Plumbing Repairs and Maintenance

One of the things that private owners and landlords often dislike the most are problems needing plumbing repairs, especially if these involve burst or leaking pipes, as considerable can be caused by what starts out from a relatively small leak.

We find that the majority of our plumbing call-out work is actually for running/leaking taps and toilets that will not flush or are over-flowing. In addition to general taps/toilet call-outs, we also deal with other plumbing work like guttering, downspouts, and drainage work, and we are very experienced in the plumbing aspects of property maintenance.

Other common plumbing property maintenance work includes blocked sinks, leaking baths, failing bath seals, faulty showers, leaking bath/shower screens and variety of other bathroom-based repairs. Eg. we recently had a request to replace a bath shower screen, the cost of replacement being in the region of £500 (including parts and labour) but in practice, the only problem with the existing unit was a faulty hinge and a failing shower door-seal – both were repairable at a cost of less than £120 (including call out, parts and labour).

Over the last 50 years plumbing has changed beyond recognition.  Back beyond then, all houses were plumbed using lead piping and back boilers, fed from gas/coal fires in the lounge, provided hot water. We used indirect and direct water systems and there were outside toilets with overhead flush systems. Of course, over the years we have moved onto copper piping and now very rarely see lead pipe. We have also moved onto fully-fledged central heating systems now – where previously there was a designated gas boiler that heated stored water in a cylinder, above which there was a header tank (usually in the loft) with a separate indirect water system for the toilets. Over the last 15 years the use of combination boilers has become common-place, where there is no need for header tanks and cylinders, etc. and we use plastic pipe-work now with quick fit couplings etc.  The variety of systems and their maintenance/repair requirements can be confusing for householder and/or landlords needless to say we can manage the majority of your plumbing needs.

We cover a large area around Altrincham in Cheshire, and while based in Hale, we also respond calls from areas such as Stretford,  Urmston,  Ashton on Mersey,  Northenden and Didsbury so just ask and we should be able to help.