Seven DIY Plumbing Hacks You Need to Know

Solder a Leaky Pipe

If you need to solder a copper pipe fitting while water from a leak is dripping out of the pipe, here’s an old plumber’s trick that’ll get you outta trouble. Grab a piece of white bread and shove it down as far as you can inside the pipe. The bread will stop the leak while you solder the fitting and will then (eventually) dissolve inside the pipe.

Stop a Leaky Shut-off Valve

Have a shut-off valve that doesn’t stop leaking when you close it and you don’t feel like replacing it? Here’s a neat little plumbing trick that’ll fix your problem! Get yourself a 3/8-in. inline shut off valve and piggy back it onto the old one. Then reinstall your supply line- it’s that simple.

Remove a Clogged Drain

We all know that hair is the number one culprit for a clogged shower drain. Here’s an easy way to remove any hair clogs. Get yourself a zip tie and make some slits every inch or so using a sharp utility knife. This zip tie is now a tool that can help make it easier to remove all of the hair that’s stuck in your drain.

Get Rid of Smelly Floor Drains

If you have a floor drain somewhere in a house that isn’t used much and often smells like sewer gases, here’s a quick fix that anybody could do. Just grab some vegetable oil and pour a good amount of it in the drain. Unlike water, vegetable oil doesn’t evaporate so you should be good for a while if you use this trick.

Restore Shower Head Water Pressure

If your shower head has less pressure in it than it used to, here’s a simple fix that you could do using a house-hold ingredient that’ll restore the pressure. Grab a plastic bag, fill it with white distilled vinegar and place it over the shower head with an elastic to keep it on as such for about a day. The vinegar will dissolve any mineral deposits that formed inside the head, and should give you back your original pressure.

Sticker Removal Trick

It’s pretty annoying when you’re soldering copper pipe and there’s a big sticker right in the way. Instead of trying to remove the stubborn sticker by hand, heat it up till the paper burns off and then use some flux to remove any residual glue. Now that’s a headache saver!

Fix a Nut That Won’t Thread

Have you ever cut all thread rod and found you couldn’t get a nut on the rod after the cut has been made? If you’re tired of having this happen to you, here’s a solution. Run a nut onto the rod before cutting it and then, once you’re done, just unscrew the nut and it’ll automatically rethread the cut end.

Got2learn

Julio has been a certified Canadian plumber for almost a decade and has learned a lot of plumbing techniques and tricks will serve you well. He has experience in both the commercial and residential worlds and covers a wide variety of subjects ranging from brazing to simply installing a toilet the proper way.

Julio creates about 3-4 videos a month. He tries to make his YouTube channel Got2learn both entertaining and instructional. If you think his videos are great (like hundreds of thousands of other folks do), head over to his YouTube channel and subscribe.