Swinging the Lead

[Deleted]

“My weekend project: installing a water softener.”

 

[NauticalGent]

Well aint you just the Handy man? What system are you installing?

 

[NauticalGent]

Here's the one I had put in. Too many moving parts for me to do it myself!

 

[AccessBlaster]

My weekend project - plumbing in a water softener!

View attachment 92514

Careful the dissimilar metals don't corrode or fight with each other. Nice job so far!

 

[The_Doc_Man]

In south Louisiana we don't have basements south of about the north shore of Lake Ponchartrain. (Due north of New Orleans.) If we do and the walls crack even a little bit, you have your own indoor fishing pond. Or mosquito haven, depending on how close you are to a natural swamp.

 

[moke123]

Is that in a basement? I ask because I have noticed that many USA houses have a basement. Basements are not very common in the UK. I wondered why the USA have them? Is it because it's very easy to dig a hole? Some other reason, like are you scared of tornadoes?

Gotta have your ManCave somewhere.

 

[Isaac]

I hated the fact that many homes in Oklahoma did not have basements, despite its notoriety for tornadoes.....and Yes, I think that's a GREAT reason to have a basement. However, in Missouri it was much more common.

 

[NauticalGent]

Its non Electric (as if theres such a thing!)

There is, the one in the picture is such a model, made by Kinetico. Being on well-water in Va, the water is extremely hard and it was staining just about everything it touched. After two years of cleaning toilet bowls with muriatic acid, the better half tasked me with getting it fixed. When the engineer came out and tested the water, he of course recommended the full-Monty: silica treatment and an RO unit for drinking - which I agreed to and she and the in-laws clucked their tongues about how I allowed myself to get tricked into buying snake-oil.

We've had the system since late February and if I tried to remove it now, they would murder me in my sleep!

Is that in a basement? I ask because I have noticed that many USA houses have a basement. Basements are not very common in the UK. I wondered why the USA have them? Is it because it's very easy to dig a hole? Some other reason, like are you scared of tornadoes?

This is my garage. Basements in southern and mid-Virginia are rare because the water level is high and with the INSANE amount of clay in our soil, the drainage is almost non-existent. The sump-system would have to be very robust and it would run constantly during a rain.

Basements were originally used to store food because they were ,much cooler than the rest of the house. Later they became auxiliary storage space. Not many tornadoes in Va, but we are prone to hurricanes. The basement is the LAST place I would want to be in during a hurricane in Va!

 

[NauticalGent]

What's happening in the USA regarding domestic heating? Over here (UK) the government has gone really stupid about having heat pumps.

Gas boilers are going to have to be replaced with heat pumps within I believe around 10 years!

I imagine heat pumps would not be effective in the UK. The school of thought in the US that they are only efficient at heating to 40f/5c. Most of them either have electric heat strips or gas back-up for when to temps drop below the threshold. Here in mid-Va, the winters are relatively mild and I think my gas furnace kicked in for about a month when we got down to 29f/-2c. For that reason, I have heat pumps but you just cant beat gas heat.

It's the summers here that are the worst. The temps are high enough but its the damn HUMIDITY! I break out into a sweat feeding the dogs. When I mow the lawn, it looks like I got caught in a flash-flood. We had to make a sort of mud-room in the garage where I can take of the the outer cloths so I don't track my funk into the house.

Being home is great, but I sure do miss the Italian life sometimes!

 

[NauticalGent]

So where do you go then, the pub?

Now THERE'S an idea!

 

[NauticalGent]

So how does your system work then - salt?

 

[NauticalGent]

Also, I wanted to say that your joints look good. Sweating copper fittings is becoming a lost art here in the US, most "plumbers" these days are using Pex and Sharkbite. Very easy to install but I question the durability.

 

[moke123]

I've always had a hard time justifying paying someone to do something I can do myself. Plumbing and electrial being 2 of them. I just replaced my water heater a couple weeks ago after it flooded my basement. Curious if you've ever tried an old plumbers trick I learned as a kid. You stuff a bunch of white bread in the pipe and shove it in a few inches. It holds back any drips of water that may steam up and push the solder out of the joint. When you turn the water back on it disolves and flushes right out.

 

[NauticalGent]

Used that trick a couple of times myself, taught to me by my father.

 

[AccessBlaster]

That trick could save you some dough

 

[AccessBlaster]

The first water heater I replaced had unions on top of unions it was completely ridged with no copper flex lines. I took a picture of it to the local plumbing supply house, the guy said hacksaw here and here and pull the whole thing out. He set me up with just a few connectors and some copper flex lines. The project went from a total nightmare to easy as pie. I have also pulled 2 new circuits into my garage and 2 outside.

 

[moke123]

The first water heater I replaced had unions on top of unions it was completely ridged with no copper flex lines. I took a picture of it to the local plumbing supply house, the guy said hacksaw here and here and pull the whole thing out. He set me up with just a few connectors and some copper flex lines. The project went from a total nightmare to easy as pie. I have also pulled 2 new circuits into my garage and 2 outside.

The hardest part was draining the old one which was in the basement. Burned out a small transfer pump so I used a 10 gallon shop vac to suck out the water and then a submersable pump to pump the contents of the shop vac up and out the Bilco doors.

 

[Isaac]

You guys are rockstars.

My dad was pretty close to "did everything himself" level of handyman. Us kids turned out more or less the opposite, just...decided to prioritize all types of non-physical skills over DIY stuff.
Except 2 of us, including me. I pat myself on the back pretty hard for things like:
- putting up all the blinds and ceiling fans up in our last 3 homes
- changing wall light switches
- making and installing custom window screens

etc.

...Just because it's a lot better than 'zero'. But you guys are way next level, good for you! Plumbing is definitely something I would like to be a lot better in - VERY valuable.

We've paid money for a guy to take a faucet apart and easily see something that just needed tightening.......and a guy to examine our non-working refrigerator, only to see a wall of ice formed on a radiator-looking area which only needed to be melted for everything to work again! (ideally, the thermostat fixed, but still, I would have liked to know 5 min with a hairdryer could have saved me $100).

 

[Minty]

I can do basic electrics, I will take any electrical/electronic appliance apart and "have a go" as my background is in electronics engineering.

I have no fear of these things because it is all relatively logical, and if it's already not working the worst case will be "it's still not working, but now I have a pile of spare screws" or "Smoke came out, please refill"

Plumbing though, hmmm water leaks make a mess. And don't stop when you flick the off switch.
The nearest I got was pulling the hot-water boiler apart when it randomly kept tripping the earth leakage on the fuse box. That turned out to be a chaffed wire on the exhaust flue fan intermittently earthing itself out, to ages to find, and I had replaced the mainboard, regulators, cut out's and most other things before it was spotted.

Live and learn.

 

[moke123]

With YouTube there's barely anything you can't fix yourself after a couple clicks.