Gas Leak Detection and Repair in Milton Keynes
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If you can smell gas right now, read the first section before anything else on this page.
- Gas Safe registered 981362
- Fixed price agreed before we start
- Milton Keynes and 20 miles around
- 8am – 8pm, Mon to Sat
Last updated
If you can smell gas right now, do this first
Call the National Gas Emergency Service on 0800 111 999
It is free, it is staffed at every hour of every day, and it is not us. Call them before you call any plumber, including us.
While you wait:
- Turn the gas off at the meter if you can reach it safely. The handle is usually on the pipe next to the meter and turns to sit across the pipe rather than along it
- Open windows and doors
- Do not use light switches, doorbells, plugs or anything electrical, including your phone inside the property. Go outside to call
- Do not smoke and do not use any naked flame
- Do not start a vehicle in an attached garage
- Get everyone out and stay out until you are told it is safe
The emergency service will attend, make the situation safe, and isolate whatever needs isolating. They do not carry out repairs beyond making safe. That is where we come in afterwards.
Everything below is for after the immediate danger has been dealt with, or for people who suspect something without an active emergency.
What a gas leak actually smells like
Natural gas has no smell of its own. An odourant is added deliberately so that leaks can be detected, and it is why gas smells of rotten eggs or sulphur.
That means if you can smell it, you are smelling something that was put there specifically so you would. Trust it. The most common mistake people make is assuming it is a neighbour’s cooking or a drain, waiting a day, and mentioning it in passing later.
Signs beyond the smell
- A hissing or whistling near an appliance, a pipe or the meter
- Yellow or orange lazy flames on a hob or gas fire instead of crisp blue
- Black or sooty marks around an appliance
- Excessive condensation on windows in a room with a gas appliance
- Pilot lights that keep going out
- A visible dust cloud or dead vegetation near a buried gas pipe outside
Any of these warrant a Gas Safe registered engineer, and the sooty marks and yellow flames warrant one urgently, because they suggest incomplete combustion.
Gas leaks and carbon monoxide are not the same thing
This distinction matters and it is routinely muddled.
A gas leak
is unburnt natural gas escaping. It smells, because of the odourant. The hazard is fire and explosion.
Carbon monoxide
is produced when a gas appliance burns fuel incompletely. It has no smell, no colour and no taste. There is nothing to detect with your senses at all. The hazard is poisoning.
Carbon monoxide symptoms are frequently mistaken for flu or a hangover: headache, dizziness, nausea, breathlessness, tiredness, stomach pain, confusion. The pattern that should alarm you is symptoms that improve when you leave the property and return when you come back, or several people in the same household, including pets, feeling unwell at once.
If you suspect carbon monoxide, get out, get fresh air, call 0800 111 999, and seek medical attention.
An audible carbon monoxide alarm to BS EN 50291 is the only reliable detection. In England, rented homes must have a carbon monoxide alarm in any room used as living accommodation that contains a fixed combustion appliance, gas cookers excepted. Owner-occupiers are not required to fit them and should anyway. They cost very little and there is no other way of knowing.
How leaks are found and repaired
Tightness testing
The standard method. The installation is isolated and pressurised, and the gauge is watched over a set period. A pressure drop confirms a leak exists and gives an indication of scale. This is the same test carried out as part of a landlord gas safety check.
Tracing
Once a leak is confirmed, it is located. That means working systematically through the installation, isolating sections, and using leak detection fluid and a gas detector at joints, fittings and appliance connections.
Most leaks are at joints, at appliance connections, at flexible hoses behind cookers, or at old compression fittings that have been disturbed. Leaks in the middle of a sound pipe run are unusual unless the pipe has been damaged or has corroded.
Repair
Depending on what is found, that is a joint remade, a fitting replaced, a flexible connection renewed, or a section of pipe replaced. Buried or concealed pipework sometimes makes re-routing the more sensible answer than opening up a wall or floor.
After any repair, the installation is tightness tested again and the appliances are recommissioned and checked. A repair that is not retested is not a finished job.
What causes gas leaks
Disturbed joints.
Building work, kitchen fitting, or an appliance being moved. A compression joint that has sat undisturbed for twenty years does not always reseal when something knocks it
Flexible cooker hoses
that have perished, kinked or been stretched
Corrosion
, particularly on older pipework in damp locations such as under floors or in cellars
Poor previous work.
Gas work by anyone not Gas Safe registered is illegal, and it is also the source of a meaningful share of the problems we find
Physical damage
, including screws and nails through concealed pipework during flooring or carpentry
Ground movement
affecting buried supply pipes outside
Gas leaks in Milton Keynes: the local picture
1970s estates, Beanhill, Coffee Hall, Netherfield, Fishermead, Conniburrow and Bradville. Original installations that have been altered repeatedly over five decades. Each alteration is a joint, and joints are where leaks live. These properties also have the highest incidence of concealed pipework in positions nobody would choose today.
1980s and 1990s estates, Furzton, Emerson Valley, Shenley Brook End and Loughton. Generally sound, with kitchen refits being the most common trigger, since that is when cooker connections and nearby pipework get disturbed.
Newer estates, Brooklands, Whitehouse, Fairfields, Oakgrove, Tattenhoe Park and Glebe Farm. Modern installations in good condition. Where problems arise it is usually after aftermarket work, particularly appliance installation carried out by someone unregistered.
Older property in Stony Stratford, Newport Pagnell, Olney and the Wolverton terraces. Older pipework, solid walls, and runs that were installed before current practice. These take longer to trace and the tracing matters more.
A short gas safety checklist
- Know where your gas meter is and how to turn it off, before you need to
- Save 0800 111 999 in your phone now
- Fit an audible carbon monoxide alarm to BS EN 50291 near each gas appliance, and test it monthly
- Have every gas appliance serviced annually by a Gas Safe registered engineer
- Check flames are crisp blue rather than yellow or orange
- Check for sooty marks around appliances
- Never block an air vent serving a gas appliance
- Check any engineer’s registration at gassaferegister.co.uk before work starts. Ours is 981362
- Never let anyone unregistered work on gas, including a general builder during a kitchen refit
Frequently asked questions
Should I call you or the emergency number?
The emergency number, 0800 111 999, always comes first if you can smell gas. They make it safe. We do the repair afterwards.
How much does it cost to find a gas leak?
We give you a price for the detection work before starting, and a separate fixed price for the repair once we know what is involved.
Will my gas be off for long?
Depends what is found. A joint remade is quick. Replacing a concealed section takes longer. We tell you what we are dealing with as soon as we know.
Is a carbon monoxide alarm a legal requirement?
In rented homes in England, an alarm is required in any room used as living accommodation containing a fixed combustion appliance, gas cookers excepted. For owner-occupiers it is not required, and it is still the only way of detecting a gas that has no smell.
My hob flames are yellow. Is that dangerous?
It suggests incomplete combustion, which is how carbon monoxide is produced. Stop using the appliance and get it checked.
Can a general builder do my gas work during a refit?
Only if they are Gas Safe registered for that work. Anyone else doing it is breaking the law and you have no comeback if something goes wrong.
Do you do gas work in rental properties?
Yes, including annual gas safety certificates. Our landlord gas safety certificate page covers the requirements.
Do you cover commercial gas installations?
Yes, for offices, shops and small commercial units. Tell us the property type and appliance.
You may also need
After the emergency service has been
Call 07514 312117 for the repair. Gas Safe registered 981362, CIPHE member, fully insured.