Chapter 2
The Plumbing System in Your Home
In This Chapter
Understanding how water runs through your house
Getting information about your water meter
Figuring out your drain-waste-vent lines
Knowing the importance of shutoff valves
B efore you begin fixing leaky faucets or unclogging drains, you need to know how water gets from one place to another in your house. This chapter covers the basic plumbing system of a home, introducing you to the water meter and the gate valve. You also get a grip on the drain-waste-vent (DWV) lines, so you can toss that acronym around among your buddies and feel like a real pro.
This chapter covers the location of the main shutoff valve and the many other valves that are a part of your home’s plumbing system. These valves enable you to turn off the water supply to the particular fixture or appliance that you’re working on or having problems with. If you want to replace a sink in the bathroom, for example, you don’t have to shut off the water supply to your entire house while you do the repair. Almost all houses have a shutoff valve wherever the main water supply comes into the house, with individual shutoff valves at toilets, sinks, bathtubs, showers, and appliances, such as dishwashers and washing machines. If your house has outdoor spigots, you may need to locate the valves for those as well. Fear not — this chapter has all the information you need to locate the valves in your house before you make large or small repairs.
The Water Runs through It
You can easily understand the plumbing system of your house if you keep a few basic facts straight:
The skinny pipes bring the water in, and the fat pipes carry it out.
Leaks in the skinny pipes or in anything attached to a skinny pipe can flood a house.
Leaks in the fat pipes cause your house to stink.
Okay. Plumbing is a little more involved than that, but if you think of your house as having two different water systems — one that brings fresh water in (see Figure 2-1) and another that takes waste water out to a sewer or septic system — the maze of pipes throughout your house may start to make some sense.
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Figure 2-1: An overview of the network of the water supply pipes that are part of the water system in a house. |
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Plumbing really isn’t complicated, and modern plumbing materials, such as plastic pipes and fittings (elbows and unions), enable you to tackle home plumbing projects that only a decade ago would have been considered too difficult for do-it-yourselfers. Recognizing the growth of the do-it-yourself market, manufacturers of plumbing tools, fixtures, and materials are constantly improving their packaging and instructions.
Getting Water to Your House
Water running through the municipal water main is carried to your house by a smaller pipe that leads underground from the water main into your house. The water typically passes through three valves and a water meter on its trip to your house.
The three valves that help bring water to your house are the following:
Corporation stop: The valve at the municipal water main that’s buried underground, usually under the street, is used to turn off the water from the main to the curb stop. You’d have to dig a hole in the street to get to this valve, so you need to hire a professional if this is your plumbing problem.
Curb stop: A valve that’s somewhere between the corporation stop and your house is controlled by the municipality and is usually located close to the street. It may be in a chamber holding the water meter or in a cast-iron sleeve called a buffalo box. In northern locations, the curb stop is buried deep in the ground to prevent freezing — you need a special long-handled wrench to turn this valve on or off. In more temperate climates, this valve is located closer to the surface. Look around your property and find out where this valve is located. (The cast-iron head is a real lawnmower buster.) If you ever face a leak in the pipe between the street and your house, this is the valve to turn off. You may not be able to turn it off yourself, but you can call the city or show the plumber where it is.
Meter valve: The third valve is inside your house. This valve is usually installed just before the water meter (so if the water meter is outside, this valve may be outside, too). Whoever installed the water meter installed the valve so that the meter can be removed for servicing should it fail.
The main shutoff valve
After the water passes through the three city-installed valves, it comes to what is known as the main shutoff valve. This valve is usually in the basement or on an outside wall in a utility area of the house. The main shutoff valve allows a full flow of water through the pipe when it’s open. Turning off this valve (by turning it clockwise) cuts off the water supply to the entire house.
The main shutoff valve in your house probably has one of two designs:
Gate valve: Gate valves are very reliable and last for years, but they become difficult to turn after not being turned for years. If you haven’t closed the main shutoff valve since you moved into your house, do it now. Better to find out that you can’t turn it with your bare hands now than to wait until you’re standing in 6 inches of water.
Ball valve: Houses with plastic or copper main water pipes leading into the house may have a full-flow ball valve. This valve is open when the handle is aligned with the pipe. To close it, turn the handle clockwise 1/4 turn so that it’s at a right angle to the pipe.
The main valve is the one to stop most plumbing catastrophes, such as a burst pipe. Make sure that everyone in the household knows where this valve is located and knows how to turn it off. Turning the handle clockwise closes the valve. You need to turn the handle several turns to fully close the valve.
After you’ve closed and opened the valve, it may start to leak a bit around the valve stem. The stem of the valve is held in place with a packing nut. Tighten this nut just enough to stop the leak. Don’t overtighten it or the valve is difficult to turn again. (If you need a cheat sheet to remember which way to turn the control, use a label or tag with the simple reminder: “Right off” with an arrow pointing right, for example. See Figure 2-2.)
The water meter
If you wouldn’t mind breaking any part of the water supply system, it’s probably the water meter. Unfortunately, as water meters begin to fail, they usually run fast and record too much water usage, not the other way around. Besides, if your water meter stops, your local water company simply prorates your water usage to an average.
The meter is owned and monitored by the water company. Sometimes, the meter is buried in the ground and covered with a popup lid; it’s usually located near the front of the house or on the side of the house near the street. In a cold climate, the meter may be located inside the house, but most municipal water companies have modified inside meters so that they can be read from the outside. By using plain old arithmetic, computing the difference between last month’s reading and this month’s reading, the utility company can figure out how much water your household has consumed. Sometimes, meter readings are done on an estimated basis; other times, meter-readers prowl through your neighborhood with handheld gizmos into which they input the readings on the meters.
By comparing the reading of the water meter over a very short time, you can spot a major leak. If you turn off all the faucets (indoor and outdoor), along with any appliances that may use water (such as a dishwasher or washing machine), no water should be flowing through the meter. To check for a major leak, make sure that everything is off and then record the meter reading. Check the meter in a few minutes, and it should read the same. If the dials have moved, you have a leak.
This technique isn’t good for a minor leak, such as a dripping faucet. Eventually, the meter records the water used, but the amount is so small that it’s difficult to notice any meter movement. Don’t let the apparent lack of movement in the meter fool you, though. Over time, even a small drip, drip, drip wastes hundreds of gallons of water, which is why we devote later chapters in this book to fixing leaks.
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Figure 2-2: Label a tag on all shut-off valves showing an arrow pointing to the right (clockwise) to shut it off and to the left (counter-clockwise) to turn it on. |
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Reading a water meter
Most meters have a cover that opens when the hinged top is raised. The meter has a digital display or round dial that shows the number of gallons that have passed through the meter. The statement for a water bill reflects the total number or gallons used between the billing periods.
On the monthly or quarterly statement that comes from the water company, you can usually find an explanation of how to read the meter, so you can keep track of water usage yourself. Call your utility company and ask for directions if you’re not sure how to read your own meter.
Figuring Out Your Drain-Waste-Vent (DWV) Lines
The fat pipes in your house make up the drain-waste-vent system (also known as the DWV), carrying wastewater to a city sewer line or your private sewer treatment facility (called a septic tank and field ).
The drainpipes collect the water from sinks, showers, tubs, and appliances.
The waste pipes remove water and material from the toilet.
The vent pipes remove or exhaust sewer gases and allow air to enter the system so that the wastewater flows freely.
The drainpipes are made of cast iron, galvanized pipe, copper, or plastic (see Chapter 3 for more on materials). Local building codes that regulate the materials used in the DWV system have changed over the years, so most older homes have a combination of materials.
A typical bathroom sink is a good example of how all these components work together. You probably haven’t spent much time observing the pipes beneath your vanity, but take a look and this is what you’ll see:
Water runs down the sink drain into a p-trap (so called because it’s shaped like the letter), which fills up with water to prevent sewer gases and odors from getting into the house through the pipe. This water gets refreshed whenever more water runs through it.
A drainpipe attached to the p-trap goes into an opening in the wall.
Behind the wall (where you can’t see), a vent line and drainpipe lead to a soil stack, which is the control center of the wastewater system. Drain- pipes take the wastewater to the soil stack; through the stack, sewer gases are carried up to the roof through vent lines.
All the faucets and water appliances in a house use this same system of drains, pipes, and vents. All the waste lines have a cleanout, which is a Y-shaped fitting that’s accessible so that you can clean out any serious obstructions within the system. Figure 2-3 shows a typical system, called a plumbing tree.
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Figure 2-3: The major parts of the drainage system of a house. |
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Locating Shutoff Valves
The shutoff valve enables you to turn the water to a particular fixture or part of your house on and off. In general, shutoff valves are below or near the source of water. But unless you know where to look, the obvious isn’t always so obvious. Take a tour of all these rooms and do some serious snooping around to find the valves in your house.
In the bathroom
Most bathrooms have shutoff valves that are designed to control the water flow to the toilet, sink, and bathtub or shower. These fixture shutoff valves are also called stop valves, because they stop the water from getting to the fixture. (Hey, some plumbing terms make sense!) Knowing where each of these valves is located can save you time and energy when you’re doing plumbing repairs. We tell you just where to find them in the following sections.
The toilet
The shutoff valve beneath the toilet is one of the more accessible valves; it comes out of the wall or floor and is clearly visible (see Figure 2-4). In fact, you’ve probably seen it many times without noticing it. Just look for a handle behind your toilet.
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Figure 2-4: Toilets usually have a stop located directly below the tank. |
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Sink or vanity basin
Your sink has two valves: one for hot water and one for cold (see Figure 2-5). A wall-hung or pedestal sink has shutoff valves that are clearly accessible, but the shutoff valves for a sink in a vanity cabinet aren’t always easy to find or reach. So go on a cleaning binge, organize the bottles of shampoo and rolls of toilet paper in the cabinet under your sink, and find the shutoff valves. If you’re lucky, the valves won’t be tucked up high behind a cabinet partition. If they are, you may need to lie on your back and shine a flashlight to find them.
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Figure 2-5: Shutoff valves for both the hot and the cold water supply are usually located below the sink. |
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The bathtub or shower
Finding the shutoff valves for the bathtub or shower may take a little snooping. In most houses, one of the walls in a bathroom contains all the plumbing pipes. So look for the bathtub and shower shutoff valves on the opposite side of the wall that contains the plumbing pipes.
“How do I know which wall contains the plumbing pipes?” you may ask. The wall usually has a removable panel on the opposite side, which covers a recess in the wall and hides the pipes from view. The panel may be located in a closet, a bedroom, or a hall that’s adjacent to the bathroom. So snoop around in your closets and look for a panel like the one shown in Figure 2-6. After you find it, remove the screws holding the panel in place, and you see the backside of the tub or shower. You may or may not find a set of shutoff valves in this wall recess.
If you can’t find this panel, or you find the panel but then don’t see any valves behind it, you haven’t reached the end of your rope just yet. Many newer bathtubs and showers have shutoff valves installed behind the shower handle. Single-handle shower valves (in which you control the hot and cold water with one handle) have a cover plate sealing off a hole large enough that you can reach the shutoff valves from the bathroom side of the wall. If you remove the handle and cover, you may find shutoff valves (such as the ones shown in Figure 2-7) installed on the hot and cold lines just before they enter the valve body. If you have a double-handled shower valve, chances are that you don’t have built-in shutoff valves.
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Figure 2-6: Shutoff valves for the tub or shower may be located behind a panel. |
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Figure 2-7: Many single-handle showers have shutoff valves located in the wall, accessible behind the handle. |
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In the kitchen
The kitchen is another big place for water usage in a home. Depending on the appliances you have installed in your kitchen, you may have water running to one or two sinks, a dishwasher, and maybe an icemaker in your freezer. The following sections give you all the help you need to find the shutoff valves for these popular kitchen features so that you can get on with the task of repairing them.
The sink
The shutoff valves to the kitchen sink are located inside the base cabinet directly underneath the sink. The supply lines may either come out of the wall or emerge from the floor.
The dishwasher
If your dishwasher is next to the sink or in the same section of base cabinets as the sink, the shutoff valve is probably under the sink. Often, when a dishwasher is located near or next to the kitchen sink, the pipe leading to the dishwasher is connected to the pipe that supplies hot water to the sink. In this case, two shutoff valves control the hot water flow: One valve goes straight up to the hot water connection to the faucet, and the other goes off to the side of the dishwasher.
If the dishwasher isn’t located next to the sink, the water supply comes out of the wall or the floor. The shutoff valve is located under the dishwasher. You can get to this area by removing the kickplate cover of the dishwasher, which should pull off easily. If you have trouble removing the kickplate cover, try lifting it slightly and then pulling it out. (See your owner’s manual for specific instructions on how to remove this panel.) You should find the shutoff valve under the dishwasher, usually in the front, close to the water supply line running into the unit, as shown in Figure 2-8.
The icemaker
Your freezer’s icemaker has its own water supply, which runs through a 1/4-inch plastic or copper tube. In most cases, the tube leads to a larger pipe, where it’s connected to a shutoff valve. Follow the tube to the larger pipe and look for the valve.
If you don’t see the valve, your icemaker may work a little differently. The water supply still runs through a 1/4-inch tube, but that tube may lead to a larger pipe that has a clamp-on device, called a saddle, that has a shutoff valve on it to control the supply of water.
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Figure 2-8: The shutoff valve for your dishwasher may be located underneath the appliance. |
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In the laundry area
The laundry area is another major place in your house where you use water. Your washing machine gets its water supply from something called a hose bib, which is hooked up inside a laundry box. This box contains the water supply and the drainpipe for the washer and is usually located in the wall just behind the washer. Instead of shutoff valves, you use the handles on the hot and cold hose bibs to turn the water on and off.
In a house without a laundry box, the hot and cold water lines are usually part of a laundry tub, and the faucets are used to connect the water supply pipes to the washing machine.
In the great outdoors
If your house has an outdoor faucet, called a bib faucet or sillcock, you can find the shutoff valve, called a bib valve, in your basement or crawlspace (located in the pipe leading to the faucet). Close the bib valve and then open the bib faucet to allow the water between the bib valve and the bib faucet to run out.
A valve that’s designed to make draining the water out of the exterior portion of the pipe easier controls some bib faucets. This valve has a small, curled screw — called a waste screw — on its side. When you remove the screw, air can enter the pipe and speed the drainage. Turn the valve off, open the outside bib faucet, and then unscrew the cap on the side of the stop and waste valve. Doing so ensures that all the water drains out of the pipe. Then simply replace the cap.
Many houses have frost-proof bib faucets for which the actual shutoff valves are located well inside the house to prevent the faucets from freezing in the winter months. (See Figure 2-9.) If you have frost-proof bib faucets (also called freezeless sillcocks ), you don’t need to shut off the water at the valves inside the basement or crawlspace during the winter. Instead, these faucets have a thick pipe leading into the house. If you need to turn off the water supply for repair purposes, look for the shutoff valve at the inside end of the pipe, where it connects to the water supply pipe.
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Figure 2-9: Frost-proof bib faucets withstand winter freezing. |
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