oh, yeah...Thursday. First I need to back up a step or two.
Wednesday night, Dudette loaned her car to CK as hers died and was in the shop. I was enlisted to do the honors of driving Dudette to and from work Thursday and maybe Friday. No biggie, I was home anyway.
Okay, now back to the regularly scheduled program...Thursday morning, after dropping Dudette off at work, I hit up the Gnome Despot for the new supplies I needed. That done, it was time to attack the plumbing once again. But, as an added incentive, I had people coming out to certify the sprinkler system between noon and 5. So, I had to hurry with the project.
Got the water in the house shut down and drained, then whipped out the torch. After breaking the union loose at the heater, I found a joint my torch would work on. Everything went well, it all came apart nicely.
After I had measurements taken and did a final put-together to make sure all the lengths and angles fit, I figured I'd go ahead and replace the section of the union attached to the water tank. No sense replacing half a union, lets just make it all brand new.
Didn't work out that way though. Even the biggest pipe wrench I have wouldn't budge that half of union. Don't know what that plumber had against his trade but everything he did was meant to be a one-time-only deal. If that union ever goes, I'm either going to need the Hulk to take it apart, or we're going to end up getting a new water heater, cause I'M not getting it off.
Anyhow, it all went back together. First time even. Then I took the water hammer arrestor apart and redid the connections with Teflon tape this time.
With everything but the humidifier connection replaced, I hit the system with water. After doing an initial check, I bled the air out of the system and gave the whole thing full pressure. No leaks. Damn I'm good.
Then I turned on the water to the irrigation system and waited for the tech to come and certify the back-flow preventer. While waiting, I fiddled around with a few other odds and ends that didn't require me to turn off the water again.
When I noticed that the tech showed up, I found him cycling the system through the zones. He looked all busy and getting with the program. I finally asked him if that was normal to check the back-flow. Not that I ever saw them do that before, but hey, the rules change all the time.
He stopped what he was doing and looked at me. "Only certify the back-flow?"
I can tell at this point, it's going to be another one of those days. "Uh, yeah. That's what you are supposed to be doing."
After he carried on about being behind from all the weather, and really backed up, he thanked me for saving him a lot of time because he was getting ready to do a full system start-up and adjustment.
I should have kept my mouth shut and let him do all that work. Not my fault if he can't read his work orders, right? Naw, I'm not that rotten.
Before he started the certification though, he did inform me that 4 out of the 7 zones were not working. Just wonderful! He was nice enough to look over the system and give me some ideas as how to fix the problem. Seems that when the lawn got replaced about 18 months back, the crew pulled the valve boxes up so they could do the tilling and stuff. And for some reason, the waterproof caps on all the wire nuts got removed. Don't ask, I do not know why.
Anyway, the tech told me what to check for and how to fix it. Once I found the place where I was losing the signal for the valves, I just had to fix that connection. And, replace all the wire nuts with approved watertight outdoor ones.
Now I knew what I would be doing on Friday. Buying more parts and fixing more stuff not on my list.
How is it that fix-it lists get longer as you work on stuff, yet the stuff on the list never seems to go away?
Projects still happen.
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