We Passed!

Whew! What a relief. The city inspector came by today to check on our all-new plumbing and gave us a little green sticker indicating that the upgraded plumbing was inspected and meets city plumbing codes. We have been taking some pictures as work on the house has progressed, so hopefully we'll have some time to put them up closer to the end of the week.

For those who weren't aware, we made a snap decision to replace all of the plumbing in our house. For those of you who have had the misfortune of staying at our place, you understand why, for the rest of our readers, a brief explanation:

Prior to the 1960s, most homes were build with galvanized steel pipes - Our house was built in 1953). Over time, these pipes began to corrode, restricting the flow of water. On top of that, there were generally only a few lines that ran throughout the house and any fixtures simply tapped into this central line. As a result, the further down the line a fixture was located, the worse the pressure. As a final problem, most of the cold water fixtures were tied in BEFORE the hot-water heater, meaning the cold water fixtures had significantly more pressure than the hot (No so hot).

Okay, maybe that wasn't so brief...

In order to replace most of this old plumbing, we had to tear off the drywall from the basement bathroom and punch several holes in the upstairs bathroom - Photos of the chaos will be forthcoming.

As with any project I take on, here's where things start going haywire...

We knew that the main-line shut-off was a little finicky (i.e. leaked in some positions), but was still workable (Keyword being was). After one of our pressure tests, the shut-off insisted on dripping continually. So now I have the (mis)fortune of manufacturing a long weekend so that I can phone the city and have my water shut off from the street so I can replace the tap. With the water off, I remove the old cartridge and go to Rona (Home Depot is the Devil) to see about getting a replacement:

Rona plumbing guy: WOW! That's really old! I haven't even seen one of these in YEARS!.

Me: So you don't carry replacements?

Plumbing guy: (laughs)

Okay, so I cant replace the cartridge for the valve, so we decide to finish the job right and replace the whole works - If only I could have actually REMOVED the old valve. Darned steel pipes, who told you that you were allowed to rust up? - Guess we patch the old cartridge up and hope for the best...

When we removed the toilet from the basement, we discovered that it had been leaking into the sub-floor for quite some time. As a result, the sub-floor in the basement bathroom now needs to be replaced. (That's our current project - Also to be completed by Thursday evening)