Category: Plumbing

Hard water may seem like the least of your worries when it comes to assessing the state of your home’s plumbing, but if you don’t have a water softening system in your home, you may experience other adverse effects of hard water like having a hard time getting your launderette or dishes clean, and buildup in your pipes. Read on to find out more about how hard water could be affecting your home.

Washing Clothes is Harder

The term "hard water" refers to water that has high mineral content. How does this affect your laundry? Well, minerals like magnesium and calcium in your water can prevent it from mixing with your laundry detergent, which can leave a chalky residue on your clothes, causing them to feel dingy when they come out of the dryer.
The same residue could also cause the color of some of your favorite garments to fade faster! Excess iron in your water can even cause some of your lighter clothes to develop a yellowish tint or rust colored stains!
Hard water will not only affect the look of your clothes, but also the feel of it. It can cause your softest tee shirt, or fluffiest bath towel to turn stiff or scratchy. And laundry isn't the only area of your home where you'll see the effects of hard water!

Dishes and Pots Are Left with Deposits

Just like hard water leaves a chalky residue on your clothes and linens, it will do the same to your dishes! If you are running a dishwasher, or even washing your dishes by hand, with hard water, your pots and pans, plates, glassware, bowls, and even silverware could dry to reveal a white film over them.
This residue is once again the effect of hard water. Beyond the white spots or film left behind on your dishes, hard water can also affect the efficiency of your dishwasher itself, leading you to use more dish soap per load!

Buildup Can Form Inside Pipes

Finally, the worst part of having hard water is not what it does to your laundry or dishes, but the effect it can have on your pipes! Hard water can leave limescale deposits in your pipes, which can collect and lead to issues like slow drainage, clogged pipes, and shower heads, lowered water pressure, and only lukewarm water coming from your faucets.
If hard water goes untreated, it can end up you costing thousands in higher energy costs, pipe flushing services, and even fixture or faucet replacement. To avoid this, and to put an end to the mineral buildup on your clothes and dishes, consider installing a water softener in your home. With so many different types of water softeners on the market today, you’re sure to find one that perfectly suits your home and lifestyle.
If you’re ready to put an end to sucky hard water in your home today, give Valley Plumbing a call to talk to one of our plumbing technicians about your water softening options!

Your plumbing system is an essential part of your Salt Lake City, UT home, but you likely don't even think twice about it until you experience a plumbing emergency. And as anyone who has ever experienced a plumbing crisis will tell you, it is a stressful, messy and potentially a costly situation.
Wouldn't it make more sense to stop a plumbing emergency from ever happening, if you could? You can! If you take a few simple actions on a regular basis, you will get the most out of your home’s plumbing, prolong its lifespan and reduce the frequency of repairs.

Local Regulations Are Important

If you're interested in saving more than a few dollars by doing a little DIY with your plumbing system, keep your costs down by following local code with your project.
That means doing all the appropriate paperwork, getting the right permits and doing whatever is required to ensure that you are following the proper regulations. Not only does this protect your plumbing, but it also ensures that the work is higher quality, which means that it will be more reliable.

Balance Your Water Pressure

High water pressure is wonderful for showering and for filling pots for cooking. However, the strength of the water is very bad for your plumbing.
It can cause your plumbing system to weaken in spots, which will cause water leaks over time.
Can you imagine that avoiding plumbing leaks is as simple as adjusting your water pressure? Check it regularly and make sure that it falls in the 40-60 psi range.

Drain Cleaning to Prevent Clogs

A clogged drain is messy and inconvenient. The first way to prevent a clog is to keep items that shouldn't be in your plumbing system out of it.
Don't flush away diapers, sanitary napkins, wipes, paper towels or food scraps.
If you cook a great deal and have grease going down your sink, or if you have a high mineral concentration in your water, you should get your drains cleaned regularly by a professional because this helps to stop clogs before they start.

Block Hair

One of the biggest causes for clogs is hair falling down the drain. It’s hard to keep your hair from gathering there, but you can block it from falling down the drain and causing problems.
Put hair traps on your drains. Empty them out after each shower. They really work well. When you think of the potential and cost associated with plumbing leaks and emergencies, it is very compelling to do what you can to prevent them from happening.

Do-it-yourself plumbing remodeling projects can be a great and satisfying way to improve life at home. Planning and executing a large-scale job also comes with a certain level of fulfillment. But homeowners need to be sure they're fully prepared, and that includes acquiring all the necessary plumbing permits.
Permits offer a measure of protection and assurance that things are being done right, and are also necessary when looking for plumbing employment opportunities. Let's learn more about the process of obtaining a permit from the city.

Cost of Procuring Permits

This shouldn't be a surprise. Yes, you're expected to fork over a bit of cash for plumbing permits, and different cities can charge different prices depending on what kind of renovations you plan to do.
Each permit you apply for will normally cost between tens and hundreds of dollars. Local governments may even charge more for each fixture you plan to install or offer package-type deals which charge extra for installing items that exceed a certain threshold. You might also have to pay simply for applying for permits.

Large-Scale Projects Require Permits

There's no way you can execute a large-scale plumbing project without a plumbing permit. These types of projects include repiping, drain line replacements, sewer line replacements, water heater installations and any relocation of plumbing. Some minor jobs, such as replacing a water tap, usually don't require special permission.
Also, try to remember different cities may serve different types of permits. Some may require a permit to perform a particular task while others may not. It's always wise to check up on Salt Lake City, UT municipal regulations to make sure you're applying for the correct ones.

Providing Protection for Homeowners

One of the primary functions of permits is to protect homeowners and ensure projects initiate without any problems.
After gathering the necessary permits, you will be in contact with municipal reviewers and inspectors from whom you need to gain approval to begin different phases of your project.
Their sole purpose, as you might expect, is to ensure everything you do is in compliance with local plumbing codes and zoning laws. Plumbing permits can also be used as evidence you're following sanitary and safety rules set out by the city. This may include potential setbacks with property regulations and neighboring buildings.

No one wants things to go wrong with their home's piping, especially considering how expensive some of the more serious plumbing emergencies can be.
But are you helpless to prevent these kinds of problems from cropping up? Most of the time, you have the power to prevent these issues, and we’ve got some tips for the more common problems.

Dealing with Leaky Fixtures

A leaking fixture is a conundrum because while it is not the biggest emergency in the world, this one is also hard to spot in advance and can happen to anyone.
The surest way to prevent a leak when everything else is in order is to make sure that your taps are tightly turned to “off.” If a leak is happening despite that, you’ve still got options.
The usual suspects in a leaky fixture are two possible parts in a tap. The O-ring or the washer can both break down after years of constant use, and if they do, they can admit water. Fortunately, neither of these parts is expensive, and both are relatively easy to replace with a wrench and a few minutes.

Keeping a Drain from Being Blocked

Prevention is the name of the game when it comes to a blocked drain. In the vast majority of cases where a blocked drain occurs, the chief cause of water not going down the drain is homeowners ignoring the advance warning this was coming.
Blockages occur when matter, such as hair or food, get caught in the drainage pipe, rather than washing away. Once this process begins, it acts as an anchor, and more mass gets caught, eventually forming a partial blockage.
You’ll notice this as a “slow drain,” where water drains out of a sink slower than usual. If you ignore this, you’ll get a blocked drain. Drain cleaner or a plunger can solve this issue in minutes.

Preventing Toilet Overflow

Few things are as upsetting as using a toilet, flushing it, and watching the water and waste rise, spill over the toilet and onto the floor.
There are really only two reasons this happens, both of which are easily preventable; children playing with the toilet, and other residents treating the toilet like a garbage disposal unit.
A toilet will only overflow when foreign matter blocks up the pipe, such as kids playing around by flushing things down. If it’s not kids playing with the toilet, it may be other residents treating the toilet as a garbage can.
Disposable diapers, cigarettes and yes, even paper towels can all jam up a toilet. Only human waste and toilet paper should go down the drain, nothing else.

Preventing Pipes from Bursting

A burst pipe can be the most serious emergency, but there are a few ways to avoid this.
If you live in an old home, 75 years or more, and the original plumbing is still intact, like cast iron drainage pipes, sheer age may be a factor.
Consider replacing it with modern PVC pipes to avoid metal fatigue issues. On the other hand, make sure your water pressure isn’t too high! High water pressure puts a constant strain on water pipes, and may eventually cause them to break.
If you take care of the plumbing in your Salt Lake City, UT home, it will take care of you, and provide you with decades of reliable service.

2018 is a new year and of course, plenty of people are making resolutions at the start. For many, one of those resolutions will be to manage money better.
One way you can do this, every day, in small ways, is through better plumbing/water management. We have four tips for you to follow that can help lower your water bills every month.

Try a Self-Serve Car Wash

The traditional argument against car washes is that you save time and effort, but spend more money to do so. Compared to washing your car at home with a hose, the expenditure on gas to get down to the car wash, and money you actually pay for the service seem in line with this type of number crunching.
However, if you live near a self-service car wash, you can pay a fraction of the price to wash your car there. More importantly, you are not using up gallons and gallons of your own drinking water that’s just spraying down your car, getting infused with cleaning chemicals, then going straight into the sewer. Washing your car with this option can actually keep your water bills low, without costing you more on the wash itself.

Plug Up Leaks

If you have leaks in your plumbing this is a significant, constant drain on your water. Every time that water leaks your water supplier is charging you for it, even if you didn’t turn on a tap!
Check your water meter to see if it has a leak indicator. Or, just take a reading, stop using all water in the house for 10 minutes to an hour, then see if the water meter has gone up anyway. If it has, you’ve got a leak. Get it fixed, to solve the problem!

Recycle Water for Your Garden

Plants can be quite demanding on your water supply, especially things like lawns and garden plants such as flowers.
However, these plants are also not too fussy about the kind of water that they get, as long as it’s relatively free of very strong chemicals.
This is where “grey water” comes in, which is just another word for gently used water, such as that put into the service of cooking, washing or bathing. Another great source of grey water is a rain barrel put somewhere on your property. You may not want to drink any of this water, but your plants will happily accept it, and it saves on your bills.

Shower More with Updated Fixtures

Treat yourself to an occasional bath, but don’t do so all the time! A bath uses up anywhere from 20-50 gallons of water to fill bathtubs of varying sizes. A shower, especially if you jump in for five minutes or less, uses up a fraction of this amount.
To get the biggest savings, however, you need an updated showerhead. Showerheads installed before 1992 are “unrestricted” meaning they don’t benefit from any water saving designs features. With a modern shower head, even at high pressure, you only use 2.5 gallons per minute!
Get a good start on your resolution to be smarter about money with our tips. By following them, you can put a sizable dent in just how much water you pay every month, and put those savings towards things that are more fun or more sensible, in Salt Lake City, UT, the choice is yours!