No doubt as a homeowner you are having to perform regular maintenance checks on your home. Whether that’s checking your brickwork, ensuring your doors are closing correctly, keeping your painting up-to-date, changing plug sockets or in the case of this article, your plumbing.
The plumbing within your home is very important and should be looked after on a regular occurrence. The more time you spend making sure it’s in its best condition, the lower your maintenance costs will be (and you won’t need to pay for someone to come in and fix it). In order to keep it at its best you want to be performing regular checks to look after it.
To help you with these checks, below are our top things to put on your plumbing maintenance checklist.
Check your guttering
Every couple of months, dedicate some time to checking the guttering of your home. On windy days, or days when it’s raining heavily, you will often find that moss is blown into your guttering causing it to clog up. If left to continue to build, this can cause it to block up your guttering causing potential damage. Dirty water will often overflow on your guttering causing leaks inside and outside of your home.
Check washing machine/dishwasher hoses for cracks/leaks
Whether you have a new washing machine or an old one, this is still a possibility – although it tends to happen to older ones. If anything sharp goes through your washing machine or dishwasher, it can cause small holes to be created, causing leaks and blockages. This can be a pain to sort out and cause damage to the interiors of your home. Every couple of months, make sure you check the condition of your hoses for cracks or leaks. Sometimes it can be the smallest hole but by spotting it, you prevent a lot of issues that could arise.
Test water pressure
Your water pressure will give you a good indication of whether you are having any plumbing issues. If when you are turning on your taps – like your shower – and you are finding the water is coming out a lot slower, then this could be an indication that there is something wrong with your plumbing. To check your water pressure, a standard test is to get a measuring jug and place it under the shower. Turn the tap on and allow it to fill up the measuring jug. If it takes longer than seven seconds, this could be a problem with your water pressure.
The above steps are a couple of many steps that you can take to ensure your plumbing is at its best. Make sure you are regularly checking and if you suspect you have any issues that you can’t resolve, get in an expert plumber to help you. If you ever feel uncomfortable with the changes you think you are going to make, don’t risk doing it yourself. A good plumber can help with maintenance tasks around the home.
