainly rate complete strangers in your house. Naturally, you have to make certain that you deal with someone you can rely on.
Some plumbing problems are a lot more common as well as can be conveniently taken care of. Doing the fixings yourselves on these basic plumbing troubles can save you heaps of cash. As a property owner, you will experience many different plumbing problems that sometimes make a nuisance. You can make use of a plumbing device for angling out the debris. You might even end up conserving money in the long run since you can rest assured that your simple plumbing issue will not intensify.
We were shown that article about DIY Plumbing Fixes from an acquaintance on another blog. So long as you liked our blog post please remember to pass it around. I treasure reading our article about Fixing Typical Household Plumbing Problems.
Leak? Reach out! Report this page