Looks like I have a leak somewhere under the slab not far from where the service line comes in. My luck the water in the cut-off box and on the ground was not from an easily replaceable valve stem in service box, but instead is coming from the house itself.
Joy of joys, and Happy Holidays to me courtesy of James Gleick and Chaos Theory.
Anyone have a plumbing leak company that their would (or even wouldn’t) recommend to end my nightmare?
Or even better, does anyone have access to leak detection equipment or have an idea for something that could be cobbled together for isolating the epicenter of the leak sound?
I have all of the stuff to fix this other than locator equipment.
I usually do my own plumbing work - sweat soldering etc but I am not up to tunneling or trenching.
Du West foundation repair has the best licensed plumbers and pricing.
I’ve had two not so lovely experiences with plumbing in & around a home with a concrete slab foundation (the worst type of foundation to have under a home in this part of Texas). The main line from the meter to the house developed a leak and has since been replaced - leak was right at the wall / cut off valve. If you replace the valve be sure to use a ball valve - they don’t leak. The main line was done for $1300 +/- for about 35 feet of line including the permit.
Du West did a different pipe repair under the slab last Feb. They were a fraction of the cost of the other four companies that came to my house. Very good folks to work with. When I say fraction - two crazy estimates were over $13k & $18k.
It ended up being less than $3k
972.406.0912 is the local number for Du West - if you go that route.
Interesting stuff.
The wiki says it is good for 5 or 6 freeze cycles, so I am guessing the plumbing code is not going to say OK about stringing it in the attic, even if it is under the 9" fiberglass batting, same as copper for the requirement that the lines need to drain from a central point.
There is an insulated version of PEX though, which would be really nice to have since the water heater is 70 feet from the hall shower and 110 feet from the master bath. As it is, it takes 4 gallon draw of water to get hot at the master bath. I will look into using the insulated overhead. I could do that and it would fix some of the BS hot water latency problem.
Right now I am looking to make sure the leak is not in the front hydrant on the wall by the cut off box that is in front of the house cutoff. That line freezes a lot with its exposure and the line ices up on a lot of cold weather episodes. I should know about that later tonight after a few beers at The End Zone sports bar nearby. The shrubs in front will either be flooded or not in a few hours with the house cut off and pressure on the front faucet/hydrant.
Otherwise it is probably on a hot water line under the slab I suspect. If so I just may redo the whole mess with the PEX, and maybe a loop pump too for the hot.
Last house I owned, I had 4 underslab leaks. I fixed the last two myself. Not for the faint hearted, but can be done, and more attractive if your insurance won’t pay.
Plumbers use a glorified stethascope to locate the leak.I used a regular medical one. Take off your shoes and socks, and feel the floor in the vicinity of the leak. Hot water leaks usually make the floor feel warm, and happen more frequently than cold water. The trick, is to listen in a pattern enclosing the leak, until you hear water moving. The figure out where it’s the loudest. You may need to install a fitting at the water heater outflow, or cold water inflow, and inject air into the line for a larger leak. The bubbles make a racket, and the sound is usually right above the actual leak (sometimes, you hear flowing water a short distance away as it hits the slab or flows through an eroded channel.
It gets more interesting, once you’ve identified your most likely spot. Remove the flooring materials in a 2 or 3 foot radius around the leak down to bare concrete. Rent an electric jackhammer from a rental yard. Bust a hole through the slab and around the rebar, until you hit dirt. Pray you located accurately. Using your fingers, dig around under the slab until you find the actual leak. Bust out about a foot and a half square over the hole.
Dig out the leak, up to about 6 inches beneath it. Cut that section of pipe away, and silver solder in a sleeve to both ends. Run water into the pipe to test. No more leak?
Buy enough flowable fill in bags to completely fill the hole you made, mix it up in a tub , and pour it into the hole in the slab. Use a stout stick to force it as far under the slab as you can, and to fill all voids. Mix the first pour a thin enough to flow well. Let the fill solidify, add more if needed. Patch the concrete, repair the flooring.
Its a truly suck job, but it was worth $5-6K to do it myself.
This is the stuff I am looking for if I have to shake this thing down and locate it.
I can pull my water heater and open up the wall where all the copper branches split off of the hot and cold feeds and find the offending line with a contact pickup, then should be able to locate it on the floor. The water heater is an incredible 19 yrs old and is full of mud from Lake Lavon anyway and needs to be tossed as it barely heats anymore for the all the crap in the bottom if it.
I have an estimate for $250 for location for next Wednesday from Delong Locator Serives, but the guy also sells some snake oil coatings to “seal” pinhole leaks, which this appears to be from the loss flow rate. So his leak test might be more of a sales job gimick than isolating the leak for an honest bash and braze repair.
I have hammered the slab to move a 2" cast iron shower drain by 3 feet to put in a Jacuzzi tub, so I can handle the under slab part if it is not the hydrant line. I just need to be confident about where to bust the hole, or to know it is not in the beam at the edge of the slab. Silfos and acetylene will be my friend here when this leak is found, chased with a bag of sackcrete and a beer or two.
Thanks @tom for the suggestion on the ball valve. I am thinking I may do that as the cutoff gate valve is only sealing up to a trickle and the irrigation cut off valve is seized. Closing the leaking house cutoff seems to work for keeping a faucet open in the house to not build up pressure against the leak hole. Not so much if I am doing work in the house but I can always open the drain gate valve outside which does still seal tight.
@tapper
Great idea on the steth. I am an EE but I did a stint as an RT a bit after the telecom crash just for the heck of it and I have 2 laying around. I can’t believe I didn’t think of that already.
It will be like diagnosing crackels and rales. LOL Why could I not synergize this!?!?!?
Good comments on locating techniques too. I saw a youtube about air and could do that. With 150PSI from the garage I could just “energize” the plumbing in a Star Trek kinda way and wait 10 seconds for the offending slab area to “open up” all by itself. LOL
I eliminated the distance for the hot water to “warm up” with a self installed a gas fired tankless heater near the master and bathrooms - I will never have a tank water heater again.
Jackhammering the slab is not something I would allow the insurance company to do - I have “post tensioned” slab (the engineers that made that “doable” for houses should die a slow painful death.
Pex may be the way to go for you - if you can run it in “climate controlled space”. It supposedly withstands damage from freezing better than copper but I wouldn’t trust the marketing folks on that…