Pivotal Advice

HeatingHelp

Pivotal Advice

In this episode, Dan Holohan shares the advice that changed his life.

Read the full story here

NYC_Plumber

When I transitioned from helper to mechanic at a big jobbing company in NYC I found times I didn't know what to do and would call the office for advice or have a foreman come look. After a while the boss called me in for a talk. His words were simple; You are the one there and know what the outcome should be - the system working as designed - so figure out what it was built to do and what changed, then undo the change to make it work again. In essence, Decide the course of action and do it. If it's right, all is good, if not then do something else. I understood that and after a while I was fixing everything.

Years later, same company and I am assistant foreman now, the boss awakened me at 3 AM one cold and snowy January night. After apologizing for waking me he said, 50 Mott street has no water! It had been freezing for days and a blizzard was happening at the moment. He said just go there and look and call me when you get there. This was an important client that managed a lot of buildings throughout the city so serving them was critical regardless of conditions.

I arrived to find the house pumps running but not a drop of water in a faucet. It was a 20 story building with a wooden water tank on the roof for the whole building. I asked the super to take me up after shutting the pumps to let them cool. He said the water suddenly just stopped. After climbing up about 30 feet on an ice encrusted ladder to the top of the elevator bulkhead where the tank was , I saw a 4" Grooved ell broken under a Tee. It was coming from the bottom of the tank - the tank drain line under the Standpipe branch. It just froze and burst, dumping the entire 5,000 gallon tank in minutes. The pumps were running an hour or so according to the super, with the water just flowing out the bottom, covering the entire roof in ice; it was single digits outside.
On the way back down to call the boss I noticed two grooved butterfly valves above the door to the stairwell. Asking what they were the super said those are the drain valves for the house and sprinkler tank, put there to Not have to climb the ladder if they needed to be emptied. I looked for a minute, looked at him and said "Do you have any Vaseline and a channellock plier"? He said sure, why.. I again smiled, pointed to the valve and said I'm moving this up. After about a half hour I had taken the house tank drain valve off and put it where the burst ell was, using the Vaseline to lubricate the grooved coupling again. We went back to the basement and engaged the pumps. Within a short time water started to spit out of laundry room faucets and a few minutes later was running normally. We went to his apartment where his wife had coffee ready for us. I called my boss and said, I fixed it Rich, it was an easy one - except for climbing the ice laden ladder and skating across the roof!

His reply was " I knew you would", that's why I called you instead of others who've been with us longer, or even our foreman; You have learned how to See what it is supposed to do and make it do that again!

I decided right there on the roof that I was going to restore the water because That is what I was sent to do..

Decide - right or wrong - you'll figure it out.

I sent this story to PM Mag many (30 plus) years ago for the old Unsung Heros column but I think of each time I talk to young kids entering our Plumbing field. I'd also tell it to each class I taught at Mechanics' Institute in NYC where I had the Plumbing theory and code class for close to 20 years!

Dan, you know me well - I used one of your theories to solve an age-old heating problem there by "Thinking like Steam" to find the change that held back heat for a quarter of the building since the early eighties! A few hours of looking, then opened a hidden valve that didn't belong and all were cozy once again ;-).

Thanks Brother, for being you.

JG

Larry Weingarten

Dan, I don't know how you crammed so much wisdom into so few words. 🙏

Yours, Larry

DanHolohan

Thanks for this!