Fun, Fun, Fun

DCContrarian

The water main on my street is being replaced. I got a hang tag on my door Monday saying water would be off for a couple hours starting at 11am. At dinner time it was still off.

Turns out that they shut it off, the work went fine, but when they went to turn it back on again the stem on the valve snapped off. It's an 8" main.

To their credit they worked through the night, under lights, to replace the valve. It was around 20F. They finished around 6AM.

Jamie Hall

Why utility workers — at least the folks with boots on the ground — are underappreciated and, usually, underpaid…

Long Beach Ed

Fun? You have no idea:

Now lets say someone had a hot water boiler with all his piping in a nasty crawl space. It leaks a little, but he keeps the feed valve open all the time so he doesn't know that. The plumber told him not to worry, it will keep the pressure up. You see, the leak's not bad, it goes right into the dirt and Mr.Homeowner's overtime has dried up on his bus route, so he has to wait to fix it.

Now the water's off for twenty hours and the boiler has drained itself through the leaky pipes.

There's no low water cutoff because, well it's a hot water system and low water cutoffs are for steam, silly.

The burner's running because the thermostat's calling for heat all day since its run out of water. It's running and running and running. In fact, the crown sheet on that empty boiler is glowing a radiant cherry red. The whole boiler room is glowing red.

A long happy day draws to an end for Mr. Homeowner who is staying at his job driving the bus on some long awaited overtime when the water department turns on that eight-inch valve .

What do you think happens to that boiler - and the house - when the water comes rushing back?

LRCCBJ

A long happy day draws to an end for Mr. Homeowner who is staying at his job driving the bus on some long awaited overtime when the water department turns on that eight-inch valve .

I think that the necessary overtime on the bus is going to increase significantly!

I do have very much sympathy for these people as the get into situations that are catastrophic for them without the knowledge or the funds to prevent it. It happens frequently with automobiles………….not so much with boilers.

DCContrarian

"Now the water's off for twenty hours and the boiler has drained itself through the leaky pipes."

In order for that to happen the leak would have to be lower than the boiler. I guess that could happen in a house with no basement and the boiler on the first floor. But it seems unlikely.

Also, even a small house has 30-50 gallons in the heating system. To be losing that much into the crawl space in a day is not a little leak!