Why Should You Avoid Temporary Pipe Repairs?

Plumbing leaks are both damaging and inconvenient. When a pipe in your home fails, it will often create a mess and, at best, prevent you from using one or more fixtures. If you don't catch the leak quickly, you may even discover substantial water damage to your house's flooring, walls, and cabinetry. The sooner you stop the leak, the less likely you'll experience these serious long-term consequences.

Unfortunately, homeowners often try to save money by repairing leaking pipes quickly and temporarily. These repairs are rarely durable and can lead to more severe issues or even make it more challenging for a plumber to locate and repair the problem. If you're considering using plumber's tape, putty, or a similar product to repair a leak, here are four reasons to contact an emergency plumber instead.

1. You Might Cause More Damage

Not all products are suitable for all plumbing materials. In particular, plumber's putties may react with certain metals. These reactions can prevent the putty from forming a watertight bond or even cause damage to the piping material. In a worst-case scenario, you might create a larger leak and cause more damage.

2. Pressure Can Destroy Temporary Repairs

While leaks from faucets or drains typically involve little pressure, supply pipes are a different issue. Using rescue tape (self-sealing silicone tape) on these pipes will require you to shut off the water supply and hope for the best once you turn it back on. Unfortunately, a high-pressure leak from a water supply pipe can potentially ruin these seals, allowing the pipe to leak again quickly.

3. You May Wake Up to Significant Water Damage

You've successfully applied rescue tape to your leak and are ready to turn in for the night, confident that you can contact a plumber in the morning. Unfortunately, temporary repairs can often fail suddenly and without warning. If your quick repair fails in the middle of the night, you may wake up to discover a huge mess underneath your "repair."

4. You Can Create Additional Problems

Certain types of leaks, such as pinhole leaks in copper pipes, result from water finally breaking through a weakened portion of corroded metal. If the internal corrosion is worse than you realize, sealing the leak may create enough pressure to cause additional leaks to form, creating a bigger mess. In many cases, plumbers need to replace whole copper piping sections once pinhole leaks appear.

While a quick, temporary repair might seem like an easy way to avoid a disaster, these fixes can often create more serious problems. When your plumbing springs a leak, contacting an emergency plumber is usually the safest option to avoid potentially costly water damage.

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