Ken Neyer Plumbing, Inc. Blog: Archive for March, 2018

What’s Better for Piping: Copper or Plastic?

Monday, March 19th, 2018

cut-pvc-pipesIn the ol’ days of residential and commercial plumbing, the most common materials for piping were cast iron, clay, and galvanized steel. If you have a home that was built before 1970, you may have galvanized steel pipes in many places—if not for your entire plumbing system. Even earlier-built houses (pre-World War II) can have cast iron pipes and a clay sewer line.

These are outdated materials, and if your home contains any of them, we recommend calling our expert plumbers for whole-house repiping in Cincinnati, OH or wherever you are in our wide service area. The pipe materials we use to replace aging pipes are copper and different types of plastic.

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Here’s the Biggest Myth About Plumbing

Tuesday, March 13th, 2018

wrenchesThere are so many misunderstandings about how plumbing works and how to fix problems with it that we could probably base our whole blog just on writing about them. These myths range from understandable confusions to the downright odd. Here’s some quick debunking of a few:

  • No, animals cannot swim upstream into your plumbing and out through the toilets.
  • Chemical drain cleaners are not an acceptable solution to getting rid of clogs. They can actually damage the drainpipes.
  • The kitchen disposal can’t chop up everything you put down it. Many food items and all non-organic waste need to be kept out.
  • Speaking of disposals, you can’t “sharpen the blades” of a disposal by pouring ice cubes into the hopper. Disposals don’t even use sharp blades!
  • Minor dripping faucets are a big deal: the cumulative water waste is enormous.

But we would like to focus on the biggest myth about plumbing, one that’s incredibly harmful: Most plumbing jobs are easy to fix and can be done DIY.

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A Pipe Burst! What Do I Do?

Monday, March 5th, 2018

leaking-water-pipeThe period at the end of winter is the time when plumbing pipes are at the highest danger of bursting. When any frozen pipes might start to melt from warmer weather is when the pressure in the pipe dramatically spikes and causes the lateral bursting. You always want frozen pipes dealt with by professional plumbers as soon as possible. But if you do run into a burst pipe emergency, you’re past the point of prevention or a planned remedy.

However, you shouldn’t panic. We’ll help guide you through what to do in the case of a burst pipe that is threatening to flood parts of your house.

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