Fordguy1964
Well-known member
So this weekend I did a thing. I'm really getting close to having an honest to goodness shop here. I'm getting pretty excited to use it.
What did you do "IN" your garage today?
- Thread starter mayhemman
- Start date
rd65
Well-known member
Not much of anything. Dont think I set foot in the shop all weekend but did do a bit of work in the house garage. Assembled our two new hose reels and a SunJoe Scarifier/Dethatcher. Cut up the cardboard and filled half the recycle bin. Raining too hard to load the hose onto the new reels. A few nice days coming this week, so will get that done afterwork.
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Ultradog MN
Well-known member
I remodeled for 30+ years. Did a hundred (literally) bathtub jobs like you are doing except the surrounds were almost always tiled.
I was SO glad when they came out with Pex.
It's much faster and cheaper - both for materials and especially labor, lasts longer than copper, you can easily bend it around as needed and you didn't have to worry about burning the customer's house down when you sweat the joints in tight locations.
Ultradog MN
Well-known member
I pulled the Suburban brand propane furnace out of the old camper up at the property and brought it home on Sat.
Yesterday I did a deep clean on the burner and and replaced the fireproof gasket where the exhaust goes through the camper shell to the outside.
Then I hooked the propane tank up to it to test it on my work bench.
I kinda screwed up and didn't mark the wires going to it so wasn't sure how to electrify it.
So I went on Grok A I, gave the make and model # and asked for a wiring diagram for it.
Bingo!
Grok lead me to the Suburban website where I downloaded a a PDF file of the complete owners/repair manual for it.
They even had a phone # you can call for help.
The camper and furnace are 50 years old this year!
How bout that??!!!
Thank you Grok and thank you Suburban.
One step closer to being ready for deer hunting this year.
Yesterday I did a deep clean on the burner and and replaced the fireproof gasket where the exhaust goes through the camper shell to the outside.
Then I hooked the propane tank up to it to test it on my work bench.
I kinda screwed up and didn't mark the wires going to it so wasn't sure how to electrify it.
So I went on Grok A I, gave the make and model # and asked for a wiring diagram for it.
Bingo!
Grok lead me to the Suburban website where I downloaded a a PDF file of the complete owners/repair manual for it.
They even had a phone # you can call for help.
The camper and furnace are 50 years old this year!
How bout that??!!!
Thank you Grok and thank you Suburban.
One step closer to being ready for deer hunting this year.
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We went into this somewhat blind (haven't built a house in last 45 years) so made the HUGE mistake of trusting what I assumed to be a trustworthy name brand tub and enclosure (Kohler). Also did big no-no and ordered fixed glass screen with swinging door well in advance as everyone was quoting us several weeks to deliver putting us in line but with time to correct values once surround in place. Had to make a 4' x5' square to get the opening dead on (as glass doesn't have much range of adjustment and found much to my horror that vertical dimensions of the surround included being bowed nearly 1/4".
You bring up a most interesting question: where do you get info on pex outlasting Cu? I have seen a lot of copper pushing up a century but pex hasn't been around for 1/2 that time. Polyethylene isn't a particularly long life material (better when hidden in walls away from UV) and IMHO Pex C is just plain **** to start with, B mediocre and A just another plastic with mediocre oxidative stability, progressive crosslinking with age and of course being a plastic is going to express toxic chemistry (from process and to add UV stability) into drinking water.
Nofries
Well-known member
Pex for me lasted 20 years, Chlorine in the water broke it down and hot water accelerated the degradation. Cost me $10K to re-pipe the whole house after it burst and flooded the downstairs. 90% of the houses in my area built about the same time are having the same problems. Class action suite only replaced pex from 15' from Water heater. And it has expired about 5 years ago. I know it was a bad batch but I'm not 100% sold on it. My mom and dads house, they have been in it for 55 years no issues with copper water lines ever.
racecougar
Well-known member
Shot the engine bay of the '73 Mustang in satin black. It was flashing off when the pictures were taken.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
PEX will outlast copper the first time the plumbing freezes in a power outage.
PEX also completely skips any concerns about galvanic corrosion in plumbing systems. Hopefully, most buildings have abandoned the use of galvanized pipes from the street to the house, but water heaters and other things in the system are still galvanically reactive with copper--and, contrary to old plumber's tales, there is no way to electrically isolate the two if there are any wires attached to anything--dishwasher, water heater, etc--as they're electrically bonded through the ground wires.
larry4406
Well-known member
Installed a new handle on a shovel.
Interesting, have not heard about that. Mostly test reports show PEX lasting 50 years or more.
Since they started using Type M copper in the 1970's, it seems copper only lasts around 20 years. People blame the water system, but it seems more likely to be the thin copper.
Old Man Roger
Well-known member
Well I hope you're right, cause my house is 21 years old.
Skyman
Well-known member
I dealt with multiple pinholes in copper pipe in my previous residence, beginning around 1993 and continuing episodically until I had ripped out and replaced the last of it around 15 years later. That house was built in 1957, and I'm reasonably confident the failing copper was original to the house. Oddly, except where the pinholes were and places where the flux residue hadn't been sufficiently removed, that old pipe showed no evidence of corrosion internally or externally. I could only guess as to the true cause of failure.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
Here's a twenty-odd-year-old piece of Type L copper pipe:
I folded that with my hands--it's paper-thin. I could easily tear it in half.
This was used as a condensate drain line for a brewery kettle. Condensate is more acidic than anything you'd likely encounter in a home plumbing system, but....
Replaced with PEX B. I'll let you all know how that holds up in twenty-odd years.
I folded that with my hands--it's paper-thin. I could easily tear it in half.
This was used as a condensate drain line for a brewery kettle. Condensate is more acidic than anything you'd likely encounter in a home plumbing system, but....
Replaced with PEX B. I'll let you all know how that holds up in twenty-odd years.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
That sounds like a case of galvanic corrosion. If your house goes back to the bad ol' days when the plumbing was used as an electrical ground, it definitely is.
rd65
Well-known member
Pex A vs B? I am using A for my shop plumbing, all told maybe 15' of it. From what I read it is better at resisting/responding to freezing temps. I will have a Bosch 2.5 gallon water heater under the cabinet to hopefully provide some passive heat as well.
larry4406
Well-known member
I see you are in central Maryland.
Are you a WSSC customer? There were law suits and zillions of complaints of poor water quality causing pin hole leaks throughout their distribution territory.
Fair comments. We happen to have a super reliable grid, so even though we get -40 pretty regularly decent insulation and minimal routing near outside walls means frozen plumbing pretty rare. Agree about Cu corrosion being better or worse depending on how much attention paid to galvanic series in straps, nails and screws, water quality and no doubt copper quality. I have a natural aversion to plastics of many kinds, and PE is far, far away from something I would trust.
rcktpwrd
Well-known member
Spent some time cleaning the outside of my tool boxes, general dust/grime and who knows what on them. I used Sprayway glass cleaner and a microfiber towel. I also added a few more stickers that I had laying around.
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Skyman
Well-known member
I don't dismiss this as an explanation. But, I do wonder why only scattered pinholes appeared over the course of roughly 15 years, with the remainder of the pipe appearing to have retained its original thickness and integrity. I am far from an expert on the topic, but I would not expect galvanic corrosion to have been localized to such a few, pin-point locations. Most of the instances of galvanic corrosion I've encountered have not been so discriminating. Puzzling, at least to me.
Skyman
Well-known member
Yes, water was furnished to that property by WSSC. And, yes, there were countless reports of pinhole leaks that, IIRC, the utility eventually attributed to their "improved" filtration and treatment processes having removed more of the organic matter that they asserted had been acting as a protective lining in the pipes. IIRC, they then began purposely introducing some sort of organic(s) as a solution. Of course, it'll be years before the results of that are likely to be known.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
Did I mention that, IMHO, commercial kitchen appliances--especially refrigeration appliances--are piles of warm, wet doggy-doo? Expensive doggy-doo, but doggy-doo nonetheless.
The kitchen left the refrigerated drawers under our flattop
empty so I could replace the door gaskets. The gaskets on these things last a couple of years at the most before they become shredded trash. I ordered a new set last winter and... they were the wrong size. I'd ordered them directly from the manufacturer, using the model # (no serial # present). Our refrigeration guys tried to put the new ones on and ended up pretty much just taping them in place. So I tried again, giving model # and actual dimensions of the door fronts. This time, I was assured they were sending me the right ones.
I beg to differ. That's the upper drawer--the one for the lower actually did fit. I taped the old/new gasket back in place and I'll try again, this time with measurements of the actual retaining slot of the drawer front. Wish us luck.
But, while I had the bottom drawer off, it turned out that the swathes of red duct tape that I assumed were holding the ill-fitting gasket in place were also holding the handle onto the top of the door--barely.
The only things originally holding the door handle to the face of the drawer were two of these **** welds:
and what appears to have been some double-face tape or adhesive:
I'd already drilled the handle part in prep to fix it right.
I think eleven 1/8 X 1/4" pop rivets should do nicely.
BTW: The Milwaukee InkzAll pens that advertise to be able to mark wet or oily surfaces... aren't. The slightest film of kitchen oil/grease and the damned thing is worthless.
The kitchen left the refrigerated drawers under our flattop
empty so I could replace the door gaskets. The gaskets on these things last a couple of years at the most before they become shredded trash. I ordered a new set last winter and... they were the wrong size. I'd ordered them directly from the manufacturer, using the model # (no serial # present). Our refrigeration guys tried to put the new ones on and ended up pretty much just taping them in place. So I tried again, giving model # and actual dimensions of the door fronts. This time, I was assured they were sending me the right ones.
I beg to differ. That's the upper drawer--the one for the lower actually did fit. I taped the old/new gasket back in place and I'll try again, this time with measurements of the actual retaining slot of the drawer front. Wish us luck.
But, while I had the bottom drawer off, it turned out that the swathes of red duct tape that I assumed were holding the ill-fitting gasket in place were also holding the handle onto the top of the door--barely.
The only things originally holding the door handle to the face of the drawer were two of these **** welds:
and what appears to have been some double-face tape or adhesive:
I'd already drilled the handle part in prep to fix it right.
I think eleven 1/8 X 1/4" pop rivets should do nicely.
BTW: The Milwaukee InkzAll pens that advertise to be able to mark wet or oily surfaces... aren't. The slightest film of kitchen oil/grease and the damned thing is worthless.
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Beerhippie
Well-known member
While it sounds like a lot of your problem is water quality (glad I'm on a well at home), the same reason applies to both: Corrosion will act first and fastest on tiny surface irregularities and impurities.
Wrench97
Well-known member
Copper I used in the 90's here is stating to get pin holes, I'm thinking pex may be easier to run between floors.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
Blew the last week's accumulation of dead flies and leaves out of the shop.
Now I'm suffering through a nasty allergy attack. ACHOO! 'scuse me.
Now I'm suffering through a nasty allergy attack. ACHOO! 'scuse me.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
Not only is PEX easier to run, but the time and money you save will knock yer socks off.
I pretty much stopped hanging copper around the brewery about ten years ago. PEX is hard to get as tidy in exposed runs, but it takes me minutes to run a line that would take hours in copper and the cost is a fraction of that of type L copper. There are also no worries about trapped runs, expansion/contraction problems, etc.
I avoid using PEX where it will be exposed to direct sunlight, but sun coming through a modern window--or what was a modern window twenty years ago--doesn't seem to have any problems. If I have to do an outside run, I'll run it in conduit--also a nice way to keep exposed runs tidy, but then it starts getting into the price/install time range of copper.
Another nice thing about PEX is the lower rate of heat conduction compared to copper. Even without insulation, hot water is noticeably hotter at the end of the run and condensation on cold lines less of a problem. The PEX seems to have less of a tendency to clog with lime scale in our hard water, but the jury's still out on that.
Being able to color-code the lines sure don't hurt, either.
I'm now using PEX for water--up to 187 degrees F at 60 psi--and CO2 and air at 125 psi. No problems so far.
I guess I've become somewhat of a fanboy, but these are my observations after decades of hanging copper and about one decade of PEX.
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Nofries
Well-known member
Here is my defective 22 year old Pex
Every time I see a flood/restoration truck and a dumpster in my neighborhood I know what happened. I personally know 15 family's that their pex leaked just inches or feet from the water heater.
Every time I see a flood/restoration truck and a dumpster in my neighborhood I know what happened. I personally know 15 family's that their pex leaked just inches or feet from the water heater.
Nofries
Well-known member
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Wrench97
Well-known member
So 6-8' of copper from the water heater to a supply manifold then Pex?Here is my defective 22 year old Pex
Every time I see a flood/restoration truck and a dumpster in my neighborhood I know what happened. I personally know 15 family's that their pex leaked just inches or feet from the water heater.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
Poster mentioned that this was a defective batch.
I mentioned that I run 185+ degree F water at 60 psi in PEX B--with no failures in about ten years. Your household water heater shouldn't go anywhere near that high.
Prospecter
Well-known member
I agree. I'll add that the battery expanders are fast, and wicked cool to operate. I love the manifold arrangement of PEX. I love the reduction in connections. One end on the manifold, and one end at the outlet. That eliminates lots of joins at elbows, and splicing two lengths of pipe. That is a huge reduction in joins that I see as potential failure points. I get concerns about plastics. But then copper is what is added to boat bottom paint to kill barnacles, and algae. I guess I just live life on the edge!
Motorman55
Well-known member
Motorman55
Well-known member
Looks good, any paint residue come off on the microfiber towel?Spent some time cleaning the outside of my tool boxes, general dust/grime and who knows what on them. I used Sprayway glass cleaner and a microfiber towel. I also added a few more stickers that I had laying around.
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69charged
Well-known member
Pulled the motor on the ride on to fix an oil leak. Gasket had pushed into the crankcase somehow over the years. It’s been leaking for awhile but finally got sick and tired of it. Pretty easy fix. One of those things that a person puts off for so long and when you finally fix it you wonder why you left it for so long nagging at you!!
Skyman
Well-known member
The problem got solved two ways. I hung all new copper, and eventually sold and vacated the property. But, it does make sense that any tiny specks of dissimilar metals that might have found their way into the manufacturing process of the copper could have led to the corrosion. Or, seemingly more likely, migrated in from the utility's ancient iron distribution network, which has been badly-neglected and is rotten all throughout that service area.
Skyman
Well-known member
This describes the majority of the things in my life.
Beerhippie
Well-known member
Big doings at the Flying 'M' Cycles Garage today!....I added a vintage style Champion Spark Plug PUSH/PULL double sided sticker to my Office/Shop door window. WOW! I'm exhausted...
jimkinney
Well-known member
Visited the son last week and took him his new drawer fronts. Closet is now finished.
