Some plumbers just keep on plumbing, and some, like Phil Groves Sewer Services from Burlington, Ontario keep looking for new ways to do old things. So Phil has a sewer camera that lets you see what is blocking your sewer line. He has a scanning device that allows him to walk across the front la...
Terry from Winnipeg, Manitoba has a bad smell coming out of his sink garbage disposal unit that he can't get rid of.Don't try to kill the smell with bleach. That will kill the smell, but it will also kill your graburator because the bleach will eat at any rubber or fiber washers. Look for an ...
Michael had a curious question. "What is an escutcheon plate, and what is it used for?"An escutcheon plate is similar to a face plate, although usually round. Its function is to cover the hole which something is inserted through. So those decorative plates in the shower that go around the fauc...
I have asked the plumber responsible for the work done whether it is normal for the laundry tub (now requires an electronic pump to drain) has water backing into it when it is rested. Approximately two inches fills the tub even after it is totally drained. Knowing very little about this stuff I h...
Broken sewage lines can cause a back-up into the house, but also cause underground pollution outside the house. They do need to be fixed as soon as it is identified that there is a problem. When the line is destroyed by crushing, or shifting ground, or a tree root that has crushed it through ex...
Changing a faucet is a simple task that you actually should do once a year, to avoid having it ever drip. The general concept is easy enough, but here are some useful working tips:Put a plug or strainer in the drain first, to catch screws and other little parts. This avoids having to extend ...
Brian in Calgary just can't get the handles off of his faucets in the shower. He has tried to pull them off until his hands are raw. When he tried to pry them, he discovered that the plumbing in the wall is not stable and the pipes move forward. He tried WD-40 and CLR to get the handles to...
George sent in his tip of using a pulley or bearing puller to get faucet handles off of the stem without having to bang them all up. He takes out the retaining screw and puts in a headless screw to give him something for the puller to push against. Then the puller just grabs the handle and you ...
Several years ago when we had my live hot line TV show across Canada, I got a call from a homeowner who had a toilet that functioned perfectly except that every night when he came home from work, the water in the bowl had dropped low enough to let the sewer gas smell into the bathroom. He ha...
Insulating hot water lines that run through a heated basement or crawl space sounds logical, but in fact it will same you little or no money. The infrequency of their use lets them cool off whether they are insulated or not, and the heat is converted to useful room heat anyway.
The exception is ...
