Adventures under the laundry sink

Don Foreman · 2009-10-12T05:12:17+00:00

After I'd had my first cuppa this morning, Mary informed me that shehad some unpleasant news. I'm never quite sure whether she's tweakingme or not, which is part of what makes life fun. She wasn't thistime: there was again a leak under the laundry sink. Said leak wasnot near the repair site from a few months ago but only a couple ofinches away. Awright, so it's time to replace the whole pipe, which entailed movinga couple of jugs from under the sink. Awright, maybe 30 jugs ofvarious and sundry chemicals. You know the stuff that accumulates ina laundry room, right? Bleach, detergent, gallon of hydrochloricacid, gallon of glacial acetic acid, half a dozen assortedphosphoric-acid metal treat soups, Birchwood-Casey aluminum blackener,jug of caustic metal cleaner ... the usual stuff. I also had tomove the washer and water softener a bit to gain access. The otherend, near the water meter, was gonna be painful no matter what becauseit's under the laundry sink. My old bod doesn't fold up as easily asit once did, and then there's unfolding. But the leak wasn't gonnafix itself and bandaids clearly wouldn't suffice. Many modern plumbers don't solder copper plumbing, they use some kindacompression fittings that don't seem expensive compared to the laborcharge for installing them, even though they're priced like goods soldin a jewellry store. Bah! I don't trust them newfangled gizmos.Probably last as long as it takes the plumber's Rolls-Royce van toclear the driveway. Only took me two trips to Home Depot. If I lived further away I'dplan more carefully, but it's only a couple of miles. On first trip Igot some pipe, a 90 elbow and a 45 elbow. Got home, starteddisassembling. Hm, the pipe terminates in one end in a solder-typegate valve. The valve seems to be OK but sometimes re-soldering usedplumbing can present problems, gate valves are only about 7 bux andthis one must be at least 30 years old. Back to Depot to get a newvalve. Also...

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Ed Huntress 16 years ago

And an old roll of asbestos paper, held up with thumb tacks, helps as well. I spray with water, tack up the paper, and spray that. And then I use a torch attachment (if I'm using propane) that's made to curl the flame around the pipe. The multi-tip heads made for this job still leave too much flame going up, in my limited experience with them.

But I use MAPP gas now, which tends to curl around the pipe pretty well on its own. And my roll of asbestos paper is so old that I can't unroll it without cracking it into little pieces. I bought it around 30 years ago. The wood in my house was installed 85 years ago and bursts into flame like it was soaked in kerosene.

There is some flexible cloth or paper made out of Kaowool now, which ought to do the job. One of the distributors is just a mile from me. I want to go check it out some time; until then, I can't be sure if it's any good.

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I hope I won't have to worry about it for a while.

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Wild_Bill 16 years ago

Yep, the swirl-type MAPP torch flame I've been using for quite a while now, is much better than the basic pointed blue cone flame propane torch of years ago.

The larger diameter swirling flame provides much better overall heating for parts the size of common plumbing sweat fittings.

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Mark Rand 16 years ago

Slightly alkaline.

Not like when I was down in Devon. That was known to be plumbosolvent from history, to the extent that the water treatment works there actually pass the water over lime beds to raise the pH.

Mark Rand RTFM

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Don Foreman 16 years ago

Oatey makes a woven ceramic heat shield that works very well.

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They're available at Home Depot.

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whit3rd 16 years ago

Yeah, but civilization depends on fire nonetheless. Use it or lose... civilization.

The 'shark-bites' are those grip/seal things, they would have gone on to the thinned copper fine, then it would have ripped in half later. Rebuilding in the case described was never gonna be as simple as a high-price fitting.

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Don Foreman 16 years ago

I found the "those" you referred to; I did, in fact, use that word. I shall amend my comment as follows:

"Shark-Bites are very pricey bandaids for those who can't solder, as well as for those who can but would prefer not to."

If a guy just has one repair to make and doesn't already have the skill and tools to make good soldered joints, the Shark-Bites are probably an excellent option. As for new construction and remodelling, I think that's all plastic now. Shark-Bites can provide a transition from old copper to new plastic.

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whit3rd 16 years ago

On Oct 12, 11:01=A0am, Cydrome Leader wrote: =A0

If you can disassemble the cheapo valve, try just putting a good quality replacement washer in; a bad batch of rubber is not the end of the world (as the QC man said when he did the incoming inspection on the washers). Any nearby valves that look similar, probably need the same treatment.

True dat. Me, I have a bucket of old ones... it just takes a few minutes to see if they're better than new, or worse.

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Don Foreman 16 years ago

The Oatey blanket isn't Kaowool but it works fine and I think it's physically somewhat more robust than Kaowool. Kaowool is sort of a non-woven fabric. I'd worry a little about the ceramic fibers in Kaowool breaking with handling and getting into skin or creating respiratory hazard. See MSDS at

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safety notice at

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I use a Prestolite acetylene-air torch. Much softer flame than propane or Mapp so it really wraps around the pipe, and a fairly short low-velocity flame provides ample heat. I don't think I'd like the weight of that B acetylene bottle on a ladder, though.

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