Pipe Just Burst in Salt Lake City? Shut This Off First

A burst or leaking pipe in Salt Lake City is not always stopped by the valve people are told to reach for, because a house on an irrigated lot in this valley carries more than one water line and only one of them is what anybody thinks of as plumbing. There is the supply feeding the fixtures, there is a branch feeding the lawn, and there is a pencil-thin line feeding the furnace. All three are live, and two of them are behind valves most households have never touched.

Key Takeaways: More Than One Line in the House Is Carrying Water

• Water first, power second, then the branch lines. A wet finished lower level and a live circuit are a worse combination than a few more gallons.
• The valve where the service enters the lower level is the main shutoff in most houses here, and in pre-war stock it is an old gate valve that may not seat all the way.
• The lawn irrigation branch can tee off ahead of that valve, so the house can be shut down while the sprinkler side is still under pressure.
• The furnace humidifier runs on a small saddle-tapped line and weeps into the cabinet it is bolted to, which is a real leak with no pipe visible above it.
• A failure on the buried sprinkler zones drains into the soil and never reaches the house, so it reads as a soft patch of lawn rather than as a stain.
• Open the lowest fixture after closing the main so the standing column of water in the pipes has somewhere to go besides the break.
• If none of the interior valves hold, the meter box out at the park strip has the one that will.
• Roto-Rooter is fully licensed and insured and answers Salt Lake City calls 24/7, 365 days a year.

Three Valves in a Salt Lake City House, and Which One Stops a Burst Pipe

Do these in order. Steps one and two are the difference between a repair and a claim.

1. Close the valve where the water service comes through the wall of the lower level. It is usually within a few feet of where the pipe enters, on the side of the building that faces the street. Turn it clockwise as far as it will go. In older houses this is a gate valve that has not moved in decades, and a stem that spins freely without resistance means it is not sealing, so keep going down this list.
2. Cut power to the circuits serving the wet area. Do it from a panel you can reach without standing in water. Outlets near the floor, a furnace, and anything plugged in downstairs come off before anyone starts pulling up carpet or reaching behind an appliance.
3. Close the sprinkler branch valve as well. There is usually a separate valve for the irrigation line, either beside the main or a short distance along the same run, and on many lots the branch is teed in upstream of the house valve. If the main is closed and you can still hear water moving, this is the reason.
4. Open the lowest fixture in the building and let the pipes drain. A closed system still holds a column of water and gravity will push the rest of it out through the split. A laundry tub or a basement shower gives it an easier exit than the hole in the pipe.
5. Lift the meter box lid at the park strip and watch the dial. The small sweep hand or the leak indicator should be completely still once everything is closed. If it is turning, water is going somewhere, and the curb valve in that box is the last one between your house and the main.

Two Water Systems on One Salt Lake City Lot, and the Valve That Stops Each

Nearly every lot in this valley is watered, which means the property carries a second piping system that is fed from the same municipal service as the kitchen sink and answers to a completely different valve.

The tee for it sits near where the service comes into the building, and on a great many lots it is upstream of the interior main. That single detail is why a household can close what it was told is the main shutoff and still hear water running. The isolation valve for the irrigation side is usually within arm's reach of the main, sometimes on the opposite side of the same run of pipe, and it is the one nobody has ever been shown.

Where the failure turns up depends on which part of that second system gave way. The brass assembly against the outside wall is above ground, so a split there is loud and obvious and puts water down the side of the building. The buried zone piping is the opposite: it empties straight into the soil, reaches nothing indoors, and announces itself as a corner of lawn that stays soft with the system switched off, a zone that will not build pressure, or a usage figure that climbed with nothing visible to explain it.

Find both valves on a day when nothing is wrong, and label them. Then close both together, every time, rather than assuming one covers the other.

The Furnace Humidifier Is a Water Leak With No Pipe Above It

Winter air in this valley is dry enough that most forced-air systems here carry a humidifier bolted to the side of the furnace, and that unit is plumbed. It is the least plumbing-looking piece of plumbing in the building, which is precisely why it runs unnoticed for months.

It is fed by a small line, sometimes as fine as a quarter of an inch, taken off a nearby copper run with a saddle tap. Saddle taps weep as they age, because the seal is a rubber washer clamped against a pierced pipe rather than a soldered or threaded joint. The line itself goes brittle where it passes close to the plenum and the summer heat of the furnace cabinet. And the unit drains as well as fills, through a tube into the same standpipe or floor drain everything else uses, which blocks with scale and sends the overflow back into the cabinet.

So the signature is a puddle with no pipe above it. Rust blooming on the top of the furnace, a damp ring on the concrete under one corner, or a stain that appears in summer when the humidifier is not even supposed to be running are all the same finding. Households look at ceilings for a week before anybody looks at the box on the side of the furnace.

Isolating it takes seconds. There is a small shutoff at the saddle tap itself, and closing that takes the humidifier out of the picture entirely without touching anything else in the building.

Frequently Asked Questions About Burst or Leaking Pipes, Sprinklers and Humidifiers

The main valve is closed and I can still hear water moving. What did I miss?

Two likely answers. The valve is a gate valve that is no longer seating, which is common in older houses and easy to confirm because the stem turns without resistance and the flow never fully stops. Or the leak is on a branch that tees in ahead of that valve, which is how the irrigation line is piped on a great many properties here. Close the sprinkler valve, and if the sound continues, go out to the meter box and shut it at the curb.

One corner of the lawn stays soft with the system switched off. Is that a pipe?

It is worth treating as one. Buried irrigation piping that has failed keeps wetting the ground long after the controller has been turned off, because the branch is still under house pressure up to its isolation valve. Close that valve and give it two or three dry days. If the patch firms up, the leak is on the irrigation side. If it stays wet, the water is arriving from somewhere else and the buried service line is the next thing to look at.

There is water on top of the furnace and no pipe anywhere near it. Where is that coming from?

Look at the humidifier. The supply line into it is small, the saddle tap that feeds it weeps as it ages, and the drain from the unit can block and back up into the cabinet. It is a slow leak rather than a dramatic one, which is why it usually turns up as rust on the furnace top or a damp patch on the concrete rather than as a stain on a ceiling.

The humidifier line has been weeping into the furnace cabinet for a while. How is that quoted?

What the water reached decides it. Replacing a saddle tap and a length of small tubing is one thing, and a furnace cabinet that has been rusting quietly for a season is another, because the heating equipment then needs its own look from somebody who works on furnaces. Roto-Rooter provides on-site estimates before any work begins.

How do I find the irrigation valve if nobody has ever pointed it out?

Start at the point where the water service enters the building and follow the pipe. The irrigation tee is usually within a few feet of the main shutoff, with its own handle, and the pipe leaving it heads for an outside wall rather than up into the building. If nothing near the main looks like it, the other place to look is directly inside the wall the brass assembly stands against outdoors.

Call Roto-Rooter With the Sprinkler Valve Closed Too

When you book, say which valves you have already closed and whether the meter dial stopped, because that narrows the search before anyone arrives. You can schedule online or start at the Salt Lake City plumbers page. If water is running now and none of the valves will hold it, Salt Lake City emergency plumbing is the line to use rather than a booking form.