Category: Plumbing

Express Plumbing Heating & Air Blog Many sinks are built into cabinets. It’s such a great idea, more storage space for all your stuff. Well, that’s what you think until you open the doors and see that curved pipe hanging out right in the middle of all that storage space. What’s that u-shaped pipe all about and why is it taking up valuable storage space? A P-trap. Its purpose is to stop the sewage gases from drifting from the drainpipe into your home or building. While at first glance this pipe looks like a U, if you include the pipe that connects to the drainpipe and tilts your head (or turn the pipe on its end) there it is, it does look like a P. In the plumbing systems in our houses or buildings. All wastewater and any accompanying waste go down the drain. Since water is not flowing through this system constantly it can get a little dry in the pipes. Causing waste to decompose. So with decomposition gases form. These gases are considered sewage gases which not only smell like what we associate with the odor of sewage but also include gases that can be detrimental to health

Express Plumbing Heating & Air Blog A Grease Trap is a common term typically used of an underground enclosure that serves as a receptacle for kitchen wastewater before it enters the sewer line. Grease is a general term used to describe animal fats and vegetable oils. These are a portion of the residue from food preparation and cooking. A Grease Trap is a common and necessary device in the food preparation industry. They are necessary to trap or intercept this grease. Grease Traps have been used for centuries, with the first patent coming in the late 1800s by Nathaniel Whiting. Without a Grease Trap, the grease leaving a kitchen would flow down the drains, into the sewer line. After that, they would travel all the way to a treatment facility. There, it could overwhelm the treatment facility’s ability to process all the wastewater. The result would be that untreated wastewater is placed back into the environment. Therefore, it is a high priority for these treatment facilities, and therefore the local governments and companies operating behind them, to make sure this excessive build-up doesn’t happen. Even before the treatment facility, large amounts of indisposed solids along with grease could form blockages