I got pulled into a thread on home repair by Legal Twitter, Part 2
This was a fork from the previous Legal Twitter thread - all unattributed tweets are, of course, me.
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rahaeli - @rahaeli
Replying to @estockbridge @riScorpian and 2 others
Tip from an actual pro: never trust a plumber alone in your house with a sawzall
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[ where I came in, part 2]
oh hon
you say that like i don't know
shall we talk about mr. fixit and plumbing? because i can talk about mr. fixit and plumbing xD
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rahaeli - @rahaeli · 53m
Oh dear, this is gonna be good
-----
okay. original house built 1911. uw music prof lived there, it was part of what they called "musician's row"
in 1924 he added on in back for student housing. we have a copy of the permit you used to have to get from UW in order to rent to students, in loco parentis and all that
-----
one of the nicer things they did was install a gravity-driven hot-water loop, going from the oil-heated hot water to the back and back to the tank. always hot water on tap, whenever you want it
-----
but that cost money and mr. fixit wasn't having any of _that_, you can wait 30 seconds for your hot water, if there's anything we have enough of it's water.
(n.b.: I _think_ this was mr. fixit but it _could_ also have been during one of the energy crisis moments of the 1970s.)
-----
so he cut it off in a variety of places in interesting ways and capped it which is all fine except
he was putting in his bath in the basement so needed to have pipes by there
and found it easier to keep that part of the loop alive than keep two leads going back to the addition
-----
which would be fine, you don't need both halves of the loop
but if you're going to pick only one
please don't pick the one that goes essentially _outside_
(it was in a hanging stub wall but unheated and uninsulated and basically outside)
-----
when this was a loop and the pipes were constantly heated this was just fine, it never would've frozen not even once
but he'd made it no longer a loop.
-----
first time it froze for us, i pulled off the plank someone had used to replace siding in that little wall and found out why they'd done that
(spoiler: they needed to get in there so often)
and found the _three_ most recent repairs.
there had obviously been more.
-----
which gets us to plumbers and sawzalls.
-----
obviously i wasn't going to let this stand and when we had the money i brought in some... well, initially i brought in the wrong plumbers, but i learn, and then i started bringing in the right plumbers
-----
there was a
lot
of sawzall
-----
it was like a goddamn three stooges short
water EVERYWHERE
well really only two places BUT STILL
STRAIGHT OUT OF THE WALL
none of us could even figure why there'd ever _been_ a pipe there, or what it had been for (tho' i figured it out later)
BUT THERE WAS
-----
(figuring it out later involved discovering the rumour that after world war ii the house had been an illegal chocolate factory supplying the then-owner's shop on the Ave was, in fact, absolutely true - they'd turned every room in the addition into a kitchen, most with sinks)
-----
_so many kitchens_
-----
so anyway, plumbers should not be trusted sawzalls
and neither should mr. fixit.
-----
rahaeli - @rahaeli · 55m
Oh dear. I shouldn't be laughing
-----
oh no, you should be, i mean, i am
_now_
Also posted to ソ-ラ-バ-ド-のおん;
comments at Dreamwidth. Please comment there.
-----
rahaeli - @rahaeli
Replying to @estockbridge @riScorpian and 2 others
Tip from an actual pro: never trust a plumber alone in your house with a sawzall
----
[ where I came in, part 2]
oh hon
you say that like i don't know
shall we talk about mr. fixit and plumbing? because i can talk about mr. fixit and plumbing xD
-----
rahaeli - @rahaeli · 53m
Oh dear, this is gonna be good
-----
okay. original house built 1911. uw music prof lived there, it was part of what they called "musician's row"
in 1924 he added on in back for student housing. we have a copy of the permit you used to have to get from UW in order to rent to students, in loco parentis and all that
-----
one of the nicer things they did was install a gravity-driven hot-water loop, going from the oil-heated hot water to the back and back to the tank. always hot water on tap, whenever you want it
-----
but that cost money and mr. fixit wasn't having any of _that_, you can wait 30 seconds for your hot water, if there's anything we have enough of it's water.
(n.b.: I _think_ this was mr. fixit but it _could_ also have been during one of the energy crisis moments of the 1970s.)
-----
so he cut it off in a variety of places in interesting ways and capped it which is all fine except
he was putting in his bath in the basement so needed to have pipes by there
and found it easier to keep that part of the loop alive than keep two leads going back to the addition
-----
which would be fine, you don't need both halves of the loop
but if you're going to pick only one
please don't pick the one that goes essentially _outside_
(it was in a hanging stub wall but unheated and uninsulated and basically outside)
-----
when this was a loop and the pipes were constantly heated this was just fine, it never would've frozen not even once
but he'd made it no longer a loop.
-----
first time it froze for us, i pulled off the plank someone had used to replace siding in that little wall and found out why they'd done that
(spoiler: they needed to get in there so often)
and found the _three_ most recent repairs.
there had obviously been more.
-----
which gets us to plumbers and sawzalls.
-----
obviously i wasn't going to let this stand and when we had the money i brought in some... well, initially i brought in the wrong plumbers, but i learn, and then i started bringing in the right plumbers
-----
there was a
lot
of sawzall
-----
it was like a goddamn three stooges short
water EVERYWHERE
well really only two places BUT STILL
STRAIGHT OUT OF THE WALL
none of us could even figure why there'd ever _been_ a pipe there, or what it had been for (tho' i figured it out later)
BUT THERE WAS
-----
(figuring it out later involved discovering the rumour that after world war ii the house had been an illegal chocolate factory supplying the then-owner's shop on the Ave was, in fact, absolutely true - they'd turned every room in the addition into a kitchen, most with sinks)
-----
_so many kitchens_
-----
so anyway, plumbers should not be trusted sawzalls
and neither should mr. fixit.
-----
rahaeli - @rahaeli · 55m
Oh dear. I shouldn't be laughing
-----
oh no, you should be, i mean, i am
_now_
Also posted to ソ-ラ-バ-ド-のおん;
comments at Dreamwidth. Please comment there.