Q.What type of saw should I use to cut a hole in the ceiling to install a bathroom vent fan? Also, can I just vent it into the attic (it is very large) without putting it through the roof? A. No! Don't vent it to the attic. All that moisture up there will spell an early doom for you roof. Not to mention rain on your insulation. If you live anywhere, where it will get cold, the moisture will condense in the cold air and rain. Vent it to the side and out an eave vent. Q. My toilet slowly overflows from the flush handle opening over night, but during the day and evening this does not happen. Can you please help me with my plumbing problems? A. Here's something to try. Take a little blue food coloring and put it into the toilet tank until the color of the water is blue. If the color of the water in the bowl turns blue, then your flapper is leaking. If there is no blue food coloring visible in the bowl, then the water is running into the overflow tube in the center of the toilet from the fill valve. After the water shuts off, remove the 1/4 inch tube from the center fill tube and see if the water continues to drip from the fill tube. If it does, then the fill valve needs to be replaced. In either case, the toilet is partially clogged or the vent is clogged because the bowl should not fill up and overflow even if the flapper and fill valve leak. Q. The kitchen sink, which is the highest trap in our house, is venting a terrible smell into the house. Is this a clogged vent? A. It could be a clogged vent or a clogged drain, both will produce the same condition that allows sewer gas to come into your home. Plumbing Pros fixes these types of plumbing problems all of the time. We are constantly removing leaves, birds' nests and squirrels' stashes from vent pipes. When you think of residential plumbing, you may not think of vent pipes. Call Plumbing Pros to clear the vent and / or drain. Plumbing Pros plumbers have experience in handling these situations. Q. Help! There's a sewer smell in the wall behind my bathroom sink. My home sits on a slab and it has no crawl space. And I've recently had the toilet seal replaced. A. Many times in older homes soil will settle under the concrete causing piping to break off under the floor. The force and pressure of the soil is enough to sever plastic and pull cast iron pipes out of the fittings. In older homes with steel piping, the threaded joints can be eaten away from corrosion and from acid-type drain cleaners. In both cases, the sewage can flow out under the concrete and create smells around and through the pipes and through cracks in the concrete. Q. How often should I have my drains cleaned? A. The length of time between each drain cleaning depends on how often you put grease and greasy food products down the line. To avoid kitchen plumbing jobs, never pour grease down the drain and use a paper towel to wipe grease from pots and pans prior to washing. Grease washed down residential plumbing will coagulate on the inside of the pipe, eventually clogging the drain line. Using a garbage disposal increases your sewer cleaning frequency. Garbage disposals deposit more sludge and debris into your piping. And many people overuse when they can simply use the garbage can to discard waste. Abuse is also common. Hard, stringy or fibrous food (such as celery, poultry skin, carrots, pumpkin pulp, etc.) should never be placed in the garbage disposal. Enzyme drain cleaners help lengthen the time between cleanings. Especially if you begin using these drain cleaning products immediately after your sewer cleaning. Q. I have a slab house and my polybutylene water main is broken under the house? A. Typically when a line breaks under the house, we abandon the old pipe and determine the simplest path to get to the main shutoff valve. Typically that involves rerouting the pipe through a utility room or doing a short directional bore under the slab. Sometimes we can move the shutoff valve and regulator to a new location, which can save some rerouting work. Q. Why does my toilet sound as though it flushed itself? A. Typically the toilet douglas valve seal has become warped and is letting water leak out of the tank. The fill valve has sensed that the toilet has been flushed and is trying to refill the tank to its proper water level. No worries, it's not a ghost, but it can waste thousands of gallons of water each year and is the number one source of water consumption in a home. Call us for service and we will dye test your toilets for free. Q. Why do we have such low water pressure? A. There can be a few reasons for this. The amount of water the utility is pumping out is one factor. Another reason is the age of your pipes and the amount of rust in them. This is the most common reason for the complaint of low water pressure. However, this is actually a water flow problem, and not a water pressure problem. There is commonly a restriction somewhere and troubleshooting is necessary to determine the cause. Elevation change, partially closed valve, failed pressure regulator (or lack thereof), plugged filter, water softeners and many other considerations, can all affect your water pressure. Again, troubleshooting is necessary to determine the cause of YOUR problem. Q. Should I drain my water heater every year? A. You could do this, but it is not necessary. The best way to protect your water heater is to change the ANODE ROD. This rod runs down the center of all good quality heaters and should be removed and changed anywhere from 2-4 years depending on how tough your water is. Contact your local plumber! This is a low cost way to maintain your water heater. Be aware: High water pressure can destroy your water heater and fixtures! Have it checked by a qualified plumber. Q. Why doesn't my old water heater work as well as it used to? A. This is usually due to a sediment buildup in your tank. As water heaters grow older, they accumulate sediment and lime deposits. If these deposits are not removed periodically, the sediment will create a barrier between the burner and the water, greatly reducing the water heater's performance level. The result is an increase in the amount of fuel required to deliver hot water. Q. Can I replace my two-handle faucet with a single-handle faucet? A. The answer in most cases is yes. Generally, faucet dimensions and sink openings are standard throughout the plumbing industry. There are few exceptions however, so it is a good idea to check sizes first. Q. My toilet keeps sweating and the dripping water is ruining the floor. What can I do? A. The water on the toilet tank is actually condensation, caused by cold water chilling the tank, which in turn draws moisture from the warm bathroom air. To stop this, purchase a kit available at a good home improvement or hardware store that allows you to mix a small amount of warm water with that going into the toilet tank.