You may have heard friends, family, or a coworker brag about performing minor repairs in their bathroom or kitchen. While there are some small plumbing repairs that can be done as a do-it-yourself, there is always some basic plumbing knowledge needed. And there are also many plumbing nightmares when things go terribly wrong.
Before you begin a project that involves plumbing, it’s helpful to understand some of the reasons that cause plumbing nightmares.
5 Times Minor Repairs Turn into Plumbing Nightmares
The water is not shut off.
The first thing you should do before starting repairs is turn off the water. Every fixture should have a manual shut-off valve located nearby. The faucet, it is usually underneath the sink. For the toilet, check behind it. Not turning off this valve before you start on repairs will cause water to flow uncontrollably when you begin to disassemble a plumbing fixture.
The main shut-off valve is not located.
It’s critical that you understanding where your plumbing system runs through your house and where the main water shut-off valve is located. When you are working around plumbing, things can and do go wrong. We had a customer remove some rotted cabinetry around the sink and accidentally break the water line where it came out of the wall beneath the sink. With water flowing like a geyser, the customer was in a panic trying to figure out how to turn the water off. Know where the main shut-off valve is in your home and how long it will take to get there.
Repair of a leak is not done promptly.
One of the biggest problems with minor leak repairs is that people don’t always consider them important. Therefore, they fail to prioritize fixing the leak. You could have a small drip under the kitchen sink. That small leak can cost you hundreds of dollars throughout the year on your water bill and waste over 4,000 gallons of water annually. It can also cause significant water damage. It doesn’t take long before a leak permeates into the structure of your home and causes mold.
A new fixture breaks.
Installing a new fixture like a sink or a toilet can be tricky. The fixture can be heavy and your space can be difficult to maneuver in. It is not unusual for us to hear about a homeowner who dropped a sink or set down a toilet too fast and broke it. Handles getting broken on new faucets are another problem. Plumbers have the knowledge and experience to know what is needed and the tricks of the trade for proper installations.
Connections are not water-tight.
It’s unfortunate when a homeowner installs a fixture with some new threaded piping and then fails to make the connections watertight. You want to seal plastic fittings, metal tapered fittings, threaded connections, and joints.
There are a lot of guides online and the equipment available at your local hardware stores that are enticing for homeowners to try to do plumbing repairs on their own. But these repairs don’t always go as planned and can become plumbing nightmares that cost hundreds of dollars more than if you called a professional plumber instead. High Priority Plumber is ready to assist you 24/7 with all your plumbing repair needs. Call us at 770.860.8110 in Atlanta.