Ken's Plumbing | Blog

Do you dream of a comfortable yard filled with mature shade trees in the summer and a show of foliage in the fall? Trees are a beautiful addition to your home’s landscape. But as with many things in life, keeping trees comes with a price—in this case, occasional maintenance costs.

You probably know the importance of keeping branches trimmed away from your roof. But did you also know that root growth can spell (expensive!) trouble for your home’s plumbing if left unchecked?

Tired of the sound of your toilet running long after you flush it? Not only is this common household plumbing issue annoying, but it can waste up to 200 gallons or more of water in a single day. That comes out to about wasted 6,000 gallons a month—waste that you have to pay for!

Thankfully, a running toilet is often a simple and inexpensive fix that many cases you can handle yourself. So stop throwing your money down the toilet and get ready for a little DIY home maintenance:

In a previous post, we covered how to repair a dripping tub faucet. Now we’re going to turn our attention to another common household issue—a leaky kitchen faucet!

In many cases, stopping an annoying drip for a kitchen faucet is simple enough for you to handle yourself without the help of a plumber. Here’s how to tackle it:

Tired of the shower going cold before you finish, or trying to ration the hot water among multiple family members every morning? Perhaps you should consider a tankless water heater.

Rather than keeping a finite amount of heated water in storage, as a traditional water heater does, a tankless heater heats water on demand, by running cold water through a pipe heated with an electric or gas-powered unit.

To determine whether a tankless heater is for you, let’s look at some of the pros and cons for installing this appliance.

If you want to have a satisfying career, you have to spend four years in college racking up tons of student debt—right?

Not necessarily.

In fact, in today’s post-Recession economy, it’s the skilled trades—those that require only technical training—that are in the greatest demand, and they often offer a more satisfying (and financially smarter) career path.

Here’s why:

Skilled trades are in high demand

As Mike Rowe (host of the show Dirty Jobs) points out, unemployment for college graduates is extremely high, with many never ending up with jobs in the fields they studied for.

Dripping tub faucet driving you crazy? Even if the incessant sound doesn’t keep you up at night, the constant drip can cause staining in your tub, plus waste water—up to 20 gallons a day!

Instead of letting that money go down the drain, take care of the problem right away. If you’re in the mood for a DIY project, grab your plumbing toolbox and get ready to do some work.

In previous articles, we’ve discussed items that should never go down your kitchen sink or other drains. At the top of this list are fats, oils and greases (sometimes abbreviated as FOG).

What makes these kinds of substances so bad for your plumbing?

Well, in addition to being harmful for the environment (large amounts of oil and grease are very difficult for water treatment plants to remove from the water system), the main issue to worry about is the likelihood of creating very nasty clogs.

Need to keep cool this summer WITHOUT cranking up the AC? Perhaps you’re trying to save money by conserving energy, you’re spending lots of time in the great outdoors, or you’ve been working outside and want relief from the heat now.

One of the best tools for beating the heat quickly is something most of us are blessed to have access to at all times: clean, fresh water.   

Even if you don’t have your own backyard pool, you can still use water tricks to keep you cool around your house and yard:

Are you frustrated with your water heater frequently experiencing leaks? Have you found yourself in a constant cycle of replacing water heaters without understanding the root cause of the issues? If this sounds familiar, it’s time to consider the installation of a water heater expansion tank.

Want to keep your bathroom clean but don’t want to expose your family to harsh chemicals and unpleasant vapors? While commercial cleaning products are popular because they do work well, you can swap them out with natural cleaning products that are gentler on your bathroom fixtures and better for your health.

Sometimes natural solutions take a little more elbow grease to reach sparkling perfection, but on the plus side, they’re easy (and cheap!) to make.

Here are some natural cleaner recipes for keeping your bathroom clean: