Brooks Plumbing Co. Blog: Archive for January, 2015

Should You Include a Garbage Disposal with Your Kitchen Remodeling?

Monday, January 26th, 2015

If you’re remodeling a kitchen on a limited budget, you may look for ways that you can cut corners here and there. There are lots of ways to save money during a kitchen remodel, such as choosing an inexpensive tile, installing an energy efficient dishwasher and refrigerator, or focusing on only one area of the kitchen at a time. But one item that you cannot afford to skip over is the garbage disposal unit.

At Brooks Plumbing, we recommend you work with a contractor throughout your kitchen remodeling project so that you don’t end up missing out on any necessary plumbing equipment. Call us for your next Olympia remodeling project.

Misconceptions about the Need for Garbage Disposals

There are a couple of different misconceptions about garbage disposals that lead some homeowners—and even a few contractors—to believe that garbage disposal installation isn’t always needed. Some people think that a garbage disposal is simply unnecessary since drains seem to clog anyway or because the motor often gets stuck, but this generally happens only when you misuse the disposal.

The second misconception is that you can always install a garbage disposal later on. Attempting to save money now by leaving garbage disposal installation for another time still puts your plumbing system at risk. Even if you put in a temporary drain trap, this won’t necessarily prevent all foods from moving down the drain. Garbage disposals break up food and even some fats and oils so that you won’t end up with a serious drainage issue on your hands.

How to Properly Care for Your Garbage Disposal

If you want to make sure your garbage disposal doesn’t run into problems later on, be sure to use a professional for installation. You should also avoid dumping certain items down the drain, including fibrous foods like celery, F.O.G. (fats, oils, and grease), expandable foods like pasta and rice, and hard foods like meat bones. Run the cold water while using the disposal so that any fat and oil that does manage to move into the sink can break up more easily. Of course, you should throw non-food items in the trash, and you should always try to break large chunks of food up first.

Professional garbage installation helps to protect your plumbing and makes food preparation and cleanup much easier. Call Brooks Plumbing today to work with a plumbing specialist on your Olympia kitchen remodeling.

Tags: garbage disposal installation, Kitchen Plumbing, Kitchen Remodeling
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Plumbing Items to Consider When Remodeling Your Bathroom

Monday, January 19th, 2015

People choose to remodel a bathroom for many different reasons.

While some homeowners just want a new look and feel to the room, others remodel for practical purposes, making fixtures and storage space more accessible or installing money-saving appliances. Others remodel to take advantage of upgrades that will make their bathtubs or showers seem more relaxing and luxurious. Regardless of your reasons for upgrading, you should remember to work with a trained plumber every time you make major changes to the room.

Bathroom remodeling usually involves some level of plumbing work, and, no matter how small it may seem, it takes a professional to determine the proper placement and sealing of your new fixture and to decide if any pipe reconfigurations must be made. You may decide, for example, to install a new pedestal sink, which involves reposition the pipes so that they are fairly hidden from view. Or, you may choose to switch to a single handle design over a separate hot and cold lever for the sink, another decision which involves some plumbing knowledge for installation.

Low-Flow Toilet Installation

Another plumbing item you might consider is a low-flow toilet. If your toilet is more than a couple decades old, it probably uses more water than it needs to for a single flush. Modern low-flow toilets use only half of the water needed for flushing of older toilets because they rely on a lot of pressure to get the job done instead of high volumes of water. Some toilets also have dual flush options for liquids and solids, and the single flush setting uses even less water per flush. Installing a toilet is a big job, requiring careful sealing and knowledge of valves as well as a bit of strength to pry the old toilet out.

Finally, if you’ve decided on a new bathtub, be sure to have a plumber work with you throughout the process so that you can get the right size and shape for your bathroom remodeling project. A plumber may need to reinforce the floors, reconnect drain pipes, and hook up the new tub to the main water supply, all while checking that the new installation is in compliance with local building codes.

The friendly people at Brooks Plumbing can work with you on your Olympia bathroom remodeling project and help everything to go as smoothly as possible. Give us a call!

Tags: Bathroom Plumbing, Bathroom Remodeling, Olympia
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Kitchen Remodeling Options: Upgrading Your Fixtures

Friday, January 16th, 2015

The kitchen is a room in the home that is central to your family life or for entertaining guests. People tend to gather around the kitchen to discuss the day’s events while cooking or cleaning. The kitchen is where you can prepare the healthy meals that will help you to make a major lifestyle change or where you can bake a warm dessert to relax after a long day.

Regardless of how you enjoy your kitchen, you want a space that’s welcoming, stylish, and easy to use. And the fixtures in your kitchen can help make it easier to prepare meals and make guests feel right at home. The following guide includes a few different ways you may decide to upgrade your kitchen fixtures when you decide on kitchen remodeling.

The Sink

A central decision in how your kitchen will be designed involves the look of the kitchen sink. Perhaps you want a double bowl so that you have more room for cleanup. Or maybe you’d prefer a stylish granite single bowl to allow for more counter space. Whatever your choice, make sure you work with a skilled contractor who can decide whether some plumbing fixtures need to be moved around to accommodate this new design. If you’d like more space underneath the sink for storage, for example, you may need a plumber to install some additional piping to move the sink higher up.

Under the Sink

You may also want to think about the fixtures that will go under the sink. It’s easiest to install a garbage disposal during your new sink installation than to schedule it as an afterthought, for example. And it’s also important to think about additional plumbing installations beforehand, like an under-sink water filtration system or even a built-in soap dispenser.

The Dishwasher

Finally, when you decide to upgrade your dishwasher, you should first check with the contractor to make sure that the unit fits in with the plumbing system and is in line with your new kitchen design. A contractor is able to make the proper measurements now so that you don’t end up discovering that your original design scheme isn’t going to work after you’ve already had the unit shipped.

You should always work with a trained contractor when choosing the fixtures that will fit into your new kitchen remodeling in Lacey. Call Brooks Plumbing to talk about your remodeling needs today.

Tags: Kitchen Remodeling, Lacey
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3 Common Bathroom Plumbing Issues

Friday, January 9th, 2015

Ah, your bathroom. It can be an oasis from a long day (think long baths) or a trip to Hades if you’ve got plumbing problems. The good thing is that many bathroom plumbing repairs can be resolved rather quickly, and even if they can’t, you’ve got the experts on hand who can help you day or night: Brooks Plumbing.

Problem 1: Drain Clogs

Drain clogs are very common in bathrooms because they see a lot of use and also have to deal with two tough challenges every day: soap scum and human hair. Soap has fat in it, and when the excess soap lather heads down the drain, the soap scum clings to the piping and can harden. Combine this with hair, and you’ve got a nice clog on your hands.

Problem 2: Toilet Problems

No one really wants to think about their toilet in any kind of detail, but it is a very used item in your home and can develop problems. One of the most common problems with toilets is running. With a running toilet, the water is constantly in flow; you’ll likely hear a noise coming from the tank. The main reason toilets run is because the flush valve isn’t closing all the ways, so water from the tank keep running into the toilet’s bowl. Other common toilet problems can be clogs and slow tank fill.

Problem 3: Slow Draining Sink

Slow draining sinks are usually the harbinger of clogs to come, so if you are experiencing a slow draining sink, try to resolve the issue before it becomes a full-on clog. Slow draining sinks can be caused by objects lodged in the piping, soap scum, hair, etc. You can try to clean build-up yourself with some white vinegar and baking soda, but if this doesn’t work, call a professional.

Don’t let your plumbing problems stop you from using your bathroom. If you are experiencing plumbing problems in your bathroom, call Brooks Plumbing to schedule bathroom plumbing service in Olympia today!

Tags: Bathroom Plumbing, Olympia
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When New Year’s Day Was Not on January 1st

Thursday, January 1st, 2015

Some holidays fall on shifting calendar days for every year, such as Thanksgiving (fourth Thursday in November) and Easter (the first Sunday after the first full moon to occur on or after March 21). Other holidays, such as Valentine’s Day and Halloween, are fixed. No holiday has a more solid calendar date attached to it than New Year’s Day. It has to fall on January 1st because it celebrates the first day of a new year. That only makes sense…

…except that, like most things that at first appear obvious, there is a bit more to the story. The beginning of the year was not always on the first of January. As with an enormous numbers of traditions in the Western World, the establishment of January 1st as the inaugural day of a new year goes back to the ancient Romans.

The modern solar calendar is derived from the Roman model, but the earliest Roman calendars did not have 365 days in a year spread over 12 months. Instead, there were 304 days spread over 10 months. The Romans believed this calendar originated with the mythical founder of the city, Romulus. If Romulus were a real person, we can credit him with a poor understanding of the seasons, as this abbreviated calendar soon got out of sync with Earth’s orbit around the Sun. Numa, one of the Kings of Rome (probably also fictional) receives credit for creating a longer year with two added months, Ianuarius and Februarius, bringing the number of days in the year to 355. The new month of Ianuarius, named after Ianus (Janus in contemporary spelling), the god of beginnings, would eventually be known in English as January. But when this new calendar was instituted, January was not the first month. March, named after the god of war, remained the first month, and March 1st was New Year’s Day.

This extended calendar still did not keep in synch with the seasons. In 45 BCE, Julius Caesar instituted reforms to align the calendar correctly according to calculations of astronomers, with an additional 10 days distributed across the year. January also became set as the first month, and offerings to the god Janus on this day started the tradition we now know as New Year’s. The date still fluctuated during the ensuing centuries, with a number of Western European holy days treated as the beginning of the year instead. It wasn’t until the next calendar reform in 1582, the Gregorian Calendar, that the date of the New Year was fixed at January 1st.

However you choose to celebrate the beginning of the current calendar, everyone here at Brooks Plumbing and Air hopes you have a wonderful 2015!

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