Home

Do you wish you had a reliable and affordable plumber you could call? Do you think your current plumber is not giving you the service you deserve? Well, look no further!

We are your one-stop shop for quality installations and repairs of all things Plumbing and Gas!

Our business is dedicated to providing Hopkinton and Metro West area residences and businesses with plumbing services of the highest quality, at truly competitive prices.

By keeping the plumbing business small and nimble we keep operating costs low and pass that savings on to the customer. We are small enough to remember your name, and big enough to handle any plumbing or gas problem you may have. Peter Zereski Plumbing and Heating is fully licensed and insured in the state of Massachusetts.

Peter Zereski Plumbing and Heating Co.

Want to see how a new shower is installed?

Watch this video of a new Kohler shower enclosure being installed. A hand held shower and adjustable slide bar completed this basic and user friendly design.

Go to our Video Tip page for more plumbing video's.

MA License 20648

Zereski Plumbing Weekly Web Blogg;

Always keep learning new skills and information, good advice for anyone. This week Zereski Plumbing and Heating attended training seminars on lead paint and how to deal with it safely in peoples homes. We will be filing the paper work in the next few weeks to become a licensed RRCC lead company(renovation and remodeling certified contractor). The course was a seminar on lead, its origins of use, why children under 6 are so susceptible to lead poisoning, how much lead dust it takes to poison children and adults, how to safely work with area's with lead paint, tools to fight lead paint dust and methods to work with and test for lead in private homes safely before and after work is done.

All though asbestos, lead and lead paint have always been a hot topic in the trade community recent legislation from the federal government will soon make such training mandatory for all persons and companies working in homes built on, or before 1978.

Lead paint was the miracle product of the day in the early 1900's. Paint wasn't bought in gallon cans like today, but was hand mixed by painters using pigment, linseed oil and buckets of "white lead". Lead has many properties that are great for paint. Its water proof, sun/UV resistant, stands up to heavy traffic, resistant to mold and flexible, not to mention lasts almost 50 years before begining to degrade. Leaded paint was "the good stuff" consequently the better job a painter wanted to do, the more lead he would add to his paint mix. On large homes painters would use literally hundreds of pounds of lead inside and out. Indoors high traffic area's and places that get wet (like kitchens, bathrooms, doors and windows) were usually painted with lead. Lead paint becomes more dangerous as it decays into lead oxide, a fine white dust like bakers flower. This lead oxide is the primary cause of lead poisoning. The older the lead paint is the more lead has converted to lead oxide powder. So this means someone who grew up in a home built in the 1920's and lived there during the 1950's would be less likely to be poisoned than a child living in that same home today because the lead has broke down into larger ratio's of lead oxide. This is part of the reason why many older people don't believe the hype about lead paint. They say "I grew up around lead paint and I am fine.", that's because the lead was stable inside the paint so it was contained and not blowing around on the floor like it will after 50-70 years.

One of the most common misconceptions about lead poisoning is that children who become lead poisoned have been poisoned by eating paint chips. This is very rarely the case as its the dust on the floor and other horizontal surfaces like window sills that stick to crawling children's hands that quickly end up in their mouth. Growing children need large amounts of calcium for bone and brain growth. Unfortunately lead is very similar to calcium on a atomic level. Children's (and adults) bodies mistake the lead for calcium and it gets deposited in the bones and brain. Children who have been lead poisoned even once are far more likely to develop ADD and ADHD as a result of stunted mental development. Treatments for severely lead poisoned people can involve a series of painful shots that jump start the human bodies own natural filter system into overdrive. However this treatment is very invasive and several people have died because of kidney and liver failure brought on by this harsh treatment.

This week I would like to mention the importance of servicing your mechanical systems.

What is a Mechanical system you say?

A mechanical system is a general term for the machines, appliances and systems that keep your house warm in winter and cool in the summer and make your hot water for bathing.

Systems that use oil...

If you have an oil fired anything, you really need to have that oil fired system checked and maintained on a regular basis because oil systems require more maintenance than gas burning appliances. If your boiler is over 6 years old you might consider signing up for a service contract with your local oil supplier. Often these contracts involve paying a couple hundred dollars a year for general maintenance. Some oil companies also offer a general system insurance plan.

Systems that use natural gas...

Most natural gas and propane fired equipment need very little maintenance compared to oil systems, but should still be checked at least yearly to prevent problems and catch little things before they turn into big problems.

High Efficiency Systems....

High efficiency gas systems need more maintenance than older less efficient gas systems. If you have a high efficiency boiler, on demand hot water heater or combination unit it should be checked every six months. Certainly no less than once a year to keep things working smoothly.

Do you like saving money???

Be proactive about problems when they are first discovered, small leaks turn into bigger ones, its just a matter of time. Also dealing with problems before they are an emergency always costs less. So if you know that no qualified person has looked at your mechanical systems in a few years, than consider having a scheduled maintenance check up. Also finding parts for units over 7 years old can take 2-3 days depending on the brand. So its far less disruptive to order the parts that can be seen wearing out, than wait until they break and have the unit out of comission waiting for new parts. Suppliers generally stop keeping spare parts on the shelf for models over five years old. This means they have to be ordered from the manufacturer and be air shipped. Zereski Plumbing and Heating offers many maintenance services for gas appliances, so if its been a while since any maintenance has been performed, or that bucket under a drippy pipe is filling up faster, you should contact us for a service check up.

Did you know....

Did you know that audible sounds of water moving through your heating system indicates a problem? That's right, if you can hear water flowing through the pipes when the heat comes on than you may have air in the heating system. Air in hydronic heating systems chokes efficiency, burns out circulators and usually means you have at least one small leak in the system. So if that boiler is covered in rust, its time to call us! Water on the floor? Call before there's more!