Well, not masonry per se, but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to quote Homer Simpson. Those of you that were paying close attention might have noticed that one of the tasks on my list was washing down my siding.
We somewhat regularly use the outdoor spigot on the back of the house for bathing the dog, spraying off the deck, or cleaning the siding. We have a spigot on the front of the house that has never seen any use, so I elected to give it a go today. I connected the hose and it seated very firmly… good news considering the backyard spigot sprays an annoying stream of water right at crotch level, which is less refreshing than one might suspect. The spigot had no knob or valve to turn it on, so I had to use a pair of vice grips.
I turned on the water and went to begin spraying down my siding and I noticed that the water pressure was not what it should be, so I went back to the spigot to investigate and noticed water running at a somewhat alarming pace out from under my siding. I quickly turned off the water and elected not to tempt fate too much further and connected the hose to the back connector and used it as best I could.
After I had completed my task, I wondered if there was any water in my basement from all that hosing down. I went to check, and seeing nothing out of the ordinary I happily went back about my business.
Fast forward a few hours… I headed downstairs to get the basement ready for D&D. I noticed that the carpet felt a bit cooler on my feet than normal, and it took me some looking around to find out why… apparently it seems that my adventure at the front of the house actually did more than I expected.
This is conjecture, but it appears that the pipe that connects my water line to that front spigot is leaky. Very leaky. So much, in fact that I can tell from the water marks on my finished basement ceiling exactly where the joints are in the pipe and where it changes direction. Two of the leaks were so bad that water was dripping from my ceiling into my big black leather chair. The other shows me precisely where the spigot is hooked to the wall, because there is a half-circle of water there which spread along the base of the wall dampening my carpet.
I have turned on a fan and pulled my dehumidifier into the room and its doing a fair job of drying things out, but the damage to my ceiling is done. At one point I was investigating one of the main leaks in the joint and touched the ceiling and it left a finger indentation.
I’m fairly certain the plumbing won’t cost a great deal to get fixed, but the carpentry to tear down and replace my ceiling is going to probably cost quite a bit. I’ve got the guys from TroubleFree Plumbing calling me back on Monday.
It always seems to happen that whenever I try to stretch my muscles and do some things to improve my homestead something bad happens. I try to replace the faucet, I blow a seal on my water line. Finish that, two out of three toilets go on the fritz. Then there’s the furnace.
I should just stop trying and hire someone to fix everything, no matter how small, that breaks.
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4 users responded in this post
Josh, I normally don’t offer to help people out on stuff like this because I’m lazy, but I’ve done plumbing before if you still want to “do it yourself”. I’ve got everything I need for PVC pipe – pipe glue & primer, pipe cutter, etc. We could knock it out pretty quickly and once you do it once you’ll know what to do next time.
I don’t do sweat soldered piping because it’s slower, involves using a torch, and a real pain in the ass to do maintenance on. Plus, unlike PVC, metal piping is prone to leaks over time (as you’ve found). PVC lasts forever as long as it’s not exposed to direct sunlight, as it gets brittle when exposed to UV rays, unless you buy the real expensive CPVC stuff.
Anyway the offer is there if you want to do it for the cost of components.
PS I do drywall also, so we could patch up any walls we have to tear in to…
I’m going to check what my homeowners policy covers first, but I may take you up on that! Thanks for the offer man!
No problem. Just let me know. It would take 2 days / evenings / whatever to complete (gotta let the glue cure before you add water, then test for leaks before you put the ceiling and walls up again).
The drywall work isn’t hard, I patched some major holes the previous tenant left in my office before moving in. You can’t even tell where they were now.
I don’t particularly *like* doing any of it but it’s been long enough since I’ve had to that I could use the exercise to keep the ‘how to’ fresh in my head.
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