Services
Most of it is repair and replacement on houses between forty and a hundred years old. Some of it is work almost nobody around here advertises, like fabricating fittings for pipe sizes that stopped being made decades ago.
From a sluggish bathroom sink to a kitchen line that backs up every time you run the dishwasher, we clear clogs at the source instead of just poking a hole through them. We use professional augers and hydro-jetting, so the line drains at full speed again.
More on drain cleaning →No hot water? Rusty water? A tank that is leaking or past its 10 to 12 year lifespan? We repair and replace gas, electric, and tankless water heaters, haul away the old unit, and make sure everything is up to California code, including seismic strapping.
More on water heaters →A mystery puddle, a spinning water meter, or a water bill that keeps climbing usually means a hidden leak. We locate leaks in walls, slabs, and yard lines with minimal disruption and repair them properly the first time.
More on leak detection & repair →Repeated backups, gurgling toilets, or sewage smells in the yard point to a sewer line problem. We run a camera to show you exactly what is going on, clear roots and blockages, and repair or replace damaged lines, using trenchless methods where they fit.
More on sewer & main lines →Dripping faucets, running toilets, and worn-out shower valves waste water and money. We install and repair all major fixture brands, and we are happy to install fixtures you have already purchased.
More on fixtures & faucets →When a pipe bursts or sewage is coming up into the house, you cannot wait until Monday. We take emergency calls 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and the phone goes to Dave rather than an answering service. First thing we will do is talk you through shutting the water off, before we even get in the truck.
More on emergency plumbing →Many San Jose homes built before the 1970s still have original galvanized pipes that rust from the inside out, causing low pressure and discolored water. We repipe homes with copper or PEX, working room by room to keep your household running.
More on whole-house repiping →Adding a gas range, moving a dryer, or plumbing a backyard BBQ island? We run new gas lines, repair existing ones, and pressure-test for safety, all to code.
More on gas line services →Too much water pressure wears out fixtures and appliances early; too little makes every shower a disappointment. We test your pressure, replace failed regulators, and upgrade old shut-off valves so they work when you need them.
More on water pressure & valves →Replacing a sewer lateral used to mean a trench down the middle of the yard, through the lawn, the walkway, and whatever was planted on top of it. Trenchless methods pull a new pipe through the path of the old one from two small access pits instead. On the right job it saves the hardscape and cuts the restoration work down to almost nothing. It is not right for every line. A collapsed pipe or a bad belly still has to be dug up. We camera the line first and tell you which one you are looking at.
More on trenchless sewer piping →The line running from your meter to the house is the one nobody thinks about until the water bill jumps or a wet patch shows up in the lawn that will not dry out. Older San Jose services were run in galvanized steel or thin-wall copper, and after fifty or sixty years in our soil they start weeping at the joints. We pull new water services in copper or PE, tie in at the meter, pressure-test the new line, and put the yard back.
More on underground water mains →A lot of San Jose housing stock predates the sizes that are on the shelf today. When a fitting on a 1920s or 1950s system fails, the usual answer from a supply house is that the part has not been made in forty years, followed by a quote to repipe the whole run. Often that is not necessary. We cut, thread, and fabricate to match what is already in the wall, so a repair stays a repair. If a full repipe really is the better call, we will tell you that too. Either way, you should get the choice.
More on obsolete pipe sizes & fabrication →Alongside the residential work we handle light commercial and industrial jobs: restrooms and fixtures in small commercial buildings, shop and warehouse lines, water heaters sized past the residential range, and service work for property managers. You deal with the same people start to finish, so you are not handed off to a crew you have never met.
More on light commercial & industrial →A cable clears the blockage. It does not remove the grease coating the inside of the pipe, which is why a kitchen line cleared with a cable is often back within months. Jetting runs high-pressure water down the line and takes that coating off, returning the pipe to its actual diameter. It is the right tool for recurring kitchen clogs and greasy main lines, and overkill for a simple hair clog in a bathroom sink.
More on hydro jetting →You cannot tell a blocked pipe from a collapsed one at the top of a cleanout, and those have very different price tags. A camera shows what the pipe is made of, where roots are getting in, whether the line still holds its fall or has a belly collecting water, and whether anything has cracked or dropped out of line. We would rather you watched the screen with us than took our word for what is down there.
More on sewer camera inspection →A disposal that hums without turning is jammed rather than broken, and that is often a five-minute fix you can do yourself with the hex key clipped to the side of the unit. Silence usually means the reset button or the breaker. What is not worth repairing is a unit leaking from the body, because the housing has corroded through. We will tell you which of those you have before charging you for the other.
More on garbage disposal repair & installation →Not every water heater problem is a new water heater. If the tank is under about eight years old and a single part has failed (a thermocouple, heating element, thermostat or relief valve), a repair is the right call and the parts are inexpensive. We diagnose before quoting. If what we find is a tank that has rusted through, we will say so instead of selling you a repair that buys a couple of weeks.
More on water heater repair →Past ten years, leaking from the body of the tank, or rusty on the hot side, and replacement is the better spend. A like-for-like swap is usually a couple of hours once we are on site. What stretches it is access and old valves. A heater standing clear in a garage is straightforward; one in a closet that has to come out sideways past a washing machine is not. A shut-off valve that has not been turned in decades sometimes will not seat again once it has.
More on water heater replacement →Hot water that does not run out, and a unit that should outlast two tank heaters. The catch is that the unit is the cheap part of the job: many houses need the gas supply upsized and new venting run, and that work does not appear in the price on the box. Our hard water also means a tankless needs descaling periodically or it slowly loses efficiency. We quote tank and tankless side by side so the comparison is real.
More on tankless water heater installation →Houses across Almaden, Blossom Valley, Cambrian and Santa Teresa were built slab-on-grade with the copper buried in the concrete. When one of those lines gives up there is a slab on top of it. We pressure-test, isolate the hot and cold sides, and pinpoint the spot acoustically before anybody touches concrete. Nine times out of ten we abandon the failed run and reroute overhead, which is faster and cheaper than breaking the floor.
More on slab leak detection & repair →A pressure regulator is a diaphragm and a spring working constantly, and ten to fifteen years is a normal life. When it goes, street pressure comes through unrestricted, and in the foothill zones around Almaden, Santa Teresa, Berryessa and Alum Rock that can be well past what a house is built for. The tell is a run of small failures: toilet fill valves and supply hoses giving up in quick succession, and pipes banging when an appliance shuts off.
More on pressure regulator replacement →The most expensive ten minutes in a plumbing emergency is the ten minutes spent looking for a shut-off that then refuses to turn. Old gate valves seize, and worse, some turn and then will not seal again. Finding that out on a Tuesday costs almost nothing; finding it out with water coming through a ceiling costs a great deal. Swapping a tired main valve for a quarter-turn ball valve is the cheapest insurance in the house.
More on shut-off valve replacement →A toilet that refills in the night is losing water from tank to bowl, and it is nearly always the flapper or the fill valve, and both are cheap and quick to replace. A toilet that rocks or weeps at the base is a different matter, because that is usually the wax seal and sometimes the flange underneath it, and water has been going into the floor for a while by the time anyone notices. We will tell you which one you have before we start pulling anything up.
More on toilet repair & installation →A good-quality tap is usually worth rebuilding, because cartridges and seals are cheap and a well-made body outlasts several sets of internals. Where it stops being worth it is a builder-grade unit with plastic guts that will fail again in a year. If the flow has faded and the tap is not dripping, it is often just scale in the aerator. Unscrew it and look before you call anybody. We fit fixtures you supply, and we will say so if we think one will give you trouble.
More on faucet repair & installation →A shower head dripping for a minute after you turn it off is just the arm draining and is perfectly normal. One that drips steadily for hours is the valve cartridge behind the wall, and that is the job. Temperature that wanders while somebody runs a tap elsewhere usually means a worn balancing spool. These are behind-the-wall repairs, so access matters. We will tell you on the phone whether yours is likely to need the tile opened.
More on shower & tub valve repair →Call and say what you are seeing, hearing, or smelling. Most of the time we can narrow it down over the phone, and that call does not cost anything.
(408) 891-4388We take emergency calls around the clock, seven days a week. Call at any hour and you get Dave, not an answering service reading off a script.
