Your pipes deal with thousands of gallons of water every single year, which means that they get a lot of use every single day. There are many different things that can cause them to start to leak. We wanted to help out our customers and put together a quick list of some of the most common causes of plumbing leaks.
- Poor installation – One of the most common causes of pipe leaks is bad installation work. This is particularly true for slab leaks. While copper is a great material for piping because it resists corrosion, it is also fairly soft. If the copper water pipes that the home builder buried in your slab get dented, those bumps can eventually wear into holes from all the water moving over them.
- Corrosion – In order to properly seal copper pipes, your plumber will melt a metal paste referred to as “flux” into the joints that seals the two pipes together. While copper does resist rust and corrosion, flux does not. Over time and depending on the composition of your home’s water, it can rust or corrode and start to leak.
- Ground shift – If you’ve recently had an earthquake in your area it could have caused a shift in the ground which might put pressure on your pipes and cause them to leak. Also, if it has been dry in your area for a long time, it could also cause shifts in the ground.
- Old age- Finally, another cause of leaking pipes is just old age. It is an unfortunate fact of life that everything eventually breaks down over time. It could be that your pipes are dried out and cracked or that the fittings are leaking from old age.
Whatever the cause, you always want leaking pipes fixed fast. When you need a Cleveland plumber, just call the specialists at Pompeii’s Plumbing and Heating.
