What the work is
There are two ways to deal with a failed line under a slab. Reroute it: abandon the buried section and run a new line overhead or through the walls. Or open the slab, repair the pipe and close it back up.
In most single-storey houses here a reroute is faster, cheaper and less disruptive, and it removes the section that failed rather than repairing one point on a pipe that is the same age all the way along. Where a reroute is impractical, we open the floor.
You will be shown both options and both prices before anything starts.
What is included
- Locating the leak precisely before any decision is made
- The reroute or the repair, whichever you approve
- Pressure testing before anything is closed up
- Photographs of the failed section
- Concrete replacement where we opened it, to a flat and level finish
What is not
- Finished flooring replacement. We restore the concrete, not your tile or your carpet
- Repairing a second failure elsewhere on the same aged line. We will tell you the risk honestly
- Drywall finishing and paint where a reroute goes through a wall, unless you ask us to include it
- Mould remediation
Post-tensioned slabs
If the slab is post-tensioned, nobody cuts it until the cables are located. A post-tensioned slab has steel tendons under load running through it, and cutting one is a serious and expensive mistake. We scan before any saw touches concrete, and where we cannot get a clean read we reroute overhead instead of guessing.
Why we usually recommend the reroute
A slab leak is rarely the pipe's only weak point. If the line failed at one place after twenty years under a slab, the rest of it is twenty years old too. Repairing one point on the floor and closing it up is a fix with a known expiry date.
The guide below explains what a slab leak looks like in the housing stock here and what to do in the first ten minutes.
What to ask anyone quoting this, us included
- Is this slab post-tensioned, and have you scanned it?
- What does a reroute cost against opening the floor?
- What is the rest of this pipe's condition?
