Turn Up the Heat on Frozen Pipes

Colorado winters have a whimsical way of making our plumbing systems resemble the frozen caverns of the Ice Planet Hoth (yea, your plumber just referenced Star Wars, we’re cool like that).

See what I mean?

Anyways, as we all know prevention is better than reaction. So with that in mind we give you the number one way to prevent your pipes from freezing:

KEEP YOUR HEAT SET TO AT LEAST 65°F AT ALL TIMES!
(when it’s below freezing outside, of course)

Yep, that easy. Fight the freeze with heat!

Is it 100% effective? No, it certainly isn’t. Winter in Colorado can be brutal and when it hits 10 below outside there’s a good chance a pipe in your garage or along an exterior wall will freeze, but this will prevent the other, easy to avoid problems.

Now, you may ask, “Chris, why do I care if a pipe freezes, won’t it just thaw?”

Great question!

The answer is yes, over time it will thaw. But when the weather is consistently below freezing this can take a VERY long time; days even. It’s best to just prevent the pipe from freezing than worrying about thawing it.

“But can’t plumbing companies come out and thaw my pipe?”

Sure, some can, if they can find it. Because of the amount of and complexity of the waterlines in your home it may be difficult or impossible to locate the freeze, and even worse it may involve making several holes in your drywall and ceiling before successfully located. There’s also a higher than 50% chance that the thawing machine used to warm the freeze will cause the copper line to split, forcing you to repair the line at an additional cost. That’s why McAdams Plumbing doesn’t recommend this practice.

“But I have PEX piping, not copper, what about that?”

Great! Pex handles frozen pipes much better than copper. It can expand and contract to its original form dramatically. This protects your home from freeze breaks. If you can locate the freeze in your PEX pipe you can easily fix it by slowly warming the spot with a hair dryer. PEX is fracture resistant, so there’s lower chance of it splitting, but it’s still possible. If you can’t locate the freeze, however, you’re still in the same boat of having to wait for the freeze to thaw.

I hope that helps give you a plan for protecting your home from frozen and broken pipes. You can find more tips on how to prevent frozen and broken pipes below in the “More Prevention Tactics” section.

Happy Monday and stay warm everyone!

-Chris

 More Prevention Tactics:

In order to make keeping your heat above 65°F more effective you can also open up all your cabinets, closets, and access panels in the house to allow the warm air to move around freely. The more “cold pockets” you have in your home the more likely it is you will have to deal with a frozen pipe.

Also ensure that any pipes you have running along an exterior wall or exposed to the atmosphere in anyway (outside of home, crawlspace, garage) are heavily insulated. Standard fiberglass insulation and foam pipe insulation are good options for this.

Finally, but most effectively, simply turn off your whole house water and open your faucets before you go to bed. By doing this you remove all water and pressure from your plumbing system while you are sleeping, and when the weather is the coldest, and make it close to impossible for your pipes to freeze. No water, no ice!

*Image courtesy of Starwarsreport.com.

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Winterize Your Home

As the weeks pass by, cold weather is creeping closer and closer. If you are not a cold weather fan like me, this does not have to mean all gloom and doom. The cold weather means the upcoming of the holiday season! Don’t let cold weather freeze your pipes, and your holiday spirit, as you and your family prepare for the holidays with costumes, turkeys, and gingerbread houses!

We were able to find a wonderful article at about.com that will help you to ensure that your home will be ready when Jack Frost comes knocking at your door!

To read the article in its entirety please click here.

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The cold winter months can wreak havoc on your home’s plumbing system

if you aren’t prepared for the temperature drop. Frozen water in pipes can

be inconvenient at best and destructive at worst. As a good preventive

measure get ready for winter with this winterize plumbing checklist.

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Beware of FOG

Happy Monday everyone!

This week we are going to talk about avoiding FOG.

Not fog, rather FOG: Fats, oils, and grease.

These buggers are what cause the majority of drain cleaning issues in your kitchen sink.

We’re highlighting a great blog produced by The Trusted Plumber, out of Phoenix, AZ. To read the original article in it’s entirety please click here.

Hope you enjoy!

*Beware of FOG! Fats, Oils, and Grease vs. Your Kitchen Plumbing

December 10th, 2014 

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Locate Your Main Water Shut Off

As a homeowner, and even a renter, it is extremely important to know how to locate your main water shut off valve.

Why?

Because if you live in a home long enough you are bound to spring a leak somewhere, at some time. Often, that leak will appear behind a wall, in a ceiling, or on your water heater, and you may not have any choice but to shut down all your water to prevent flood damage until you can get a plumber out to help.

So in this week’s blog I’m going to show you how to recognize, find, and use your main water shut off valve so you can rest easy knowing what to do in case of an emergency.

Step One: Recognize Your Valve

There are 2 very common types of shut off valve you will find in not only Colorado homes, but most homes across the United States. They are ball valves and gate valves. They can range in size, but the most common are 3/4″ and 1″ for residential purposes. Handle colors may also vary, so don’t necessarily expect yours to be red or yellow. They could be blue, black, pink, or any other color of the rainbow.

Ball valves are very trustworthy and shut off with a simple quarter turn of the handle. When the handle is parallel to the body (as seen above) it is in the open position. When the handle is perpendicular to the body, it is in the closed position.

Gate valves take a little more effort to close and can become stiff with age. They are, however, very reliable and have a very long life. To shut off a gate valve simply turn the handle clockwise until it will not allow you to turn anymore. Make sure the handle is snug. Some gate valves require a little extra effort on the final quarter turn, but if you find yourself exhausted, hurting, or needing tools to fully close the valve it would be a good idea to have it replaced before an emergency.

Step Two: Find Your Valve

You main water shut off valve is usually in a basement or utility room of your home. In Colorado it is also common for the valve to be located in a crawl space if one exists. Due to the cold temperatures in Colorado it is rare to find a water shut off outside the home or in a garage and it is not recommended that you relocate your shut off to such a place.

Start by following the wall that faces the city street side of your home at the lowest point. If your home does not face city streets (i.e. rural properties) look toward the side of the home that faces your well. The shut off may be behind an access panel, coming off of a copper pipe that pokes through your concrete foundation, in the furthest corner of your crawlspace, near a water heater/furnace, or right in plain view. Less often the shut off is located in an upstairs mechanical room. This happens more in apartments, condo units, and multi-home complexes.

Step 3: Test Your Valve!

Once you have located your valve it is recommended that you test it to ensure it is operating properly. As with all metals in contact with water it will wear down and eventually become non-functional. If this has happened, you want to know before an emergency, not after.

In order to test your valve turn it’s handle following the directions in step one based on your type of valve. Once you have fully closed the valve go to your nearest faucet and turn both the hot and cold water handles to the “on” position. You should have a steady flow of water for a few moments which will become lesser and lesser until the water completely stops flowing. The more faucets you open the faster this process will occur.

If you have the main water valve turned off and you are still seeing water drip out of fixtures after a few minutes of waiting your valve may not be fully closing. Contact your plumber to have them come test the valve and properly replace it if necessary.

If you have a small leak coming from the packing nut (see picture below) on your shut off valve simply use a small crescent wrench first remove the handle stem nut and handle, then lightly tighten the nut and replace handle. Gate valves normally require a Phillips head screwdriver to remove the handle, however the packing nut is in the same location. Tighten only enough to stop the leak, starting a quarter turn a time time. Check after each quarter turn. If you over tighten two things may happen: 1) the handle may become too tight to turn, or 2) you may break the packing nut which will mean you must replace the whole valve.

If you are not comfortable performing the previous task contact your plumber to tighten the bolt for you. Sometimes it’s better safe than sorry, especially on older devices.

Residential homes often also have a water shut off located in a pit at the city street. You’ll recognize this by the round iron lid that is marked with your municipalities insignia. PLEASE DO NOT USE THIS! This shut off is for licensed professionals and city workers only. Because this valve is city property, not property of the homeowner, you could face a fine ($500 – $5,000) from your city for using this device.

For Licensed Professional and City Use Only

When you are ready to turn your water back on, do so slowly and purge the air from your waterlines starting with bath tub spouts first. There will be a lot of bubbling and gurgling as your system regains water pressure.

I hope that’s a helpful walk though. If you have any tips or ideas to help your neighbors find their valves, post them below. Also feel free to send pictures or messages with crazy places you’ve found your main water shut off valves.

Extra tip: Occasionally when you shut down your water system small pieces of debris can come loose. This is nothing to worry about, it causes no damage, however this debris can clog the aerators in your faucets. You can avoid this in one of two ways:

1. Simply unscrew and remove your faucet aerators prior to turning you water back on to allow the debris to pass. Then re-install the aerator after purging water.

2. Open a bathtub faucet on the top floor first. They allow for unrestricted flow, therefore if you let this run for a couple minutes it should remove the debris from your system without you needing to remove faucet aerators.

All the best!

-Chris

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Shopping for online plumbing fixtures can be a dangerous endeavor.

This is not the first time McAdams Plumbing has touched on this subject (and honestly, it won’t be the last) but we feel it’s very important for folks to know what to expect when it comes to plumbing fixtures.

Today, however, we are going to let the folks from Faucets Galore talk a bit about the issues you can run into when trying to order plumbing products online.

Enjoy!

(You can read the original text in its entirety here)

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BLINDFOLDED SHOPPING – BEWARE THE CONS (LITERALLY) WHEN SHOPPING ONLINE FOR PLUMBING FIXTURES

Blindfolded? Absolutely, and most don’t even know it. Unfortunately, folks are completely unaware of the pitfalls of buying plumbing fixtures online, and they get trapped into the so-called “advantages”. Buying online may be wise for some things, or at the very least not too painful if something goes wrong, like when you’re buying shoes or jewelry. But when you’re buying heavy or specialty plumbing fixtures, this is a very risky endeavor. We’ve had many customers come to us after they’ve purchased plumbing fixtures online, and upon hearing some of the same horror stories over the years, we thought we’d share some of their most common complaints. As many have warned in numerous online articles,

“Buyer Beware when Shopping Online”

1) Your item may not be what you thought you ordered, or may not include all the components you need. Unfortunately, one cannot truly know what’s being purchased online, until they actually receive the item. The item could be exactly as you expected, or way off; it may include all the components you need, or it may not. Descriptions are great, and the more the better, but they can never take the place of knowing for sure.

• Many items are being counterfeited now for online sale. CBS News recently reported that many items purchased thru Amazon are being counterfeited or switched for something else, unbenounced to Amazon, and there are likely many others.

• “We think the amount of fraud and counterfeit goods that were sold to consumers was between $110 and $140 million just this past holiday season,” James Lee of the Consumer Fraud Center in Santa Monica said.

• In the case of plumbing fixtures, many look the same on the outside, but may be VERY different on the inside, even when they are the same model number! This is a dangerous thing for a plumbing fixture that will be holding water under pressure in your home. Yikes! A scary thought with a faucet that’s substandard or out-of-date. In addition, many components like drains, supply lines, or valves may not be included with your order. Buying plumbing fixtures can be quite comprehensive, so it’s best to have a knowledgeable plumbing showroom representative help make sure you have everything you need for your project. See our BE INFORMED Information Sheet for more details.

2) Shipping Expenses to Receive. Lots of online retailers offer smokin’ deals on pricing, but put the item in your cart (especially with tubs and toilets) and you’ll likely get sticker shock for the shipping cost.

3) Defects, Damage, Mistakes. It’s never fun to wait patiently for an item, only to receive it damaged, defective, or the wrong unit altogether. Dealing with these issues with online retailers can be very challenging, sometimes even a real nightmare, not to mention the additional time to wait for a replacement. This’ll delay your remodel significantly.

4) Shipping Expenses to Return Unwanted Items & Restocking Fees. If you don’t like an item, or need to switch to a different color/finish, you will pay for the return shipping on your own, and may likely have to pay a restocking fee. These fees add up quick, therefore many will keep undesired items they would have otherwise returned. Do you really want to look at that toilet you don’t like everyday?

5) Online Security – or lack of it. We’ve all heard the dangers here. Fraud and security breaches are everywhere online, and it looks like it’s only getting worse. Security is even in jeopardy with large retailers now, and those with whom you’d never expect to have such a problem. The internet is too sweet a pond for hackers and thieves not to play in. To add insult to injury, more often than not now, they get off scott-free. As such, they boldly laugh in the face of enforcement. So much so that now they’re even holding police departments’ data for ransom! How more brazen can you get?! If these vermin have so little a chance of being prosecuted, they’ll just keep comin’. And sadly, everything retailers try to do in thwarting this problem is always just a step behind. No site can boast they are 100% free of these cockroaches. If/when one is caught, another is waiting in the wings, with better software and more clever systems to beguile shoppers and retailers. It’s just a sign of our digital times.

6) Spyware. This part gets even scarier. Our computers are like fishbowls now. The amount of data collected and housed by online retailers and browsers is getting so massive and invasive, that it makes just looking around online a negative experience.

7) Some online retailers do a very good job reducing the above risks when buying online, but knowing exactly who those retailers are takes experience, and are you really willing to bet your remodel on selecting the right one? Even then, things still do go wrong, and isn’t it nicer to have a local, real person available to resolve your issues? We believe it is.

Our objective isn’t to scare people with this article, but in keeping with our overall mission of being an Information Center, our paramount concern is that folks are informed. As we consider adding more e-commerce to our website, we will do so as a brick & mortar store, where our customers can have real access to real people for questions, and to address concerns or issues.

– There’s a whole host of articles available online that discuss this subject in detail. You may want to view two different articles both entitled,”The Disadvantages of Online Shopping” here and here, as well as “The Computer Revolution/E commerce/Disadvantages”.

– See more at: http://faucetsgalorenv.com/blog/2014/06/05/blindfolded-shopping-beware-the-cons-literally-when-shopping-online/#sthash.y8E7Owbt.dpuf

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