When should I close my stem wall vents in Sisters?

Before the first hard freeze, which in Sisters can be early October. Open vents let the crawl space drop to outside temperature, and the plumbing under the floor goes with it. Close them in fall, open them again in late spring so the crawl space can dry out. If your vents are the kind that do not close, we can fit covers.

My bathtub will not drain and it is below freezing. Is the drain clogged?

Maybe not. If the tub is on an exterior wall or over a cold crawl space, the P-trap under the floor can freeze solid and act exactly like a clog. Running hot water down it will not fix it and can crack the trap. Call us; we thaw it safely, check the supply lines next to it, and close whatever let the cold in.

Do you come out to Black Butte Ranch and Camp Sherman?

Yes. Both are about 30 to 40 minutes from our Bend shop in normal conditions, and we are out that way often enough that a call usually fits with other work. The repair itself is the same flat rate as in Bend; the trip charge is different for the distance, and we tell you that number before we roll. In winter we will tell you honestly if Highway 20 is going to slow us down.

Why does my water pressure in Sisters drop when someone else turns on a tap?

On city water it is usually a failing pressure-reducing valve at the house. On a well it is the pressure tank losing its air charge or the pressure switch set wrong. Either way it is a one-visit diagnosis, and both are fixes we carry parts for.

My outdoor hose bib froze and split. What should replace it?

A frost-free hose bib. The valve on a frost-free sits a foot or so inside the wall where the house is warm, so the exposed part drains dry every time you shut it off. We replace split bibs the same visit, and we will tell you if the one that failed was a frost-free that had a hose left on it, which defeats it. Take the hoses off in October.

Plumber in Sisters, OR

Cascade-foothill plumbing, from downtown to Black Butte Ranch

Need a plumber in Sisters, OR? Mr. Rooter Plumbing of Central Oregon has made the drive up Highway 20 from our Bend shop for more than 20 years, and owner Greg Muensterman has 46 years in the trade. Sisters gets more snow and harder freezes than Bend, and the houses outside town are on wells and septic, so we send plumbers who have thawed, repaired, and re-plumbed all of it. Sewer camera on every van, price quoted before the work starts, and a plumber on call around the clock.

Cascade-foothill plumbing, from downtown to Black Butte Ranch

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Residential & Commercial Services

Plumbing services we provide in Sisters

Sisters sits at 3,189 feet where Highways 20 and 126 meet, about 20 miles northwest of Bend and a good deal closer to the Cascade crest, which is why it gets snow when Bend gets rain. Inside the city limits the homes are on city water and sewer. Step outside them, to Tollgate, Crossroads, Indian Ford, Black Butte Ranch, or up the Metolius to Camp Sherman, and you are on a private well, a septic system, or a community system, often all three within a mile of each other. We have worked on every kind of house Sisters Country has, from the 1970s ranch homes in Tollgate to the new builds east of town, and we are in Sisters every week.

About us. Greg Muensterman started plumbing in Southern California in 1980 and opened Mr. Rooter in Bend in 2006, out of a spare bedroom. Today four licensed plumbers work out of our Peerless Court shop on the north side of Bend, every van carries a sewer camera, and the larger vans carry a gas and an electric water heater so a replacement does not wait for a second trip. We are a local, owner-run shop. The person who calls you back after hours is a plumber.

A recent Sisters job. The call was "my tub will not drain." It was the middle of winter, and when we got under the house the tub's P-trap, which sits below the subfloor in the crawl space, was frozen solid. Nothing wrong with the drain at all. The stem wall vents around the foundation had been left open since summer, the crawl space was the same temperature as the yard, and the trap was the first thing to go. We thawed it safely, checked the supply lines next to it, and closed the vents. That house needed its vents closed months earlier, and so do most of the houses in Sisters.

Frozen pipes. This is the Sisters call. Crawl-space lines, open stem wall vents, pipes in exterior walls, hose bibs without frost-free stems, and water heaters in unheated garages all freeze here before they freeze in Bend. A frozen line cannot be properly repaired until it thaws, because there is almost never only one break; we bring the system up to temperature safely, find every leak, and repair them in one visit. Before winter we close vents, add heat tape and insulation on exposed runs, and replace hose bibs with frost-free ones. See pipe insulation.

Wells and water quality. Outside the city limits most homes are on private wells, and the water on the Sisters side tends to be cleaner than Crook County's but can still carry iron and sediment. We handle everything from the pressure tank into the house: pressure tanks, pressure-reducing valves, softeners, and filtration sized for your water. We check incoming pressure on every water heater call, because a pump running high shortens a heater's life. The pump down in the well is a licensed well contractor's job, and we will tell you when that is what your symptoms point to. See our water softener and filtration service page.

Septic-side plumbing. For homes on septic, a backup is usually in the line between the house and the tank, not the tank itself. Every van carries a sewer camera, so we find out which before anyone digs or pays for a pump-out. We clear the line, show you what we found on screen, and when the pipe itself has failed, our trenchless sewer line repair options avoid a trench across the yard. For city-sewer homes in town, we handle the lateral the same way. Drain-only details are on our drain cleaning page.

Water heaters. A dead water heater in Sisters in January is a same-day job. Our larger vans carry a 50-gallon gas and a 50-gallon electric Bradford White unit, and a lot of the heaters out here are propane, which we handle. Repairs most often come down to a thermocouple or an element and generally run $375 to $650, with a one-year warranty on every repair and installation. See our water heater repair and replacement page.

Emergency plumbing. After 4 p.m. on weekdays and all weekend, our phones roll to a 24-hour answering service that texts the on-call plumber. He calls you back himself with a real arrival window, Santiam Pass weather included, and the flat-rate price is the same at midnight as at noon. See our emergency plumbing service page.

Mr. Rooter Plumbing of Central Oregon

This page covers Sisters and the 97759 area: Tollgate, Crossroads, Indian Ford, Squaw Creek Canyon Estates, Black Butte Ranch, and Camp Sherman along the Metolius. We also serve Bend, Redmond, Tumalo, and all of Deschutes, Jefferson, and Crook counties from our shop on the north side of Bend. If you are up a forest road, call anyway; the on-call plumber will give you an honest arrival window.

Areas We Serve

Ashwood
Bend
Black Butte Ranch
Brothers
Camp Sherman
Crescent
Culver
La Pine
Madras
Metolius
Paulina
Post
Prineville
Redmond
Sisters
Sunriver
Terrebonne
Tumalo
Warm Springs

Services We Provide

Every service below is available to Sisters homes, cabins, and businesses, with the price quoted before we start, licensed Oregon CCB plumbers, and the Neighborly Done Right Promise. Tell us whether you are on city water or a well when you call; it changes what we bring on the van.

Residential
Commercial

Frequently Asked Questions

Before the first hard freeze, which in Sisters can be early October. Open vents let the crawl space drop to outside temperature, and the plumbing under the floor goes with it. Close them in fall, open them again in late spring so the crawl space can dry out. If your vents are the kind that do not close, we can fit covers.
Maybe not. If the tub is on an exterior wall or over a cold crawl space, the P-trap under the floor can freeze solid and act exactly like a clog. Running hot water down it will not fix it and can crack the trap. Call us; we thaw it safely, check the supply lines next to it, and close whatever let the cold in.
Yes. Both are about 30 to 40 minutes from our Bend shop in normal conditions, and we are out that way often enough that a call usually fits with other work. The repair itself is the same flat rate as in Bend; the trip charge is different for the distance, and we tell you that number before we roll. In winter we will tell you honestly if Highway 20 is going to slow us down.
On city water it is usually a failing pressure-reducing valve at the house. On a well it is the pressure tank losing its air charge or the pressure switch set wrong. Either way it is a one-visit diagnosis, and both are fixes we carry parts for.
A frost-free hose bib. The valve on a frost-free sits a foot or so inside the wall where the house is warm, so the exposed part drains dry every time you shut it off. We replace split bibs the same visit, and we will tell you if the one that failed was a frost-free that had a hose left on it, which defeats it. Take the hoses off in October.

See All FAQs

Residential
Commercial