We are having a nightmare right now and we are feeling really sorry for ourselves, so much so I could cry.
A couple of nights ago I spotted some water on the hall laminated floor and I thought the dog had peed as he pees but then we realised it wasn’t the dog at all. We have water coming up from our floor and it’s spread from the hallway to the kitchen.
We have check everything, our washer, our boiler, our freezer, fridge and nothing is leaking so it has to be coming from a burst pipe under the floor.
I can’t believe this is happening and so near Christmas.
My husbands anxiety levels are through the roof as he doesn’t deal with stress anymore like he used to.
I’m so worried about getting ripped off, its going to be a big job and I know it’s going to cost a lot of money. Yes we have insurance but the plumber says we will probably only be able to claim the damage to our floor, not for the actual work as well.
It’s clear water, not sewage so at least it doesn’t smell but it’s squelching and so worrying. Plumber can’t get here till tomorrow as he’s in London on a job back tomorrow.
If your own water pressure hasn’t gone down and if your central heating system is working ok; boiler water level not reduced…could it be possible that it’s a Thames Water Board pipe? I’d give them a call…
Turn your water off at source (main stopcock) and see if the leak reduces.
Lion Q
Can you close the main stopcock? Ours is just outside the street. The problem we had was a leaking pipe outside our back garden. We had a local plumber in and he fixed it for £30 quid.
So sorry to hear about your nightmare LQ. Do you have solid floors (concrete) or suspended floors?
The main problem with a leak (if it is a pipe) is not fixing the leak but getting to the problem. i don’t know the layout of your house but it could be a pipe or fitting leaking somewhere else and the water is travelling under your laminate then up to the surface, perhaps a downstairs basin, tap or loo. I have seen this happen a few times.
Just remember that the plumber will not be too stressed about it and will take it all in his stride. I hope it all works out ok for you, I’m sure it will.
If you’re up to it, I’d strongly recommend that you remove the laminate since the plumber will need access anyway. Plus the floor itself will need to dry out before you get the insurers to put down a new one. Finally, by removing the laminate, you might even slow the spread of water to adjacent areas which will help things dry out more quickly after the repair.
If I lived closer, I’d come round and repair it for you. But I don’t, so I can’t.
Obviously a bit of a ballache so close to Christmas, but it could be worse and I’m sure it all looks worse than it is. Repairing a pipe doesn’t usually take long once the leak is found.
Could be a radiator feed/return pipe. Depending on whether it’s a pressurised system or gravity fed would determine whether it would eventually stop getting worse while she waits for the repair.
Hopefully it’s a wooden subfloor for easy of access, although the expansion of the floorboards might make it harder to get it flat afterwards. Swings and roundabouts!!
As others have said LQ, the main problem is in finding the leak and there could be many reasons why the leak started. If, for instance you have a screed floor under the laminate and the house is of a certain age, then the heating pipes could have been laid through the screed and the cement may have corroded through a pipe over time, allowing a leak. However, this is all conjecture without knowing the property but I’m sure the plumber will soon diagnose the problem once he arrives.
Wiishing you all the best though for a swift and cheap resolution, whatever the cause…
I read this last night when lying in bed, LQ, and couldn’t answer right then. So sorry to hear about this, and hope the plumber finds the source and deals with it. What a nightmare! When my sister had a leak from her toilet in the old house, into her laminate, she had a dehumidifier on for weeks to dry it out, but was able to have new flooring laid through the insurance. What upset her was the fact her late partner had laid that original laminate.
Sorry to read of your problems with unexplained water on the floor LQ, hope you get it sorted soon.
When I had a complete new central heating installed a couple of years’ ago, part of modernising the house, I noticed the downstairs radiators were fed from pipes actually set in the solid concrete floors. The new ones were fitted to the lower parts of the walls, not under the floors. I do wonder though if you have the piping under the floors as I did? If so then one of those could have sprung a leak and no matter if the water supply was turned off, there would still be a cold water tank in the loft and the water in the heating system to feed that leak. This could be the case if your heating is not the modern combination boiler fed directly from the mains water supply. The older systems, as the one I had replaced, had the water supply tanks as previously described.
Good luck with the plumber today getting it sorted out as soon as possible.
Plumber has been and he’s going to make a start tomorrow.
He thought it was either coming from the bathroom or the central heating but he’s ruled out the bathroom so it looks like a leak in the central heating pipes somewhere.
Apparently it’s been leaking a while, just we didn’t know until it has shown itself by bowing the flooring. It has now spread into the kitchen and has just started making its way into the living room but he think he will be able to save our living room floor but the kitchen and hallway definitely has to come up.
He’ll be here at 8.30am to make a start. I’m really grateful to him as he only got back from a long drive from London today and he called here before going home which was good of him.
We feel so much better knowing he knows what to do, he didn’t seem overly concerned, I reckon he’s seen much worse in his time.
Not looking forward to the upheaval but such is life eh, I’ll look on it as a positive and look forward to my new floor lol
I had said a few months back I want a new floor downstairs but we decided not to because we couldn’t be bothered with all the mess but now we have no choice.
Thanks for all your responses. You are all invited to my New Floor Party when its done…Bring a bottle…AND A MASK! :-p
Oh Gawd Queenie, what a mess and a worry, and right on top of Christmas too.
Good luck tomorrow, and I really hope he can fix it quickly for you. :hug:
