Leak Detection in Pomona

Pomona’s water infrastructure spans decades of growth across the eastern San Gabriel Valley, and that layered history shows up in how leaks behave here. Older cast-iron and galvanized supply lines in mid-century neighborhoods sit beneath concrete slabs, stucco exteriors, and compacted clay soils, all of which can mask a slow leak for months while your water bill quietly climbs. RT Olson Plumbing, Heating and Air Conditioning responds 24/7 to leak detection calls throughout Pomona, using non-invasive electronic and acoustic tools to pinpoint the source before a single wall is opened.

Why Pomona Properties See More Hidden Leaks

Pomona’s housing stock tells the story of postwar California expansion. Tracts built from the late 1940s through the 1970s were plumbed with galvanized steel, which corrodes from the inside out. By the time a pinhole leak appears, the surrounding pipe wall is often paper-thin. Slab foundations, common across Pomona’s residential neighborhoods, trap leaking water with nowhere to go except sideways through the concrete or upward through flooring, making the source difficult to trace by eye alone.

The local soil adds another layer of complexity. Pomona sits in a basin where expansive clay soils shift seasonally with rainfall and drought cycles. That movement stresses underground supply and drain lines, particularly at joints. During dry stretches, which the Inland Empire sees regularly, soil contraction can pull fittings apart by fractions of an inch, enough to start a slow underground water leak that won’t surface until the damage is already widespread.

Our Leak Detection Process in Pomona

The goal is to find the leak without turning your home into a construction site. The process starts with a pressure test on the supply system to confirm a leak is present and to isolate whether it’s on the hot or cold side. From there, electronic amplification equipment listens through slab, drywall, and soil for the acoustic signature of water escaping under pressure, a sound that’s distinct from normal pipe flow and identifiable even several feet underground.

For underground water leak detection, ground microphones and correlating technology compare signal timing at two points along the line to triangulate the leak’s location to within inches. Thermal imaging supplements acoustic work inside the home, revealing temperature differentials behind walls or under flooring where water has migrated away from the break. The combination means the excavation or access point, when one is needed, is targeted and small rather than exploratory.

Once the leak is located, you receive a clear explanation of what was found, where it is, and what the repair options look like before any work begins.

Reaching Pomona from Corona

RT Olson’s team dispatches from Corona and reaches Pomona via the 71 Freeway or the 60, depending on where in the city the call originates. The eastern portions of Pomona along Garey Avenue and the areas near Cal Poly Pomona are typically straightforward to reach. Because dispatch runs around the clock, a call placed at midnight gets the same response as one placed at noon, there’s no after-hours surcharge for the dispatch itself, and no waiting until morning to find out whether a slab leak is actively damaging your subfloor.

Equipment & Methods We Use for Leak Detection

Hidden leak detection in Pomona’s older homes requires tools that can work through multiple layers of building material without disturbing them. The core equipment includes:

• Electronic leak correlators, compare acoustic data from two access points to pinpoint underground leaks along supply mains and service lines
• Amplified ground microphones, isolate the sound of pressurized water escaping through soil or concrete
• Thermal imaging cameras, detect moisture migration behind drywall, under tile, and beneath engineered flooring by reading surface temperature variation
• Pressure decay testing, confirms whether a leak is present and helps narrow the affected segment before acoustic work begins

None of these methods require opening walls or cutting concrete to locate the problem, that only happens once the location is confirmed.

Local Note

Homes built in Pomona during the 1950s and 1960s frequently used a combination of galvanized supply lines and copper distribution branches, a pairing that creates accelerated corrosion at the transition fittings due to galvanic reaction between the two metals. Those transition points are a common leak origin that gets overlooked when someone assumes the copper lines are fine. When a high water bill doesn’t match any visible dripping, that galvanized-to-copper joint under the slab or inside the wall cavity is often the first place worth checking in a home of that era.

If your water bill has spiked without explanation, you’ve noticed a warm spot on a tile floor, or you can hear water running when every fixture in the house is off, those are signals worth acting on before the damage spreads. Call RT Olson at (951) 344-5596, the team serves Pomona 24/7 and can schedule same-day electronic leak detection to find the source and give you a clear path forward.