One nightmare scenario that will play through a homeowner’s mind sooner or later is none other than a gas leak. Depending on the gas, you could have a leak and not even notice it until the people in your home are sick—this is especially true of carbon monoxide. But there are plumbers who specialize in pinpointing the exact location of gas leaks, the nature of the gas leaks, their causes, and how to implement their solutions. Cary, North Carolina, gas leak expert Chris Kousis of CK’s Plumbing & Backflow, LLC, has much to say about detecting and fixing gas leaks.
Even though some gases are not detectable by our noses, Kousis maintains that the quickest way to discover a leak “is that you’ll smell it.” Of course, Kousis is referring to gases that people can smell. For example, Kousis can tell if there is a gas leak on the lines that lead to your stove.
But for those times when a plumber is suspicious of a gas leak but can’t smell anything amiss, there is electronic equipment. “We generally call ‘em sniffers,” Kousis says about these specialized plumbers’ machines. He nicknamed them that way because they detect the gas “that’s too small to sniff yourself.” Plumbers also use soapy solutions to find out where leaks are exactly. Special bubble solutions, using a thick soapy water, are applied to every joint in the piping. “If bubbles are visible after application of the solution, then you got a leak! It’s pretty much that simple,” says Kousis.
Then comes the task of mending the leaky pipe. The tactics plumbers use will depend on the kind of piping materials that are damaged. For instance, black steel is a popular material for piping. With black steel piping that has a leak, Kousis says, plumbers will probably have to completely cut away and remove the damaged pipe and replace it in full. With copper piping, plumbers can fix the section where the leak is located. They have to “re-flare it and put it back together correctly,” says Kousis. That means they work on re-forming the piping in front of them in such a way that closes up the leak. Then there’s the “track pipe”—this is a new brand item that has been around for eight or nine years now. It’s made of corrugated stainless steel.
Kousis’s piping of choice when CK’s Plumbing & Backflow, LLC is patching up leaky pipes is either black steel or copper. “I just think it’s better piping.” Corrugated steel piping is “just not something I’d put in my own house, so I don’t want to put it in any other houses,” says Kousis.
What’s certain is that as a homeowner, it’s best to have a vocabulary of the different kinds of piping so that you’ll understand what choices a plumber has to make. Cary, North Carolina, plumbing expert Kousis knows well what piping is available, and what piping he prefers. But whether an electronic leak “sniffer” is needed or soapy solution should be used, you’ll know what plumbers are doing when they come in to detect and fix a gas leak.