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Saturday, May 23, 2009
Nip the drip
By Rick Nathanson
Journal Staff Writer
Editor's note: Particularly in these trying economic times, homeowners want to maintain their investment in their homes. This three-part Albuquerque Journal series will help readers look for warning signs of plumbing problems, address fire and water damage and solve issues from mold. The series continues next week on the cover of Home.
You discover heat mysteriously rising from beneath the tile of your kitchen floor. Unfortunately, you don't have radiant floor heat.
Maybe a section of drywall in your living room isn't so dry, or that miserable excuse for a lawn suddenly has a small patch of bright-green, fast-growing grass.
When the signs are this obvious, you don't need to be a plumber to figure out you have a water-line leak, although you may need a plumber to fix it. But what if there are no obvious signs? Can you be sure your home's water system is tight and leak free?
"It's extremely common for people to have leaks in their plumbing system and not know it," says Steven Wood, president of Flo-Right Services, a general plumbing, heating and cooling company.
"The best way to determine if you have a leak is to go through your home and make sure all the water fixtures are turned off and that toilets aren't running. Then go out and look at your water meter. If the tiny red dial is spinning, you've got a leak."
Even the smallest amount of dripping at a sink or shower will show up, Wood says. "The little dial may have stopped moving for a while, but it will eventually spin forward to catch up with the amount of water released."
Sometimes, Wood says, the calcium and minerals in water can help seal a tiny leak, but don't count on that. In general, leaks tend to get worse over time — and a water bill will reflect that. "If you're not really using more water from month to month but your bill is creeping up, you're leaking somewhere."
Finding the source
Pinpointing escaping water can be tough, even for plumbers.
There are different sonic or trace gas methods they can employ to locate leaks. The services generally cost $400 to $600.
Flo-Right uses a method that involves pumping air or nitrogen into a home's water system through an outdoor hose bib and then using specialized equipment to listen for a gurgling sound emitted as the oxygen or nitrogen escapes at the leak site.
When a leak is small and doesn't appear to be getting worse, and if it is underground where it can't cause damage inside the house, some homeowners resign themselves to slightly higher water bills and forget about it.
Wood cautions that small underground leaks tend to attract tree and plant roots, which wrap around the pipe at the site of the leak and eventually can exert enough pressure to cause the leak to worsen or the pipe to break.
Leaking underground sewer lines also can attract roots, but because those lines are bigger in diameter and not under pressure, the roots are able to work their way inside, where they grow, clog the pipe and eventually cause it to burst.
Toilets and evaporative coolers are the biggest leak offenders at home, says Chris Wilson, owner of CaitCo Drainworks, a plumbing, heating and cooling company. Worn rubber flappers on toilets allow water to seep from the tank into the bowl, while swamp coolers often leak because floats are improperly adjusted or because copper water supply lines weren't drained during the winter, froze and split.
You also can blame the weather for the majority of leaks to underground yard irrigation systems. These, too, can trap freezing water during the winter and cause pipes and connectors to crack.
Old means trouble
In homes 20 years old or more, Wilson says, the failure rate of the buried supply line between the water meter and the house is high, particularly where the line was made from galvanized steel or polybutylene plastic. Galvanized steel corrodes and rusts over time, and gray polybutylene pipes react to chemicals in the water, become brittle and crack.
Of course, there's no shortage of faucets and water fixtures needing replacement washers, where imperceptible or sizable amounts of water can drip, drip, drip away over long periods, he says.
Many leaks are inexpensive and easy to fix, if the homeowner has the knowledge and inclination to perform the labor, saving the flat rate per-job cost, or the hourly plumber rate — ranging from about $70 to nearly $100 in the metro area. But it's important for the homeowner to know his or her limits.
"I can't tell you how often we've gone to homes where people thought they could fix something and wound up with flooding or somehow making the problem worse," Wilson says.
Many house calls that plumbers make are because of leaking water heaters. These can be costly when the tanks are in utility closets or garages adjacent to an indoor wall, says Andrea Navarrete, installation manager at B. Carlson Heating, Air Conditioning and Plumbing.
Calcium in our hard water settles on the bottom of the tanks, where the heating element is. It takes longer to heat the water through the layer of sediment, which also speeds up corrosion, she says. With enough corrosion the heater will leak, potentially causing water damage to walls, floors, carpets, furniture and other household items. It also can lead to mold.
"You could be looking at a whole restoration at that part of your house," Navarrete says.
She recommends replacing the tank when it starts making "a loud gurgling sound," which indicates significant mineral buildup on the bottom of the tank.
While heaters are readily available at home-improvement stores, installation isn't generally a do-it-yourself job, Navarrete says.
"You have to make sure the installation is done to code, that water and gas lines are attached properly, that the unit is vented correctly, and the temperature and pressure relief valve is operating like it's supposed to. Otherwise pressure can build up and water will leak out at the valve," she says.
In the metro area, the average installed price of a 40-gallon water heater ranges from $750 to $950. Larger tanks and more complex installations cost more.
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