I have a quick question. I moved into a house about 6 months ago. About a week ago I was in the basement when someone flushed the toilet and I noticed a "ticking" or "knocking" sound from the plumbing. I have never noticed this before and I am assuming that it has just recently started. I followed the noise back to the main water meter. Is this common for the water meter to make this noise? Or is there a possibility that there is something wrong with it? Thanks for the help
Mike Lambert
Alot of them make a bit of noise.
That's probably the usage-counter working. sometimes it's a little wheel inside the meters that actually spins and clicks a counter connected to the dials on the front. Every tick won't make a needle move, but every so many will - forget how many. Can you see if a neighbor's does the same thing? I assume it's a quiet tick, right?
Pop
I only started to notice it recently, but it is loud enough to be heard upstairs when the house is quiet (no tv or kids). I was just hoping that it doesn't mean that it might be going bad.
Mike
You can talk to your water provider, but I suspect it is within what they will call normal. I think I have the loudest one in the neighborhood. You can hear it all over the house, at least where there are pipes, as it travels along the pipes.
What's the brand of the meter?
"For almost 10 years, Sensus Technologies Inc. has been receiving complaints from customers concerning water meter noise in their SRII water meters. This noise, which is characterized by a motoring sound, ticking or clicking, and a swishing sound, has been noticed to travel down the plumbing. This non-repeatable, chaotic noise is suspected to be generated by solid-to-solid contact within the meter, and therefore, mechanical improvements (decreasing tolerances, making meters more symmetric, etc) have been made. These improvements have achieved significant noise reductions. However, the problem is yet unresolved. It has been reported that the noise emission changes with changing temperature of the water and that sharp pressure spikes can be observed at the meter outlet. As a result, testing these meters for the source of the noise is believed to be imperative for the problem's solution."
In the event you aren't absolutely certain it's emanating from the water meter, there is a possibility it's actually the PVC drain flexing from the weight of the drained water. I have a similar ticking sound which can be heard in the walls at first/second floors, and that I discovered was the PVC drain. In pushing upwards lightly on it (from the basement), the sound stopped. Not much I can do about it, so I'm living with it....
A well placed strap or wooden block should be able to quiet that down if you can stop the noise by pushing on the pipe.
nobody else can hear the ticking. everone is guessing. call the water company if you cant figure it out.
randy
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