Expert Leak Detection By An Experienced Plumber Helps Stop Water Damage Early | Harvey, LA
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At bluefrog Plumbing + Drain of New Orleans, LA, our plumbers can help you locate plumbing problems in your Harvey, LA home early. Often, your first clue that a pipe has sprung a leak is that sagging patch of plaster on the ceiling or damp spot on the wall, the warping floorboards or water running across your basement and down your drain or into your sump pump.
Our team of plumbers can even help you with problems hidden in your yard or under your foundation slab. It’s a combination of experience and training, and up-to-date equipment that helps them detect plumbing problems, often without cutting into walls and concrete floors to explore for the source of the leak. Our goal is to help you live a more relaxed life, with less stress from your plumbing, helping you catch issues early and even prevent plumbing problems with our plumbers’ expert awareness.
What’s Going on in the Hidden Pipes in Your Walls?
You might catch a hidden leak by a damp patch in your wall, spoiling your paint or wallpaper, and damaging the plaster or sheetrock behind them. Cutting through to locate the problem, though, there’s no guarantee that the pipe damage is there, as water tends to flow along the outside of pipes or down studs in your wall until it reaches a point where it accumulates, and then you get your clues. If it’s been happening for a while, you may smell a musty, moldy odor from the moisture, or even notice insects or vermin taking advantage of the water to locate their home nearby.
If you’re fortunate, you might hear a sound from the leak that helps you locate it more accurately. Actually, with our new ultrasonic equipment, we can not only hear the leak but also use sonar-like techniques to locate it. That can save a lot of exploring, and even locate leaks earlier if, for instance, you know you have corroding pipes and want to run diagnostic tests to find any problems.
Electrical Problems That Come with Your Leaks
As water flows behind your walls from a leak to wherever it soaks in, there’s a good chance that it will cross your home’s wiring, which if it’s intact might not be affected, but even a small hole from a misguided staple holding the wire in place can be a problem. Fixtures, switches, and outlets provide a big target for your stray water. As it sinks into these devices water is likely to cause electrical problems right away, and also cause corrosion that increases over time, creating urgent electrical hazards that may require repair or rewiring.
Water also has a tendency to enter the jacket of wires and travel deeper inside, so the actual extent of the damage may not be known. If you have GFCI or more recent AFCI protective devices, leaks and corrosion from them can cause unexpected tripping of these devices, warning you that there’s current leakage or arcing, just not where you can see the cause.
Basement Plumbing
Maintenance of your water heater not only helps it last longer and serve you more reliably, it also helps protect you against small leaks from a faulty pressure relief valve, bigger leaks from damaged or corroded tank lining, or even bursting and flooding from unrelieved pressure and weak tank walls. Our plumber can help you with regular water heater repairs and maintenance, and also let you know the condition of the tank so you’ll know when it’s time, usually after ten years or more, for a replacement unit or a switch to a different technology such as hybrid or tankless water heaters that you might have been thinking about for energy savings.
Our plumber can also check the visible pipes in your basement and look for plumbing issues such as copper pipes supported by metal hangers, which may produce accelerated corrosion and damage. If your washing machine has rubber water supply hoses that are typically constantly under pressure, our plumber will probably suggest stainless steel ones that don’t present the risk of bursting and flooding that rubber can over time.
Under the Slab
In some homes, the plumbing distribution network is laid in place and concrete poured over it, creating what is typically called “under the slab” pipes that can corrode or be damaged by a number of factors under your home including foundation shifts, soil movement, tree root growth, and water table changes. Leaks under the slab are most likely to be noticed by a rise in your water bill or movement of your water meter when you’re sure everything is shut off. You might also find pools of water near your foundation, which are a good reason to call our plumber to check for problems under the slab, or in your water supply line. Since cutting through the slab or digging under it are the main ways to inspect for leaks, our modern electronic methods can be very helpful when used by expert plumbers.
Ultrasonic Leak Detection and Video Inspection
Useful throughout your home’s plumbing system, ultrasonic leak detection can detect and locate leaks without significant cutting to access pipes and the subsequent cost of repairs. Combined with in-pipe video inspection, leak detection and repair can be much more efficient than in the past. An added advantage is the fact that plumbers can use these technologies to perform routine inspections, for example on older pipes, and detect leaks before they show any other signs of trouble.
Your Local Plumbing Experts in Harvey, LA
At bluefrog Plumbing + Drain of New Orleans, our team can use their experience, skill, and technology to help you catch leaks in your plumbing early, and even perform checks on older plumbing for peace of mind. Working with our experts, you can spend more time planning for routine repairs and upgrades, and less time reacting to leaks and drain crises. Let us help you relax, call today.
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