- 11
- Dec
I’ve sarcastically commented on the plumbing here in hell in the Do It Wrong series but now I am going to give you the serious play by play of how, with the help of my friends, I replaced half of it.
Tuesday, Dec. 5th 7am — I had just finished my morning 2 cup serving of coffee and headed upstairs to the hell tower bathroom to prep for Dan’s arrival and a day of installing insulation and start on the new walls. I decided I would do some last minute changes to the existing galvanized steel plumbing where the supply lines are connected to the sink nipples (no need to laugh, that’s what they’re called). As I inspected the pipe I began to realize that it could possibily be in pretty bad shape under the floors an in the walls as well. I headed down to the basement to inspect.
I didn’t know it at the time but what I discovered over the next hour or so of investigation would keep Dan and I occupied for the next two days. I found where the supply lines to the second floor connect to the main lines in the basement and gasped. The pipes were unbelievably corroded and rusted.
I proceeded to pace around the house for the next half hour or tying to decide what to do: leave the existing pipe and risk a leak / burst in the future AFTER my bathroom is refinished or drop a small fortune on pipe and drop on Dan that we were going to be doing A LOT of pipe work. I decided to go forward with the replacement. I headed up to the kitchen with Snake Plissken (that’s what I call my sawzall), pulled a cabinet out from it’s place, beat a hole in the wall with the staff of ages (superbar xl prybar), and proceeded to cut. What I uncovered sealed the deal. ALL of the pipes from downstairs all the way to the shower head, sink, and crapper had to be replaced.
Dan arrived shortly after and I took him on a tour of what I had found. He agreed that replacement was probably the best option so we measured from the outside walls and cut a hole in the floor upstairs to expose more pipe and more corrosion.
I decided that while we were replacing these feeds, we should just go ahead and replace all the other messterpieces that the previous owners left in the H2O delivery department. Not only were we going to get new copper to the upstairs and eventually to the crapper, but we were going to replace the majority of the pipe back to the main coming into the house.
Off to home depot and a few hundred dollars later, we returned with what we thought should be enough pipe and fittings (we ended up going back later for several more 10 ft lengths). I spent the next several hours learning how to solder pipe while Dan tediously cut away and removed hell’s old copper mess. I learned a valuable lesson. Sometimes it’s easier to just replace entire sections rather than cut into it. The rest of the night (until about 2am) was spent measuring, soldering and hanging new pieces. We got the new ball valve installed at the main after the meter and a lenght above it and the new cold supply for the wash tubs.
Sometime in the evening, the deconstruction crew (Rob) showed up and sawzall’d out the old steel. It was pretty disgusting to think that people drink from water that runs through this.
Tuesday was finally over and we had accomplished most of the work. The cold water was functioning in the addition of the house and ready to be hooked up to the supply for upstairs and the kitchen.
We started again the following evening, after another trip to hell depot for more fittings. Several hours later, we had the hot supply to the addition finished and leak free and started on to the bathroom and the kitchen. The end result was a new system with 1/4 turn ball shut off valves instead of crappy traditional valves that will eventually leak.
The pipe running to upstairs was secure in the kitchen and will be again upstairs to avoid vibration and banging when the water turns on and off.
The final step was to get the kitchen back in operation.
Overall the project went pretty smoothly. It could have been worse, although it could have been avoided if corners weren’t cut in the past. Please, for the love of God, DO IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME.
Now that the supply lines are run to the second floor hallway, the next step is to get the water to the shower, sink, and crap king. Stay tuned for pluming part #2.
One last thing, RESCUE SAWZALL BLADES (called “the torch”) are GREAT for cutting old shitty pipe.
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December 12th, 2006 at 1:55 pm
Wow. Just wow.
December 13th, 2006 at 12:31 am
I so feel your pain! My next house will be either new or 0-5 years old!
Hello house…. good bye money!