How to Find Water Leak in House

The water supply and drainage system in your house is made of an extremely complicated network of pipes and drains. In most cases, piping is done with the help of plastic or metal pipes. Based on the function of pipes, we can broadly classify them into two types, namely, the supply pipes and drainage pipes. The mechanism of supply pipes starts from the supply valve that is found in a small chamber outside your house. This pipe is connected to a ground tank from which water is pumped to the tank on the roof top. The water can be used. Some houses do not have a ground level tank. The drainage or sewer is then collected into the sewer pipe, which dumps the waste water into the community sewer that is laid underneath your street. If you suspect that your water bills are rising substantially then you will need to see if you find a water leak in your house.

How to Check for a Water Leak

There are some simple techniques and tricks that will help you to find water leak points. If you do find a leak, repairing it should be your first priority in your home improvements list. Here's what you can do when you find water leak in house.

Check the Leak Indicator
Freshwater comes into your house through a pipeline that is provided by the local government. A small chamber with a water meter is constructed on this line. You can look for such a chamber which probably lies somewhere between the community valve and the ground level tank. In many cases, especially during harsh winters you will find that water is leaking near the water meter or the community valve, due to ice formation and frozen pipes. In cases where you want to find water leak in house, you can start at the water meter itself. Within the water meter you will find that apart from the indicator, you have a triangular disk which is known as the leak indicator. In case you have a leak, this disk keeps spinning. Thus, checking the leak indicator is your step number one.

Check for Plumbing Problems
Next obtain a plumbing diagram of your house and follow each and every line from its origin at the roof tank till its outlet such as the flush, tap, etc. If any pipeline has sprung a leak, you will find that the walls around it have become moist and damp. Carry a torch with you and check the joints and links that are attached to make the entire pipeline. Damage to joints is a common cause of leakage.

Food Color Experiment
Next you will have to check all the valves in your house. For this you can use the food color. A simple example is that of the rubber valve in your toilet reservoir. In order to find water leak in house, you will have to first flush the toilet and drain off the entire reservoir. Then pour down the food color into the reservoir and wait. If the color of water in the main drain off bowl changes, you need a valve replacement. You can also try out the same thong with the main roof tank. Shut off all the taps and valves in the house and pour some quantity of food color into the tank and then scan all pipelines for the presence of the color. Use some bright color such as red or yellow.

If you follow these steps patiently and carefully it would not be very difficult to look for leakages. In order find water leakage in house, it would be advisable if you arm yourself with an architectural plan and the plumbing map of your house. I hope finding water leaks in house and detecting plumbing problems will be easy now. Keep a check on leakage problems and prevent wastage of water. Save water, it is precious.