How do you get this cap off?

Precaud

@JUGHNE , the details are in another thread. I'm first going for @mattmia2 's suggestion in this post:
https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1596701/#Comment_1596701

If that doesn't work, I'll do it @EBEBRATT-Ed 's way in this post:
https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1596735/#Comment_1596735

Nix the torch. I have all fittings off now except for that blasted cap.

STEAM DOCTOR

Cut, hammer , chisel. Could have been done a long time ago.

STEAM DOCTOR

Two cuts. Don't hit the male threads. Extend the cuts past male threads. Once past male threads, cut all the way through. Cut perpendicular to the cuts and join the two cuts together. Sort of cutting a "U". Everything past the male threads should be full depth. Put the chisel in and bang away.

GW

That whole main at the floor does not budge up enough to squeeze the wrench underneath it? If yes then you could get better leverage. We carry a breaker bar pipe in our install van.

HomerJSmith

propane torch:
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Bernzomatic-WK2301-Propane-Torch-Kit-333084/202539561

Precaud

STEAM DOCTOR said:

Cut, hammer , chisel. Could have been done a long time ago.

No worries. I thought I had metal cutoff wheels but didn't, so I removed everything else. Found some masonry wheels and am about to trying those.

STEAM DOCTOR

Even if you get a wrench on, you might not be able to remove. Not sure if masonary blades will work. Be careful, grinder blades break

hcpatel78

propane torch and sledgehammer will loosen inside the thread. The heat will expand the cap little enough will create some gap between thread.
second through just chisel the floor underneath. you can always put cement easily after you done with the work.

Precaud

Got it. Sludge city.

STEAM DOCTOR

Nice. Nice job cutting. Dont worry about that little cut in the male threads

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes

Two pages of "How To Remove A Cap" was awesome!

Precaud

Thanks everyone for your help. The masonry blade worked just fine. Decades of sludge. Pretty obvious why it took forever for condensate to return to the boiler!

Tomorrow: clean, flush the return, and remove the male part of the union, then its time to put it back together upside down.

Precaud

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes said:

Two pages of "How To Remove A Cap" was awesome!

There was bit more to it than that...

Precaud

I figured out last night why the wet return is sloped like it is, which put that cap at floor level. When the original installers got done piping it, the wet return *was* parallel to the floor, but that made the end of the main/dry return an inch or so too high. They had made a measurement error on the main drip length. Instead of putting an inch shorter nipple below the union to correct it, they did the expedient thing and sat on that end of the wet return, pushing it down and lowering the end of the dry return. The 90 at the Hartford loop obliged and took up the slack angle.

Once I get the hose fitting on there, it's probably not worth correcting.

jumper

I knew a guy who could loosen any threaded connection with rap-a-tap skill. He'd angle a chisel almost tangentially and use a medium weight ball peen deliberately. You'd think that if the cap wouldn't move then the nip would?

EBEBRATT-Ed

Several different ways to skin that cat.

Brute strength is't one of them on an old wet return IMHO.

Most of the time I use an angle grinder. With a little practice there pretty good in most cases

STEAM DOCTOR

Used grinder for years. Switched to diablo heavy metal blades. Expensive but worth every penny. Will cut through cast iron fittings, black pipe...No sparks or broken grinder blades.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Grinder, sawzall they all work. Not one size fits all different methods depending on the location. Grinder to cut fittings, sawzall to cut nipples out of fittings

STEAM DOCTOR

I used to use grinder on fitting. Switched to Diablo heavy metal blades. Cuts through cast iron fittings. Like hot knife through butter.

Precaud

EBEBRATT-Ed said:

Grinder to cut fittings, sawzall to cut nipples out of fittings

Yeah, I should have used the sawzall to shorten a nipple that had to be removed from a tee. I made axial cuts and then had at it with a chisel and mallet, but I should have shortened it as much as possible first. Was a real bear to get out. Threads did get damaged but the plug still threads in 2-3 turns and it's well above the waterline, so generous taping and it will be fine. Lesson learned...

ChrisJ

Cut off wheels are amazing tho......

Precaud

ChrisJ said:

Cut off wheels are amazing tho......

Yeah, I like like all the sparks flying (with safety goggles on, of course) !

jumper

EBEBRATT-Ed said:

Several different ways to skin that cat.

Brute strength is't one of them on an old wet return IMHO.

Most of the time I use an angle grinder. With a little practice there pretty good in most cases

Nobody has mentioned nut splitter set up? A screw pushes a chisel to cut through cap. Danger is when metal deforms instead of getting cut. Not so bad in this case? Keep that chisel edge sharp.

Also does the cap have to be cut through right down to threads?
Once it's weak enough won't it screw off?

JUGHNE

If the end of the cap was sawed off without hitting the nipple threads, it might be easier to split the remaining ring on the nipple.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Yes what @JUGHNE mentioned above is a good method. Thake the strength out of the fitting. Especially with a cap that is malleable

PerryHolzman

Here is another approach. Sorry I didn't think of showing it before. I just remembered that I had pictures (attached).

This was a project to install a water softener for my wife and build a soft water cold water supply to select applications (in this case, the 1st floor shower). How do you take a fitting apart without unscrewing the pipe up in the wall (which would be a rather expensive wall repair); and with limited working room.

I first cut a bulk of the external fitting with a hacksaw blade (there is tape around the blade under my hand).

Then using Dremmel tool cut off wheel I cut clearly behind where the pipe threads ended.

I then carefully filed with a fine flat file until the thread roots showed (without touching the threads of the pipe); and these lines are larger from unscrewing the elbow.

I then heated the elbow with a propane torch. It turned right off just using an adjustable pliers once it was heated.

I've included the finish project picture for this connection so you can see the results. I'll admit that the soldering is a bit rough (lack of practice as this homeowner doesn't do much soldering).

Other comments:

1) For those who see a wavy and bent copper line in the background. For this project I ran a temporary water line to the laundry using soft coiled copper tubing. Not pretty; but, it was replaced with nice and straight copper tubing about a week later from the new soft cold water header.

2) The larger brown/red (I'm partially color blind) pipe is my Monflow T loop.

In the case of the cap in question. I probably would have just ground off the top - filed carefully to a similar point, heated it, and then it should turn off easily. I learned this method in the US Navy about 1976.

mattmia2

I'm not color blind and i would describe that as brown-red...

Isn't there an access in the wall behind the tub where you could have just unscrewed the pipe from the tub valve? (it looks like there is enough space to grab that with some small pipe wrenches as well)

PerryHolzman

No access. There is a very nice custom built set of shelves and drawers behind the working end of the tub. I can see some of the pipes by pulling out a drawer. I would have to remove the whole assembly to gain working access to the pipes. Given the tile work that was done in the bathroom... I'm not sure that the assembly can be removed without messing up the original tile job, and finding duplicate tile is likely impossible (1954 house).

My other comment is that taking this fitting apart was most of a day job, I took breaks ever time things didn't go well and between steps. Patience is a key for a job like this when you are working with limited access.

Have a great day,

mattmia2

i had a similar problem in my mom's house that was built in 1957. I needed to replace the galvanized hot water piping that was mostly plugged and starting to develop pinholes. There was a panel to access the drain that allowed some access to the valve. There was a union on the tub valve but it and much of the pipe was half embedded in the mortar that squeezed through the lath. I was able to grab the pipe and unscrew it from the union, i think i made some attempt to hold the union and i replaced it with a piece of copper. I'm not sure I recommend that method, but it worked.

At a later point i replaced the vanity which had the sink glued to the wall with construction adhesive and i broke a couple tiles getting that free. I eventually found some replacements that were salvaged from installations where they were glued, but it took months of searching ebay. Using a torch to dehydrate the mortar so i could scrape it off and read the manufacturer and see the pattern of grooves on the back helped a lot with matching it up.

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes

Nice work, Perry!

If you get the chance later, replace the copper to galvanized connection to prevent galvanic corrosion and stop electrolysis.

Is that all 3/4" pipe? If so, why so big to just one fixture? Just curious.

Big Ed_4

You can always just crack that cast tee . Use two lug hammers , use one against the fitting and the other to hit on other side ... Or dye grinder ... Lots of luck with wrenches

PerryHolzman

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes said:

Nice work, Perry!

If you get the chance later, replace the copper to galvanized connection to prevent galvanic corrosion and stop electrolysis.

Is that all 3/4" pipe? If so, why so big to just one fixture? Just curious.

Thanks. There are several original copper to galvanized pipe fittings in this house (the hot water was done with copper)... So I think that I'm ok with the way I did the fittings.

Galvanized pipe for the water supply in my house is 1/2" Copper tube is 1/2"

Perry

mattmia2

I suppose it is possible the hot water was originally plumbed in copper, but what is more likely is that it was replaced in the 80's or so when the galvanized started failing on the hot water side. Because of the elevated temperature, especially if you have a big family and it stays hot a lot of the time, the corrosion of the galvanized pipe proceeds much faster on the hot water than on the cold water. i have seen a lot of buildings with copper hot water piping that was replaced in the 70's or 80's but still has the original 80 or 90 year old galvanized or iron cold water piping which still has marginally acceptable pressure.

Joe_Dunham

Beat the union nut with a hammer, then break it loose. Then put the pipe wrench on it in the tighten direction, stand on and and see if you can break it (this will give you options in the next step) Then you can;

Disconnect the union, pull the 2" pipe away from the wall, pull up on it and stick a brick under it. Use two pipe wrenches facing each other like a couple of T-rexes in battle. . If you cant get it, cut the nipple 1/2" away from the tee all the way through and use a sawzall to make two cuts parallel to each other 1/2" apart. don't worry too much about the threads you can cut them a bit and use permatex on the threads. Chisel the piece out and collapse the remaining piece of the nipple and pull it out.

OR do what a fitter would do, loosen the union, shatter the cast iron tee with a big hammer and a bigger hammer as a backer . First the bull, then the run on the long pipe side. It will all come apart.

Joe_Dunham

In the first sentence I mean put the wrench on the cap

jumper

mattmia2 said:

I suppose it is possible the hot water was originally plumbed in copper, but what is more likely is that it was replaced in the 80's or so when the galvanized started failing on the hot water side. Because of the elevated temperature, especially if you have a big family and it stays hot a lot of the time, the corrosion of the galvanized pipe proceeds much faster on the hot water than on the cold water. i have seen a lot of buildings with copper hot water piping that was replaced in the 70's or 80's but still has the original 80 or 90 year old galvanized or iron cold water piping which still has marginally acceptable pressure.

usually. Sometimes cold plugs up first. Depends on water.

EBEBRATT-Ed

@Joe_Dunham

I agree and thought the same thing but how a pro attacks things and a homeowners approach are sometimes different

PerryHolzman

@mattmia2

In my specific case. All the original hot water runs in this house was copper (Easily verified by access panels to 2nd floor bathroom). As part of the soft water project I replaced part of it to replace a failed isolation valve for the water that runs to the 2nd floor. The old copper was in great shape. Otherwise, all I had to do was supply the soft cold water to the existing indirect water heater tank... and I had soft hot water to everything.

The only places in the house that had historical galvanized to copper transitions were on cold water. That is the only place where they are now (I did add a few as part of the soft water project). I left hard water to the toilets, outside lawn faucets, and kitchen drinking water (with a new 3/8" copper tube & isolation valve run under the sink). The old galvanized pipe was in great condition (I wish I could buy pipe like that today). Just a minor layer of scale inside.

Have a great day everyone.

Perry

jacobsond

My go to method is 2 hammers one on each side and tap around the fitting to loosen the threads some. You can hit it pretty hard. Then use the dead blow hammer on the end of the pipe wrench. Just like an air hammer wrench. Short heavy blows . Works most of the time. I have used an air chisel to make some relief cuts or an angle grinder. Not very often tho. Your pipe looks really good compared to the stuff I deal with.

Grallert

cut it