Found soggy grass next to porch area. Did some digging down below concrete. Siphoned water out. Water coming back in from under porch area and quickly. Turned main valve off and no water coming in in the dug out area. Obviously main line leak somewhere under porch area/foundation. I do have the Main Line damage insurance endorsed/advertised thru our city water dept.

Folks suppose to out in A.M. to eval/fix.

Anyone know or have experience with how they fix/repair these type leaks?

Depends on how far under the house it is. If it's close to the edge they'll likely tunnel. It it's way under they'll probably knock a hole in your floor and patch it from there. Funny how they find the fresh water leaks sometimes. One company I used took out a stethascope and he could find a leak in 3 or 4 minutes! And very accurate with it! Not fun either way. Sorry man. (and happy belated birthday yesterday!!)

I had to repair a line a couple of years ago. But it wasn't under the concrete. A connection came undone.


The secret is to let the glue off gas before burying it. Let it set before you seal it off with dirt. Otherwise, it'll leak in the future. And around here, the water and sewer lines where put in the same ditch. Side by side. So digging to get to it. You gotta be careful and not bust the sewer pipe trying to find the water pipe.

It was about 3 feet buried.

We have had 2 slab leaks both in the same general area where the hot water lines from the water heater have bends. Plumber said bad original install they actually put a slight crimp at the bend and over time kind of how the Grand Canyon was made. Each one was about $2k the plumber jackhammered thru the concrete fortunately we had a few spare tiles so it went pretty smooth. That said hoping we don’t have to deal with more slab leaks. There are a few horror stories in my neighborhood making ours look mild.

It is not hard to repair. Hardest part is digging a hole to China to find out where leak is coming from. I should clarify it is doubly hard if the leak is located under your porch or patio or slab but unless your house is really old most lines enter service the house from a frontal connection.

I just spent $3200 repairing a hot water line leak between the water heater and the kitchen sink. No digging, just capped off lines and reran through the attic.

And no matter how much you want to. Never scoop the loose dirt out with your hands. It'll rip fingernails worse then hand digging potatoes. Wear gloves.


Total cost something like $20 bucks. Glue has gotten ridiculously expensive. Looking up what I did. I estimated about ~$1500. Mostly labor. I bet a plumber would have brought an excavator. A machine that cost $150 an hour to run. No telling the rent. Glue marked up. Name it.


I used a shovel.

T-Bird, just curious, what year was your house built?

1975

Makes me wonder if you have Polybutylene pipe in your house. I know they outlawed that sometime in the 90's. The neighborhood I used to live in, all the houses in the subdivision had PolyB from the street to the house as a main line. Several of my neighbors had to have it replaced, as it was basically a cheap water hose buried underground. When I sold my house, I made sure it was disclosed to the buyer, who was my best friend at one time.

There is about a 10' section of polybutylene line from where the hard main line ends that goes under my sidewalk/porch and connects to home (no idea why and that's where the leak is). Plumbing inside home is copper.

Awt. insurance approval to cut concrete and replace 10 foot section of Poly with cast iron or copper.

Back in business. Concrete tomorrow. Glad I had the waterline repair insurance (extremely low price and they covered entire repair & concrete job).
Service Line Warranties of America

Wholly Ape Monkey Sauce. That's a job.

Damn, that's one long run of a leak. Looks like they did a good job on it.

They didn't even attempt to repair or find the leak in the old polybutylene line POS. Just ran all new stuff.