Easy plumbing tips to help you avoid spending money on a professional

While there are times when calling a plumber is inevitable, many plumbing issues can be avoided entirely with a bit of thoughtful preventative care. Following just a few plumbing tips when dealing with your toilet, sinks and showers can make a big difference in how well your plumbing functions. Be careful what goes into your pipes, clean with simple and environmentally-safe methods, and always deal with issues immediately rather than allowing problems to fester. Here are 10 more tips for keeping plumbing utilities in healthy shape.

10 Plumbing Tips to Keep Your Pipes Tight and Unclogged

1. Be careful what you flush!  Avoid flushing feminine hygiene products, paper towels, baby wipes, or pretty much anything other than toilet paper. This may seem like an obvious one but you’d be surprised what people attempt to put down their toilets!  Being careful with what you flush goes double if you have a septic system.

2. Do your best to minimize the amount of hair that makes its way down your shower drain. Wipe out your drain after every shower, or shave your legs in the bath and it will collect around the sides when the water drains, easy to wipe away with a piece of toilet paper.

3. Clean all drains frequently with this environmentally-safe standby – Shake baking soda down and around drain, then slowly pour in vinegar.

4. Don’t pour cooking oils or other fats down your sink. Instead, let fats solidify after cooking and scrape into the trash.

5. Avoid bumping the pipes under your sink. If you must keep a trash can or other things in the space below your sink, be careful moving them around.

6. To keep your garbage disposal running smoothly, avoid putting the following down your sink: Absorbent foods like rice and pasta (which can expand in size), banana or potato peels, coffee grounds, eggshells, fibrous foods like celery or onion skins, large bones, excess fat and grease.

7. Run warm water when you run your garbage disposal. Let the water run for a few seconds after you turn off the disposal. Every now and then, run a handful of ice cubes down your garbage disposal to help keep blades sharp.

8. Running citrus peels through the disposal will help clean blades and get rid of odors.

9. Repair problems early. Even a tiny leak can cause excess moisture, leading to all sorts of bigger problems.

10. Avoid flooding — Educate yourself on the whereabouts of your home’s main shutoff valve.

These simple plumbing tips should help keep your plumbing happy. Treat your household plumbing with care and take care of minor problems immediately, before they become major problems. If you notice a problem without an obvious fix, or if a small problem is quickly escalating into a big one, it’s probably time to give your local experts a call. Professional plumbers have the training and experience to handle many problems that your D.I.Y. attempt may unfortunately just make worse.