Frequently Asked Questions

The water level in my pool drops 1" every week. Do I have leak?

Answer: Probably not. Normal evaporation in the CSRA is 1/8" per day or 1" per week. You can click the bucket test on the home page to measure your evaporation.

I know I have a Pool leak. The pool guy told me to let is drop and it should stop at the leak  Does this work?

Answer. No. 99% of the time the water level will stop 2 feet or more above the leak. You can fill a plastic grocery bag with water. Punch a hole in the bag. Water will not leak down to the hole. Squeeze the bag. You will see more water shoot out of the bag. Head pressure in a pool works the same way. When to pool is full, there is a lot of head pressure on the sidewalls and floor. After the pool drops, the head pressure is less.

Letting a pool drop is a bad idea on every pool. Chemicals get out of balance and the pool gets dirty. You cannot find or fix a pool leak without getting in the pool. Never let your pool drop to find a leak.

I recently called on a service company to search for a leak in my hot and cold water lines. The technician came to my house and spent only about five minutes looking for the leak. Then he said I should have my home totally repiped instead of having the leak found and fixed. Apparently the plumbing is so corroded that it is not worth the headache of fixing. Is this good advice?

Answer: While it is true that plumbing can deteriorate with time, we do not generally recommend replacing all of the plumbing in your home due to the cost. When you talk about repiping a home, you have to consider that you will spend a considerable amount of money on the repipe work alone. In addition to the cost of the repipe, there is additional expense associated with the restoration work that is required on the walls that the pipes are plumbed in and through. Locating and repairing the leak is more typically around $1,200, much less than a repipe.

There are occasions when a full repipe is a good choice. For instance, we would strongly consider a repipe if there had been several leaks on the same line in a short period of time. The objective of quality leak detection is to identify the problem first and proceed to choose the best, most cost effective, and least destructive repair method.

If you want to make the best choice, you should have all of your options before you. What if the leak is outside the home? By taking incomplete advice, you might pay for a repipe of the indoor plumbing and still have the leak problem. If a company is not willing to provide you with accurate, valid information about the leak location and some reasonable repair offers, you should be concerned with the soundness of their advice.