(Newswire.net — November 11, 2014) Cambridge, MA — The turkey is in the oven and you’re almost done preparing your Thanksgiving side dishes when the kitchen sink clogs. Or, perhaps your guest has just informed you that the water in the shower is not draining and the tub is full. Why now of all days?
“Holidays are a busy time of year for plumbers. Clogged sinks, showers and toilets are the most prevalent plumbing issues,” said Tim Flynn, owner of Winters Home Services, an award-winning provider of plumbing, heating, and drain services to residents throughout the greater Boston area.
Flynn shares several tips to help avoid plumbing issues that might clog up your holiday:
Check and test your drains before that special holiday meal and prior to your guests’ arrival. To test your kitchen sink, fill the sink all the way with cold water. Cold water solidifies grease. Release the stopper and let it drain. If it drains very slowly, you’ll need to clear it. Same with your bathroom shower drain. Any water should drain immediately and you shouldn’t have water accumulating around your ankles while you shower. If either or both your kitchen sink and shower drain very slowly, consider a professional drain clearing before your guests arrive.
If your kitchen sink clogs (and you do not have a disposal), it is most likely due to grease build-up or food obstruction. Use a stopper to stop up the drain and fill the sink with hot water. Pull the stopper to force hot water down the drain, which oftentimes melts the grease and moves the obstruction along. If that does not work, try using a plunger or a drain-cleaning product.
If your kitchen sink disposal stops working, DO NOT insert a wooden broom handle into the disposal to dislodge food. It never works. Shut the disposal switch off and try pressing the red Reset button on the underside of the disposal. If that doesn’t work, shut off the disposal switch AND your home’s power to that switch. Once the power is off, insert an Allen wrench into the center slot on the disposal’s underside and turn it from left to right a few times. If it doesn’t move, you will need to call in a plumber.
Winters Home Services offers $99 drain clearing service, anytime, any drain (with proper access).
The company also addresses a number of drain issues in their library of “How To” videos. Learn about unclogging a toilet and garbage disposal, fixing a clogged bathroom sink and more at wintershomeservices.com.
About Winters Home Services
Founded in 1994, Winters Home Services is an award-winning service company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, specializing in plumbing, heating, cooling, and drain cleaning and air quality services. Offering the first-to-market CarePlus Home Monitoring Program and lifetime guarantees on many of their services, the company focuses on high quality workmanship and consistent world-class customer service. Winters Home Services promises to fulfill the needs of every customer with a sense of urgency, ensuring comfort, safety and well-being. Winters Home Services is one of the largest residential plumbing companies in the greater Boston-area with a large fleet on the road and a full staff of licensed and insured plumbers and technicians. Dedicated to supporting the community, Winters is a sponsor of the Duckling Day Parade annual Mother’s Day event and a partner of the Friends of the Public Garden, a non-profit organization that works to protect and improve Boston’s first public parks: the Boston Common, Public Garden, and Commonwealth Avenue Mall. The company is an ongoing supporter of events at Club Café.