Having a water leak in your home can cause untold amounts of damage. If it is somewhere that you are unable to see, it is even more important to get it taken care of as quickly as possible. If the water leak is hidden behind a wall or under a floor, it may begin to rot your home’s structure away before you ever find it.
If you suspect that there may be a water leak, whether it be from a leaking supply water line, broken drainpipe, or water infiltration from the snow melting, call a professional like GTA Restoration. They can not only find your water leaks with minimal intrusion to your home, but they can repair the damages done and restore your home to pre-accident condition.
Water Leak Causes
Rusty Pipes
Leak detection can be easier than you may think. There are the obvious signs of a water leak, such as a damp floor, wall, or ceiling. You can also look for rusted water lines. Water lines that are beginning to deteriorate, such as from rust, can become susceptible to a crack that will cause water to leak.
Aging Pipes
Maybe your entire house was plumbed with PVC and CPVC pipe, so rust isn’t an issue for you. That doesn’t mean that you don’t have anything to worry about. Plastic pipe can become brittle as it ages. This means that undue stress like freezing, excessively high-water pressure, or physical pressure can cause the pipes to shatter, causing you to be left with a water leak and potential water damage causing a major flood damage etc.
Mineral Deposits
Depending on where you live, you may have high amounts of minerals in your water. This can become a problem because if your pipes become lined with mineral deposits, then they can corrode and damage your piping from the inside. This can lead to pin holes and cracks which will allow water to infiltrate your home.
Water Pressure
This is another one that you may not expect to cause much of a problem. However, if you already have deteriorated pipes, then excessive water pressure is enough of an issue to cause a leak in your water lines.
Melting Snow
Snow can cause a whole list of different water issues for your home. The snow on your roof can create ice dams that pool up water and leak under your shingles and get into your attic space. The melted snow can seep through your foundation, weakening your foundation and pooling water under your home. As it melts it can also penetrate any openings, cracks, or gaps in your exterior. Finding any point of access possible into your home, and silently causing water damage without you knowing.
How to Tell if You Have A Leak?
Homeowner Water Leak check – A simple way for a homeowner to tell if they have a leak in a supply water line is to check your monthly bill. Having a higher-than-average water bill is a sure sign that you need to try and find a water leak.
The Water Meter Leak Test
You as a homeowner can check your own water meter to see if there is a problem. How you will go about doing this is:
You will need to make sure that there is no water being actively used in your home. You do not want to shut the main water supply off to the house, or it will negate the whole point of this test.
Make sure that there are no appliances running, such as dishwasher or clothes washing machine. Look at your meter and take note of the numbers on it.
Wait an hour, making sure that you are not using any water. After the hour, return to the meter and check the numbers you wrote down against the numbers that are shown. If the numbers changed, then you most likely have a water leak.
If you have a meter located at the street, and you do have a leak. You can go inside the house and turn the shutoff off where it enters the house. This will designate the line going from the meter, through your yard, and to your home. Now you can go back and take the numbers down again, wait an hour and compare. If they have moved, it is the line in the yard. If they haven’t, then the leak is in your home somewhere.
Looking for a Hidden Water Leak
So now you have gone through the trouble and found out that you have a leak by looking at your meter, but you have no idea where it is. Walk around your home and look closely for these telltale signs of moisture:
1. Wall discoloration will happen when the wall covering gets wet. If it is painted drywall, then the drywall will soak up that water and cause a stained color.
If your wall has wallpaper covering it, then the wallpaper will begin to bubble and peel and pull away from the wall. A sure sign that there could be water damage behind it.
If you hear a dripping sound anywhere in your house. Under cabinets, behind walls, cubby holes, and crawl spaces are all places to listen for the dreaded dripping sound.
A musty smell. If you have water getting into your home for a long enough period, then it will develop a musty smell. This is one of the most telltale signs, so this may be one of the easier ways to tell if you have a moisture issue. Especially if it is infiltration from snow and not a leaking supply line.
Avoiding Water Leaks
How do you avoid having water leaks? Doing preemptive maintenance is one good way.
Water Softener
You can have a water softener installed, which will pull most of those minerals out of your water before it gets into your water lines and causes problems.
Replacement
If you have old metal pipes, then maybe you should consider having them replaced with a newer plastic option. It is estimated that plumbing pipes should last about 20 years. If you were to have them replaced, then you should be worry free for at least 20 years.
Commercial Drain Cleaner
If there is a problem like a plugged-up drain, then you should avoid using the commercial drain cleaners. These products are high in hydrochloric acid, which means that while it may clear your drain, it is also deteriorating your pipes. This can lead to your home developing a leak.
Professional Water Leak Detection Check
A professional company like GTA Restoration is trained and equipped to deal with your water issues. They will be able to bring a crew of experienced individuals who know what to look for and how to find those leaks. They can use the latest technology like thermal heat radars to see if there are any temperature differences to alert them of water hiding somewhere.
They have other equipment like an Infrared thermography (IRT), thermal video and/or thermal imaging, which will allow them to look behind walls and hard to reach places without destroying any property. With their different lines of non-destructive moisture detectors, they will be able to tell you quickly and accurately if and where your water leaks are happening. This will give them the knowledge to repair the problem while causing as little damage to your home as possible.
Depending on how long that leak has been happening, it is very possible that you do not only have a leak. There may be a mold issue, and maybe rotten home structure that must be addressed. Mold will be a very real possibility with water leaks, and it needs to be handled with care. Blindly tearing into a wall can cause it to enter the air, endangering the people involved and the people in the house. This is exactly why you need to call a professional company that can not only fix the leak and repair the damage, but make sure that you and your family are safe during and after the repairs.
In Water Leak Detection Summary
Having a water leak in your home can cause a long list of expensive issues that you may have to deal with. At GTA Restoration, we do our best to make sure that our pipes won’t freeze in the winter and burst. We try to keep the snow off our homes and away from our foundations to avoid infiltration. But these things do happen, and when they do, it seems like it’s always at the worst of times.
This article has covered some of the ways that you can try and find your own water leaks if you suspect that you have one, and ways to avoid having a water leak detection to begin with. It is important to have a professional company come and find your leaks, repair them, deal with the issues involved, and put your house back in order. Call GTA Restoration today for all your water restoration needs!
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