Going away for 8 days. Google says, across the board, to turn off water main. But we had a major rerouting-of-pipes plumbing job a year ago for which the water was shut off for 2 days. When the water was turned back on, all the faucets ran slow, and plumber said it was calcium build up from the water being shut off for a long time. He did whatever he did to fix that issue.

Was the calcium build-up that affected water pressure due to the plumbing work? Or was it due to the water being shut off for a couple days? If I come home from vacation to a house full of slow faucets, I'm leaning toward not turning it off!

Are there any other possible cons to turning off the water main that the experts know? (brand new home-owner, so I don't know a single thing about this stuff!)

Thank you!

Absolutely shut the water main off. Don't drain the pipes... just shut the main shut off, off and that's it. Doing this just guarantees that if your water heater (if you have one) or a flexible connector or something like that breaks your entire house won't flood knee deep while you are away! When you return home just turn the main water supply back on and turn water on to remove stale water... should be that simple (no clogging should occur in 8 days). Note here that if you have an older style shutoff with a wheel type handle that you turn numerous times, you do NOT want to overtighten the wheel when shutting the main off... just turn until you feel it start to tighten down and then stop. Here, if overtightened it could be a problem when turning back on, so just be gentle and you will be all set.

Also, if you have a gas water heater you should lower the thermostat setting to pilot or vacation setting on the front dial... why pay for hot water while on vacation, right? Just be sure to remember where the dial was before lowering the temperature and then reset the thermostat to the original setting when you get home. If you have an electric water heater then just turn the breaker off at the breaker panel.

Don't worry about pipes clogging up...pretty rare and usually only happens if pipes sit for months or longer.

There you go...

Mark

I have left water off for 1 month with no issues. What type of plumbing pipes do you have?

Thank you so much for the response!

Um... copper? Eek, so embarrassing. We just bought this house a couple months ago (we were here for the plumbing work last yr as renters, and as renters I didn't pay as much attention as I should have.) thanks for the response!