Finding leak in buried pipes

Goodjob

I have a ground floor utility room and there is a leak resulting in water stains on the floor and paint coming off walls.

In the area of the stains I have copper radiator pipes for 2 radiators and 2 copper pipes for a sink and a waste pipe. All the pipes are sunk into concrete.

How can I find the leak in the most cost effective fashion? The plumber is proposing to put some isolation values on the pipes for the sink, but this is all very hit and miss. Ive also read about putting some sort of mixture in the header tank for the central heating as a way of sealing radiator leaks. Ive also seen that soem companies have some sort of scanner but Im worried about the cost.

Money is tight so could really do with some guidance.

Thanks

muckybutt

You could look at hiring a thermal imaging camera, they will show the pipe runs up fairly easily and should also show where its leaking.

1jim

Could it be a mains water leak?
Our mains water pipes were under the house, we had a leak, the waterboard found it, they rerouted the mains water and a plumber plumbed the mains in. Not sure who would help if it's central heating type of pipe though

alanobrien

So that seems to be 7 pipes going into the concrete. If the floor is just concrete ie no laminated floor covering it etc then thermal imaging or ultrasonic leak detection kit should work. Getting someone in to do this is expensive though so its worth seeing if you can hire one for the day at HSS or similar as they are fairly easy to use.

JohnB47

Do you have a water meter? If so, you could confirm if it's a mains water leak by looking at the little spoked dial on it. If that dial is turning, even very slowly, when you have no taps etc. turned on in the house, it means water is being drawn off and it could indicate that the mains pipe is the problem. Of course you might also have a dripping tap or feed to the loo.

What you do about it depends on the possibility of re routing it.

mchale

If it was a rad pipe leaking surely the boiler would loose pressure (if a combi), if not what about some food dye in the header tank & see if water leaks that colour, a old fashioned way for your sink taps is to:

last thing at night fill a bucket of water then
switch mains water supply off & open both taps, then
remove top of taps so you can see inside the tap body, fill both taps with water and leave overnight if water level in tap body drops then that's the line your water leak is on.