When we bought and moved into this house 5 months ago we noticed that after water has been running and stops, there is a sound in our walls very similar to when you blow across the mouth of an empty glass bottle. There are some facts that may help diagnose this problem:
1. It can happen after any water has been running, whether hot or cold, whether toilet, shower, or sink in any room
2. It doesn’t happen every time, but it happens most of the time, and we can’t identify a variable that makes it happen or not happen
3. Our water pipes are not visible except in one small area in the basement near the hot water heater
4. This is a big one: We hear the sound many times when no one has recently run water! Sometimes I the middle of the night or while watching TV. Is some pipe slowly leaking to cause that? I don’t know of one.
5. Here’s another big one: It can sometimes (even when no one has run water) make the sound continuously for several minutes 0 I timed it at 4 ½ minutes once. Other times it is just a few seconds
6. It happens in all kinds of weather (hot, cold, wet, dry)

We call it “Hootie” because it sort of sounds like an own if it happens only for a short stent.

We have city water and live in a small town in Iowa. The house is a ranch-style and was built in 1974.

What would cause this and what can I do to alleviate it? Is this what an expansion tank is for?

~N

Do you have a pressure regulator on the incoming water pipe?

Could be upstream of your meter and a problem for the city water company to resolve

A plugged up water softener or defective pressure reducing valve can cause that sound.

hj is right. I have heard the sound of the diaphram vibrating and it sounds like what you describe.

Thanks AJ. I do not have a water softener. I'm not knowledgeable about plumbing, so forgive my elementary question, but is a pressure reducing valve something that I will have in a standard city water setup? How would I locate it?

~N

Thanks for the reply Steve.I'm green here, so forgive me. How would I recognize a pressure regulator if I have one? Is that the same as the "pressure reducing valve" that AJ suggested below?

~N



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There are LOTS of places it COULD be, even buried near the meter, so we cannot answer that question. WE also cannot tell you what it LOOKS like, since there are many different designs. Put a gauge on one of the hose faucets on the outside of the house, (turn the faucet on), then open a tub or shower valve and see if the pressure goes down, and also if it goes up when you turn the faucet off. It will take two people, one to operate the faucet and one to observe the gauge.

The regulator will look sort of like this and be on the incoming main water pipe.