Unless you’re personally in the plumbing industry on a daily basis, it’s safe to say there are more than a handful of various plumbing components that the average homeowner isn’t going to be too familiar with. And while for the majority of time, this is perfectly fine, there are likely going to be a few occasions where it wouldn’t hurt to know what’s what. As has always been the case with our blog, we generally like to provide tips to homeowners that will keep their plumbing system running more efficiently and without consistent repairs. After all, if you’re going to experience plumbing issues, it’s always better for them to be minor issues rather than major emergencies!
On this week’s blog, we’re going to walk you through a handful of different plumbing pieces that you may or may not know of. Chances are many of these will be items that you’ve seen before, but either didn’t know the name of or were unaware of its general purpose in the grand scheme of things! Before we jump into all of that plumbing lingo though, we would first like to give a warm welcome to any first-time blog visitors. Our business, Stine-Nichols Plumbing, is a residential and commercial plumbing company based out of North Kansas City, MO. We currently serve the entire Kansas City area, as well as just about every surrounding city. If you live near KC and are in need of some plumbing help, don’t hesitate to click the link HERE to get in touch with one of our plumbing experts. Now…back to the topic at hand, unique plumbing components!
Wall Hydrant
The first plumbing component that we’ll discuss is actually the one pictured on this blog’s thumbnail. No matter if it be on the residential or commercial side, hydrants are something that’s in a plumber’s regular vocabulary. As you can likely guess, wall hydrants are generally installed on the exterior of one’s house and allows you to access water while outdoors. Many of the more popular options are also categorized as being frost-proof or freeze-less. In addition, you’ll also find some wall hydrants come with a key that allows you to open or close the valve when you need to use the water source. This helps prevent any unapproved usage of water. All in all, a wall hydrant certainly serves a rather simplified role, but nonetheless is something you’ll see just about everywhere!
T&P Valve & Discharge Pipe
Water heaters are undoubtedly composed of quite a few important pieces. We’ve touched on many of these in prior blog posts, but I’ll just highlight one that serves a very important safety role. Generally installed on the side of your heater (towards the top of it), you’ll see a valve that comes out and has a pipe connected to it which runs down the side of your tank. This is referred to as a temperature & pressure relief valve and the discharge pipe. While there’s a long discussion we can have about the specifics of these parts, we’ll focus on their primary responsibility here. Essentially, the T&P valve is there to serve as a safety feature if the temperature were to get too hot or the pressure to get too high. If this happened, it would release water via the discharge pipe. Long story short, it can help prevent your water heater from causing a major plumbing emergency!
P-Trap
If you’ve ever had your local plumber out to look at an issue underneath your sink, there’s a possibility they might have mentioned the term, p-trap. Without a doubt, it’s an integral part of your home’s plumbing system and if you want to see one first-hand, open the cabinets under your sink and look for a u-shaped pipe. A p-trap has a few different responsibilities in its role within one’s plumbing system. First and foremost, it’s in charge of preventing sewer gasses from making their way into your home by holding water to act as a barrier. As you can likely guess, sewer gas poses a few different risks, so the p-trap’s ability to prevent them from entering the house is extremely important. In addition to this, p-traps can also catch debris before they get even farther along in the drain. If you happen to accidentally drop a piece of jewelry down the drain, this could easily save the day!
While p-traps are an invaluable piece to one’s plumbing system, that doesn’t mean they’re invincible. As is the case with any other plumbing fixture or component, they can also experience issues from time-to-time. One of the most common instances of this is a dry p-trap. Whether that be due to a drain not being used, evaporation or a few other factors, p-traps can go dry and when this happens, you’re leaving yourself susceptible to sewer gasses getting inside. Other instances where p-traps can fail include when they either are leaking or have a significant clog causing the drain to run much slower than normal. In any case, if you’re unsure of the appropriate actions to take, p-trap repair or replacement is definitely a service you can leave up to your local plumbing professional.
Aerator
An aerator is actually a term used to describe a couple of different things. For some, the first thing that comes to mind could be a lawn aerator. However, on today’s blog, we’ll be looking at an aerator from the perspective of a faucet. While faucets serve a rather straightforward purpose, they are certainly a little more complex than you may initially think. You can almost describe an aerator as a screen that’s screwed onto the end of your faucet. One of its most critical responsibilities is in regards to water conservation. We’ve talked about low-flow plumbing fixtures a few different times on our blog and it goes without saying that it’s truly amazing how much less water is used nowadays on routine daily activities. Well, faucet aerators do just that, by still allowing you to have an adequate amount of water while reducing the overall volume of water.
And as we mentioned with p-traps above, aerators may require a little bit of maintenance every now and then. Luckily, this maintenance is about as easy as you get. Over time, it’s not uncommon to experience some sediment build-up on the aerator, which may impact the water pressure you’re seeing. In order to clean it, you’ll just need to unscrew the aerator and then let it soak in vinegar for a few hours. After this, you should be able to poke out the build-up with a toothpick. And just like that, you should soon see an immediate improvement!
Your Local Plumbing Pros in Kansas City
As a plumbing business that offers residential services, we have had the opportunity to witness first-hand a variety of plumbing issues. It could be as simple as clearing a clogged garbage disposal or as extensive as a complete bathroom remodel. However, no matter what the problem may be, we take pride in providing reliable and long-lasting plumbing solutions. We hope you enjoyed this blog post highlighting a few plumbing components that don’t always get talked about as much. While we always love talking about water heaters, faucets, water softeners and so on as a whole, there are quite a few smaller components that are still very important to the overall process.
If you live near the Kansas City area and are needing some assistance with a plumbing project, we would be happy to help! To request a free quote or speak with a member of our team, simply fill out the form HERE or give us a call at (816) 348-3481. We look forward to hearing from you.