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What do other plumbers call...

Tony_23
Tony_23 Member Posts: 1,033
Of all the "left-handed" tools :)

At Scout Camp we always sent the Tenderfoot Scouts to find a "left-handed smoke shifter". Funny what they'd come back with sometimes :)

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  • Jim Bennett
    Jim Bennett Member Posts: 607
    What do you call...

    a slip joint trap adapter in your area? Around here everyone calls it a "disanco", but no one seems to know how it became known as that. Is this just a regional thing?

    I knew one plumber from Florida who simply called it a "sanco"

    Just something I always was curious about.

    Jim
    Jim Bennett
  • frank_25
    frank_25 Member Posts: 202


    I think you are refering to a Fernco clpg (as it is known in NYC), It's a black "rubber" tube with stainless bands at the ends? Comes in varoius sizes and reducing, Tee, & 90*. Not legal in NYC.
  • Bill Nye_2
    Bill Nye_2 Member Posts: 538
    No Frank

    He means a slip joint trap adapter. It is called a Sano or Desanco in southern Connecticut. Either term will get you what you need.

    The more confusing issue is Grinder ? hero, hoagie, sub, submarine, poor boy ?

    Pop, soda ? Frappe ? Milkshake?
  • J.C.A._3
    J.C.A._3 Member Posts: 2,981
    Local dialect....

    I love it ! How about a cabinet?

    Walk into any supply house and ask for a PRV. You get that deer in the headlights look. Ask for a water feeder and it's at your fingertips.

    We got lots of those type things up here in the Northeast.(22 years and I'm still trying to figure it out) Chris ;P
  • gerry gill
    gerry gill Member Posts: 3,078
    cleveland ohio area

    its also known as a desanko..why? beats me..

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  • singh
    singh Member Posts: 866
    we call it

    a trap adapter, in NY . Some call it a desanco, but I always thought that refered to copper DWV fittings.

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  • Mad Dog_2
    Mad Dog_2 Member Posts: 6,831
    You might get slapped in a NYC or LOng Island supply house

    asking for that...at the very least a look of disgust and total ignoring...NEXT!!!!!. That sounds like a regional term based on the manufacturer of such item. Mad Dog

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  • Jim Bennett
    Jim Bennett Member Posts: 607
    Desanco

    I'm in western New York and have always called this a trap adapter. The desanco term seems to be getting more prevalant, so much so that most counter guys, at least the newer ones, have no idea what a trap adapter is.

    I have a local plumbing catalog from 1926 that specifies "trap adapter", so I was just curious as to how and when it came to be desanco.

    Just one of those odd plumbing terms I guess

    Jim Bennett
  • is that the

    Is that the same problem when I ask for cold water paste? One of the supply house told me to go to Home Depot and I told his boos, he got on the counter man's case...
  • Plumdog_2
    Plumdog_2 Member Posts: 873
    Always been desanco

    Don't know where trap adaptor came from; must be newbie term. First time someone asked "do you want a trap adaptor with that?" I said no, gimme a desanco. How come in Pa. they have Hamburgs?
  • Tony_23
    Tony_23 Member Posts: 1,033
    Trap adapter

    Not a newbie term. 1926 catalog :)

    I suspect Desanco is like saying Kleenex for all facial tissue.

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  • ScottMP
    ScottMP Member Posts: 5,884
    26 years in the trade

    and I've never heard of cold water paste ???

    I HAVE heard of a Desanco ( still don't know why ) We started calling them trap adots. because the young guys have No Idea what we were talking about. Desanco ???

    Scott

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  • ScottMP
    ScottMP Member Posts: 5,884
    26 years in the trade

    and I've never heard of cold water paste ???

    I HAVE heard of a Desanco ( still don't know why ) We started calling them trap adots. because the young guys have No Idea what we were talking about. Desanco ???

    Scott

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  • Al Corelli
    Al Corelli Member Posts: 454


    When speaking about a "street" fitting of the style you mentioned, we call it a trap adapter. When referring to the "female version, we call it a DeSanko. That is for either PVC or copper.

    Amongst ourselves (in the basement), we call them "gozinta" or "gozonta" fittings. Actually, the local supply house can pull the correct fittings from these references.

    But that would be plumbing. And that is my partner's forte. I have no poop on my hands, thank you.
    I am the Heatguy.

    Soil pipe, indeed!
  • Al Corelli
    Al Corelli Member Posts: 454


    The only "water paste" I know of, is the stuff you smear on the bottom of a tank stick to see if there is water in the oil tank.
  • Dick Charland
    Dick Charland Member Posts: 178


    If I had to guess, I'd say it was probably the company"s name that first came out with the fitting, I've always known it by that name.
  • Bill_24
    Bill_24 Member Posts: 26


    I have had customers call them desancos, trap adapters, slip adapters, and marvells, here in northeast Ct.
    I guess it is all dependant on regional lingo.
    When I was new to the buisness I was once asked for an
    "estabrook" and I definatly had the deer in the headlights look on my face when I asked "A what?"

    Bill
  • cold water paste

    My late father always had me confused and the older the supply guys knew what it was... Pipe insulations that u mixed with cold water! For small jobs, pipe fittings, between the fiberglass insulations...
    Dancano for me.... Never heard of it in this part of the country.... SWA , thiught its means Southwest Airlines....dings....
  • Mad Dog_2
    Mad Dog_2 Member Posts: 6,831
    Never heard of either

    In NYC domestic water lines are called Crotons. Only because the Croton Reservoir feeds NYC with water. Go 25 miles out on LOng Island and you'll get a dirty look if u said: "I'm doin' Crotons today." Mad Dog

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  • Hey Mad Dog ,

    My father used that term that for years , he was a NYC Union plumber.
    First I have heard that expression in alot of years , you bring me back , Thank You .

    Ken Resnick
  • garret_5
    garret_5 Member Posts: 1
    Pop versus soda -- the big map

    This is really fun to look over...
    http://www.popvssoda.com/countystats/total-county.html
  • Albert Huntermark
    Albert Huntermark Member Posts: 68
    Desankos / Hemways Plumbing Terms

    In the Pittsburgh area, for as long as I can remember they were called Desankos. I learned the term before I got into plumbing and heating while I was a clerk at a local hardware store in my high school days. All the catalogs listed them that way. They were described by the slip joint size, the size of connection to the drainage piping, type of connection to the drainage piping male or female, and finally the material of the drainage piping they connecxt to, e.g. 1-1/2" slip x 1-1-2" hub PVC Desanko or 1-1/2" slip x 1-1-2" spigot PVC Desanko; 1-1/4" slip x 1-1/2" hub copper Desanko etc. Perhaps the fitting was invented or made by someone named Desanko?
    I only knew the term trap adapters to mean the Fernco type when they came out, and I call them Fernco Trap Adapters!
    Another plumbing term that I never fiqured out was one I heard on my second day as an apprentice, being sent out to the truck by my journeyman to get him the "Hemway!" I searched through the truck that day for at least 15-minutes! When I went back into the house we were roughing in, and not wanting so look stupid, I told him that I couldn't find it! He smiled and told me that it must be at the shop! A few days later I asked my instructor at class, he said that it was hard to describe! Sometime later a sympathetic supplyhouse counterman let me in on the joke!
  • Albert Huntermark
    Albert Huntermark Member Posts: 68
    Desankos, Hemways Ah, those plumbing terms!

    In the Pittsburgh area, for as long as I can remember they were called Desankos. I learned the term before I got into plumbing and heating while I was a clerk at a local hardware store after school in my high school days. All the catalogs listed them that way. They were described by the slip joint size, the size of connection to the drainage piping, type of connection to the drainage piping male or female, and finally the material of the drainage piping they connecxt to, e.g. 1-1/2" slip x 1-1-2" hub PVC Desanko or 1-1/2" slip x 1-1-2" spigot PVC Desanko; 1-1/4" slip x 1-1/2" hub copper Desanko etc. Perhaps the fitting was invented or made by someone named Desanko?
    I only knew the term trap adapters to mean the Fernco type when they came out, and we call them Fernco Trap Adapters here!
    Another plumbing term that I never figured out was one I heard on my second day as an apprentice. I was seventeen at the time, because of my experience working at the hardware store, I knew what a lot of the fittings and tools were, and what I didn’t know, I could kinda of figure out. The journeyman plumber that I was working with was impressed that someone my age knew what I knew. Hey I thought I knew it all too!!! When I think back how foolish I must have sounded at times!!! Anyway, he told me to go out to the truck and get the “Hemway” for him. I searched through the truck that day for at least 15-minutes! When I went back into the house we were roughing in, not wanting to look stupid, I told him that I couldn't find it! He smiled and told me that it must be at the shop! A few days later I asked my instructor at class, he said that it was hard to describe and dropped it! A few of the other apprentices were curious too! Sometime later a sympathetic supply house counterman let me in on the joke after I told him I wanted to buy one! The old timer told me that it was an old joke played on apprentices. I never forgot it!
  • J.C.A._3
    J.C.A._3 Member Posts: 2,981
    What's a \"Henway\"?

    About 3 or 4 pounds !

    Ask Milne about the guy at the new firestation who was sent to the Police station across the street for a "Bucket of Steam".

    One of our lead plumber recently sent the new guy into the supply house for one too. (nasty games! If the guy shows up, don't do those things to him!!!!) Chris
  • gerry gill
    gerry gill Member Posts: 3,078
    i sent a new guy

    to the pipe shop for 40 feet of fallopion (spelling?) tubing once.. i told him to ask the lady pipefitter cause she had it.

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  • Jim Bennett
    Jim Bennett Member Posts: 607
    At Least...

    They dindn't send him for Updock :)

    Jim
    Jim Bennett
  • Dave Larsen_2
    Dave Larsen_2 Member Posts: 53
    desanco.....

    desanco was the term i was taught 30 yrs ago in colorado. Now I live in wisconsin and no one here has ever heard of it! But in WI a drinking fountain is a "bubbler"?! on a lighter note i once sent my helper to the hardware store to pick up a pedo file..........he never got it.
  • singh
    singh Member Posts: 866
    Traps

    A NY trap is another term seldom used anymore.
    As is a LA trap.

    BTW anybody have any extra sky hooks. : )

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  • JohnNY
    JohnNY Member Posts: 3,226
    Coming in late to this conversation...

    I'm in the trade over 25 years, having been taught by my father.
    The terms "desanko" or "trap adapter" aren't even vaguely familiar to me.
    Are you people talking about a T150 or T1125 coupling? That's the neoprene coupling with stainless band that adapts 1-½" pipe to tubular.

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  • Jim Bennett
    Jim Bennett Member Posts: 607
    Trap adapter

    John, what I am refering to is the fitting you use on a Lav or Kitchen sink to adapt from your pipe size to your tubular trap size.

    For example 1 1/2" pvc (ID)to 1 1/2 tubular (OD). I know this fitting as an "1-1/2 socket (for over the pipe) by slip joint trap adapter". Commonly refered to as a "Desanco"

    Always wondered how that term came about. I thought it might be a regional term but from the posts it appears to be common in other areas also.


    Jim
    Jim Bennett
  • bobbyg_2
    bobbyg_2 Member Posts: 139
    Southern Indiana

    I just checked with the guys on our counter. In southern Indiana it is a desanco when its brass dwv adapter and just a plain old trap adapter when PVC.

    When I told them what this was about. They started talking about commonly used (funny) names. The cap that goes into a 4-hole sink when only 3-holes are used. (can't tell you what plumbers call it!)
  • ScottMP
    ScottMP Member Posts: 5,884
    Thats a

    cock hole cover. Its part of the terminolgy.

    brass nipples

    black nipples

    ballcocks

    sillcocks

    male adpts.

    female adpts.

    Scott



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  • Paul Rohrs_4
    Paul Rohrs_4 Member Posts: 466
    My ARMY days..

    We used to send the newbies to the motor pool to get:

    Frequency Grease

    A couple of yards of Flight Line (think air-force)

    Muffler Bearings

    My favorite, "Bring us back some Electrons".

    Thanks for the memories.

    Regards,

    PR

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  • My father told me...

    that the original slip joint adapter for use in Durham cast iron threaded tees came from a company named the DEtroit SANitary COmpany, hence the name Desanco fitting.

    I have no idea whether he was pulling my leg or not, so I have to take it as the gosh honest truth...

    That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

    ME
  • Scott Kneeland
    Scott Kneeland Member Posts: 158


    I had a equipment sales man once at a company I worked at he thought he knew all, when he was ordering a steam boiler package I wrote down on his order sheet 1- box of 2"pipe threads for the job he really tried to order them and got upset when the supplier had no idea what he was asking for.

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  • Plumdog_2
    Plumdog_2 Member Posts: 873
    You are correct, sir!

    At least I think you are. Now why do we call that little dial do-hickey a Tridicator when it only does two things? If it's because it reads in PSI and Kpa as well as Farenhiet and Celsius then it should be called a Quadra-tater.
  • Jeff Elston
    Jeff Elston Member Posts: 289
    Tent Wrench!!!

    I was sent for a "tent wrench" as a young boy scout, the next day they tried "left handed smoke shifter" But I was on to it, the quarter master let the cat out the bag the first time .

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  • John Ruhnke
    John Ruhnke Member Posts: 882
    Bucket of Steam..........

    Chris,

    When I was a twenty year old kid I worked for a heating contractor named Joe Gawel. Joe and his lead mechanic another Joe had fun with me one day. They sent me all over Pitney Bowes looking for a bucket of steam. I was new and had no idea what I was doing or what was going on. I was smart enough to know the steam wouldn't stay in the bucket. I thought they were looking for a special pressurized bucket or something like that. Everyone except me was in on the joke. I just went from dept to dept. One guy would laugh and say "no we don't have that here try the machine shop, I think they got that there." I must of went to 4 places before someone let me in on the joke. It turns out that Joe has sent other new apprentices around like that before so that the old timers at the various departments eventually were all in on the joke.

    I look back on it now and laugh. Everyone has to start learning somewhere.

    JR

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  • ScottMP
    ScottMP Member Posts: 5,884
    Preasure/altitude/temperature

    I belive those where the three things thye read.

    KUDOS to Mark, I would put money on that. I tried to google the word and found nothing.

    Scott

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