You may already know that your heating and air conditioning equipment needs seasonal HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning) maintenance, but did you realize that you also require annual plumbing maintenance by an expert? Gordon's Service Experts offers the Plumbing PLUS™ Maintenance Agreement for Oklahoma City homeowners to help them locate issues before they become big problems. While you should definitely call immediately for plumbing problems and schedule your plumbing maintenance yearly, here are a couple ways to get your home in great plumbing shape for spring.
Check both your faucets and toilets for any leaks. Make sure there isn’t any water dripping out of or around the connections when you turn off your faucets. If there is, installing new fixtures or repairing the leak could help better the faucet’s performance and may even save you money on your water bill.
After the faucets, examine all accessible pipes for signs of leaks. You can often find visible pipes in basements and below sinks. In extreme weather pipes can freeze and crack, so springtime is great to make sure the winter weather didn’t damage anything that could cause plumbing problems.
- Give your drains some long overdue care
Inspect your toilet for any leaks or cracks in the bowl and the tank. If your toilet appears to be in good condition, go ahead and add about six drops of food color into the water in the tank. Wait half an hour and then check the bowl. If the bowl water is clear, you’re fine. If the color appears in the bowl, you could have a leak and will want to call a plumbing expert.
- Remember your water heater maintenance
If a stench seems to be drifting up through any of the drains in your home, it be evidence that plumbing maintenance is needed. A properly operating drain shouldn’t release odors into the air. Verify there are strains placed in all your drains to stop hair and other debris from spoiling in the pipes and resulting in a clog. Once you’ve treated them with a common drain cleaner, pour eight pints of water into drains that are not used often. This will fill the trap and help to stop odors from getting in and smelling up your home.
Your water heater takes excellent care of you so ensure you’re returning the kindness. Keep in mind that newer water heaters have a higher efficiency, so if yours is over 15 years old, it could be time to start looking into a new one to help make sure you don’t have that sudden burst of cold water for a week. Despite whether or not you plan on purchasing an upgraded water heater, there are a couple things you can do to help keep it functioning properly.
Verify that the temperature is set no higher than 120°F. This will help lower your energy consumption (and help lower your bills) while also evading scalding. As a safety precaution, you will want to relocate anything from around the water heater. Your annual Plumbing PLUS Maintenance plan includes a water heater maintenance; and it could actually help your water heater run more efficiently and avoid plumbing problems moving forward.
These are just a few ways of how you could help get your plumbing ready for spring, but if you are not comfortable completing any of these tasks, you are welcome to call Gordon's Service Experts and we can come out and perform your yearly plumbing maintenance and repair (or help prevent) any plumbing problems.