Showing posts with label water. Show all posts
Showing posts with label water. Show all posts

Five Tips On Buying Water Products For Your Home

Water is the essence of life. Wise are those who incorporate water into their daily lives and environments. When purchasing water products for your home, your success can be enhanced by keeping in mind five basic features. Taking the time to understand and apply these five simple factors will save you both time and money, and will let you experience maximum pleasure and usefulness from your new water product acquisitions.

The first topic we should always consider is why are we seeking to purchase water products? Are we seeking increased health benefits, such as we might receive from owning a pool or a hot tub? Perhaps in our mind we can almost hear the sounds of water, the comforting bubbling sound of an indoor fountain or the gentle slosh and splash of tiny birds in a bird bath. We should be clear about our desire so we can better match our purchases to what we are hoping to obtain. We also need to remember to not limit ourselves, since there is nothing that says we cannot combine art and practicality, usefulness and beauty, in the water products that we add to our environment.

As we move close to making an actual purchase, we will need to check again, to measure our desire against our reality. If foremost in our minds are the health benefits of warm, swirling water and arthritis, we do not want to become lost in our pursuit of a three-tiered, cascading fountain. If our needs are for stress relief, an eight-inch tiny water display may not meet all of our expectations. Knowing what our goals are can make all the difference in our purchases making us happy for a long time to come.

The second feature to consider is size. It sounds simple but it is something we sometimes overlook, as we become excited to purchase those water products that promise to bring us both pleasure and increased health benefits. We need to first dream, and then adjust our images to fit our lives. If we live in a small garden home, no matter our love for swimming, an Olympic size pool is out of the question. We might want to turn our desires to something smaller, such as a hot tub or even a water fountain for our entry way.

If we are seeking to furnish a single room, again, our consideration of a small space to be utilized is important. We love water, we know we care about both its health and artistic qualities, but we must also realize we need to choose something that we can place within an already-furnished room. We might select a small desk-top fountain or even a decorative spring-water dispenser.

The third feature, after defining our desires and the sizes we can accommodate, should probably be financial. What can we truly afford, and how can we best maximize our purchases? In this area, we are lucky, since we live in an age of unprecedented opportunities to save money, through the use of the internet. Not only can we use the internet to make cost comparisons and therefore make wiser purchasing decisions, we can actually order via the internet, often savings ourselves a significant amount of money. And we do not need to limit these purchases to small items anymore, since such large items as water beds, hot tubs and above-ground pools, can all be ordered, often at considerable savings, from the comfort of our own computer.

Within the arena of economy, we need to think of our desires, and the best way we can afford to allow these desires to materialize. If we are thinking of spending a large amount of money, we should explore both financing and outright purchasing options. Waiting a few months, until we can afford to purchase outright, may, in the long run, save hundreds of dollars in interest costs. Or shopping for a low-interest loan may allow us to have our desire right away, paying for it slowly over time. Just as we strive to match our desire to the size of our environment, we should also match our investment to our ease and ability to pay for it.

Fourth, we should consider maintenance. Is what we are purchasing going to require daily or periodic care, and if so, can we do the maintenance, or will we need to hire someone else to do it? What will the maintenance costs be and are we prepared financially to assume them? No matter how beautiful the desire, an unclean pool or a dirty water fountain quickly lose their appeal. On the other hand, with careful planning, maintenance need not be an obstacle, as long as we are prepared and aware of its implications.

Last in our list of features to consider as we bring more water into our home, is the flexibility of what we are buying and how we can use it. From a table fountain to a hot tub, we are not limited to a single use. The hot tub, for instance, when not being used for recreation or healthy exercises, can be decorated with floating flowers and candles. It can become an artistic center piece to a small home party or get-to-gather. Our table fountain can be moved to a different area of our home, and surrounded with pictures of a birthday celebrant, complete with tiny stars scattered about, and packages holding birthday surprises. Our most important thing to remember may be the very idea that we are not limited, in either our choices or our uses of water products. Matching this knowledge while paying careful attention to the main features of purchasing water products brings our environment closer to being the haven we know it can be.

Determining And Fixing Plumbing Noises In Your Home

To diagnose noisy plumbing, it is important to determine first whether the unwanted sounds occur on the system's inlet side-in other words, when water is turned on-or on the drain side. Noises on the inlet side have varied causes: excessive water pressure, worn valve and faucet parts, improperly connected pumps or other appliances, incorrectly placed pipe fasteners, and plumbing runs containing too many tight bends or other restrictions. Noises on the drain side usually stem from poor location or, as with some inlet side noise, a layout containing tight bends.

Hissing

Hissing noise that occurs when a faucet is opened slightly generally signals excessive water pressure. Consult your local water company if you suspect this problem; it will be able to tell you the water pressure in your area and can install a pressurereducing valve on the incoming water supply pipe if necessary.

Thudding

Thudding noise, often accompanied by shuddering pipes, when a faucet or appliance valve is turned off is a condition called water hammer. The noise and vibration are caused by the reverberating wave of pressure in the water, which suddenly has no place to go. Sometimes opening a valve that discharges water quickly into a section of piping containing a restriction, elbow, or tee fitting can produce the same condition.

Water hammer can usually be cured by installing fittings called air chambers or shock absorbers in the plumbing to which the problem valves or faucets are connected. These devices allow the shock wave created by the halted flow of water to dissipate in the air they contain, which (unlike water) is compressible.

Older plumbing systems may have short vertical sections of capped pipe behind walls on faucet runs for the same purpose; these can eventually fill with water, reducing or destroying their effectiveness. The cure is to drain the water system completely by shutting off the main water supply valve and opening all faucets. Then open the main supply valve and close the faucets one at a time, starting with the faucet nearest the valve and ending with the one farthest away.

Chattering or Screeching

Intense chattering or screeching that occurs when a valve or faucet is turned on, and that usually disappears when the fitting is opened fully, signals loose or defective internal parts. The solution is to replace the valve or faucet with a new one.

Pumps and appliances such as washing machines and dishwashers can transfer motor noise to pipes if they are improperly connected. Link such items to plumbing with plastic or rubber hoses-never rigid pipe-to isolate them.

Other Inlet Side Noises

Creaking, squeaking, scratching, snapping, and tapping usually are caused by the expansion or contraction of pipes, generally copper ones supplying hot water. The sounds occur as the pipes slide against loose fasteners or strike nearby house framing. You can often pinpoint the location of the problem if the pipes are exposed; just follow the sound when the pipes are making noise. Most likely you will discover a loose pipe hanger or an area where pipes lie so close to floor joists or other framing pieces that they clatter against them. Attaching foam pipe insulation around the pipes at the point of contact should remedy the problem. Be sure straps and hangers are secure and provide adequate support. Where possible, pipe fasteners should be attached to massive structural elements such as foundation walls instead of to framing; doing so lessens the transmission of vibrations from plumbing to surfaces that can amplify and transfer them. If attaching fasteners to framing is unavoidable, wrap pipes with insulation or other resilient material where they contact fasteners, and sandwich the ends of new fasteners between rubber washers when installing them.

Correcting plumbing runs that suffer from flow-restricting tight or numerous bends is a last resort that should be undertaken only after consulting a skilled plumbing contractor. Unfortunately, this situation is fairly common in older houses that may not have been built with indoor plumbing or that have seen several remodels, especially by amateurs.

Drainpipe Noise

On the drain side of plumbing, the chief goals are to eliminate surfaces that can be struck by falling or rushing water and to insulate pipes to contain unavoidable sounds.

In new construction, bathtubs, shower stalls, toilets, and wallmounted sinks and basins should be set on or against resilient underlayments to reduce the transmission of sound through them. Water-saving toilets and faucets are less noisy than conventional models; install them instead of older types even if codes in your area still permit using older fixtures.

Drainpipes that do not run vertically to the basement or that branch into horizontal pipe runs supported at floor joists or other framing present particularly troublesome noise problems. Such pipes are large enough to radiate considerable vibration; they also carry significant amounts of water, which makes the situation worse. In new construction, specify cast-iron soil pipes (the large pipes that drain toilets) if you can afford them. Their massiveness contains much of the noise made by water passing through them. Also, avoid routing drainpipes in walls shared with bedrooms and rooms where people gather. Walls containing drainpipes should be soundproofed as was described earlier, using double panels of sound-insulating fiberboard and wallboard. Pipes themselves can be wrapped with special fiberglass insulation made for the purpose; such pipes have an impervious vinyl skin (sometimes containing lead). Results are not always satisfactory.

 
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