USEFUL ADVICE
1. Do you want to buy a house, or already in the process of finding one? Let’s say you’ve found the house that suits you well. You’ve checked everything, and it seems ok! Now, one extremely important thing is left to do: ORDER DRAIN TV CAMERA INSPECTION! Home inspectors almost never are able to do this. Underground drains especially have lots of hidden problems, such as (but not limited to) damaged pipe sections, tree root penetrations, shifted (sagged) pipe sections where a layer of water stays constantly, kitchen grease deposits, building materials (tile grout, cement, etc.) deposits. There may be a sanitary drain trap present, a “time bomb” that may clog and cause flood anytime! Any of those problems cause sewer backup and basement flooding. Therefore, CALL US before buying the house. We’ll check the house drain system, and you will be saved from unwanted troubles. If any of the problems mentioned above were found, you can negotiate a much lower price for the house, or ask the current owner to fix it, or buy another house with a better drain system!
2. If you already purchased a house even moved in, call us for TV camera drain inspection, especially when you plan to do renovations or have valuable items at home. Imagine that you’ve spent thousands of $ on renovations, spent lots of time and efforts. And then sewer backed up and all what you’ve done is spoiled. Usually during renovations considerable amounts of such building materials as paint, tile cement, tile grout, floor leveling cement etc. may enter the drain. These materials accumulate in place where there is a problem in the drain, clog the drain and cause sewer backup. Does it make sense to get in trouble due to sewer backup? No. But people without knowing do get in this kind of trouble. Countless times we witnessed how expensive rugs, hardwood or laminate floors, drywalls at the bottom were destroyed by sewer backup. One time there were lots of valuable documents stored in files in the basement. Sometimes audio/video devices are damaged. Add also expenses to get rid of dangerous bacteria and awful smell. Now you know, and what you do next- is up to you.
3. Are you a restaurant owner? Arrange high pressure power washing for your drains. It should be done at least one time every 2 years. Even if you have grease interceptor installed, it may not guarantee 100% grease removal. Some amount of grease still may get through, accumulate and cause serious drain backups. And, of course, order grease interceptor cleaning on time. If you don’t have grease interceptor installed, then order installation ASAP! It is mandatory in restaurants and similar food processing facilities. Without this device drain will get lots of grease deposits really quickly, drain backups will follow and it may be very costly to fix the problem. Plus imagine that you have lots of guests in restaurant, a party, and suddenly sewer is backing up, and it is not possible to flush toilets or wash dishes.
4. Use good filtration systems to purify water from kitchen tap. It can be Brita, GE or special faucets from Moen and American Standard with replaceable cartridges. Take care of your health.
5. If you want to reduce considerably your utility bill, install instantaneous electric water heater.
6. To reduce tremendously water bill, make sure your toilets have properly working flappers. Drop some dye in toilet tank (you can get it free at Home Depot). If dye appears in toilet bowl, then flapper is leaking water and has to be replaced. Also if ball cock in toilet tank is damaged, then water may run constantly into toilet bowl through overflow tube, ball cock to be replaced. Call us for service. Also when one of those problems exists and something clogs the toilet by accident, then water has no place to go and overflows toilet bowl, causing flood in the house. Especially bad it can be if it happened on second floor- ceiling may be damaged by water.
7. Change every 10 years seal (wax or rubber gasket) under the toilet. Most manufacturers guarantee seal for up to 10 years. When seal does not work properly, dirty water with each toilet flush get beyond the toilet, causing bad smell in the house, may get even between dry walls or damage ceiling if toilet is on main or second floor. We see this problem so often.
8. Use to your advantage City rebate programs. Some of them are on www.toronto.ca/water. Our specialty is work with City rebate programs. Save thousands of dollars.
9. Call us to install main drain backwater valve. Doing so, you will get your money back from the City and save your house from flood.
10. Call us to remove old trap from sewer line. This “sewer backup time bomb” may clog at any time and cause flooding in your basement. Same time we can install for you fullport mainline backwater valve, so you get enhanced protection against flooding.
11. We recommend to replace old rubber washing machine hoses for new braided ones. These new hoses are much stronger and work well! We withnessed numerous cases when old rubber hoses broke causing instant flooding.
12. We recommend quarter turn shut off valves for fixtures. They are very reliable. Older types of shut off valves may start dripping water over the time, especially after you try to turn them.
13. If you have water service pipe made of lead or galvanized iron, we recommend to replace it. Lead is poisonous, and galvanized pipe usually rusts and clogs with sediments. This reduces pipe diameter and steals water pressure from plumbing system. If you are unsure what kind of material your water service pipe is made of, call us for an inspection.
13. If you have water service pipe made of lead or galvanized iron, we recommend to replace it. Lead is poisonous, and galvanized pipe usually rusts and clogs with sediments. This reduces pipe diameter and steals water pressure from plumbing system. If you are unsure what kind of material your water service pipe is made of, call us for an inspection.
14. If you have low water pressure in your house, you may need to get new water service line on private or on City property, or on both. You may also have somewhere in the house sections of old galvanized pipe. We will help you to fix this problem.