Haunted Humming in the Night: The Spooky Pipe Noises in Your Home

Is Your Plumbing System Making Sounds?

You may expect to hear knocking, humming, and whistling on October 31st, when kids are trick-or-treating with their parents, but if you hear such noises all month during October, you might fear you’re being haunted by ghosts in the night, or that perhaps your home was built on sacred ground and the spirits have finally come for their revenge.

Never fear! Knocking, humming, and whistling sounds are totally common when it comes to your piping system since these are sounds you usually hear when something isn’t quite right. Read on to learn about how to diagnose these common sounds in your Woodland home to find out if you're in need of repiping services.

Pipes Under Pressure (More Pressure than Rock Singers)

A humming sound coming from your pipes is often the result of high water pressure and is usually heard when you have your water running. High water pressure can cause vibration in your pipes, and can eventually shake your pipes a bit loose.

Sometimes, it might just be loose pipes, in which case an experienced DIYer or preferably a plumber can tighten the pipe brackets, or add a little padding around pipes where they come out of the walls.

If you know how to check your water pressure, you can use a threaded pressure gauge to check it. If you don’t know the correct water pressure for your home, or if you want the peace of mind that comes with a seasoned professional doing it, a plumber can easily check and confirm your home’s proper water pressure.

Most homes should be below 55 psi, so a reading like 100psi is a big red flag. Your home should have a water pressure regulator that can be adjusted to bring high water pressure down, but if you don’t have one, a plumber should install one.

Pipes Whistling for Attention

Sometimes your plumbing system might cause whistling noises, particularly by the toilet, washer, or dishwasher. When it comes to the dishwasher or washing machine, typically a washer or another component has worn out, causing whistling or squeaking.

Changing the worn-out component should help. This is also a problem that can occur from faucets when they have components that wear out as well. If you hear whistling everywhere, you might have a broken water pressure regulator or mineral buildup in your pipes.

Most often, homeowners experience whistling from the toilet. This is usually caused by a worn-out fill valve in your toilet’s water tank, particularly if it’s a metal ballcock. This is what allows your tank to fill up with the proper amount of water when you flush the toilet. Often a small component is broken, but it’s less hassle and very cheap to just replace the entire valve.

A Hard Knock Life for Pipes?

When your pipes make loud knocking noises, it’s known as a water hammer. On occasion, knocking can mean your water pressure is too high, typically if it occurs when turning on the water, or it can mean that there’s sediment in your hot water tank that needs to be flushed out.

If you hear water hammer whenever you shut off a faucet or other source of water, then there are a few ways of fixing that issue depending on when your home was built. Normally, homes built before the 1960s had sections of air pockets built into the plumbing system to absorb the shock of water stopping quickly, preventing such noises.

These sections can become filled with water over time, so the solution is usually to drain the water from your home’s system and then refill the system, which allows the air pockets to be filled with air again.

Homes built after the 1960s should have had water hammer arrestors built in to stop the noise, which usually doesn’t break down very easily, so a plumber should see if your home maybe was never built with water hammer arrestors, or see if something else has gone wrong. Hopefully, the above tips will help fix all the noises your plumbing is making, so that the only noises you hear are trick-or-treaters at the end of the month.

About Hall’s Plumbing

For over 20 years, Hall’s Plumbing has been serving the plumbing needs of Woodland area residents. Hall’s Plumbing offers a variety of budget options and most importantly, payment is for the whole job, not per hour, so there is no toying with time to make the job more expensive than it needs to be. Hall’s Plumbing is the best choice for getting the job done right, to your full satisfaction, and making sure your home’s plumbing stays up to code.

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