radiator leaking, bathtub operating in reverse

[ghostjmf]

ain't life a blast.


So I get this call from the landlord a few days ago asking us if we have a leak in our radiator because water is raining down into the 2nd floor apt from above where they have a radiator.

"No", I answer confidently. "We haven't even had the heat on for a month." Ahhhh, but you don't have to have had the heat on for your radiator to leak. Apparently. Its a steam system, so the only thing that rises to our apt is steam, not water. But when it cools its water, & stays trapped in the radiator. Until something lets it out. Apparently a lot stays trapped in the radiator until something lets it out.

OK, so I have a big water spot on the floor behind the radiator steam-release valve, & a wet speaker, which is not going to help its performance any; given that it was a speaker with sorta-blown bass anyway, which is why it was serving as an adjunct TV speaker, but the sorta-blown bass will not be improved by having soaked up some of the leak.

There is also water in the basement. In my storage bin, because as discussed before my bin is the lowest point of the basement's unlevel floor, & that's the way water flows, but this time it looks like the source is my furnace. Which just had a new water-release mechanism put on it because the one on the 2nd floor's furnace blew a few months ago & even though the systems are all under 10 years old, the landlord decided to replace floors 1 & 3 too. I wonder if this new leak is related to "fixing" that other leak. We will find out.

So I'm on my way out the door this morning when I notice the bathtub is full. Of water. Scummy algae-ish "I've been living in your pipes a long while" sort of water. It is not the residue of anyone's shower. (I know it is not mine, & I checked with housemate. I didn't really have to check; whatever we think of each other, neither of us have been observed to be covered with scummy, rubbery algal-type growths.) I bailed this out into the toilet, which fortunately still takes water down (when that fails, there is always "over the porch railing; look out below!"). But the unbailable bit left did not go down by lunchtime; I went home then to check. I was of course checking if more stuff had come back up, which it had not.

Perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not, city work crews have several nearby streets closed off while they drill for G-d knows what. They had the signs warning about work to be done up before my 1st leak, the radiator leak, started. I had assumed this work involved sidewalks, as further down the neighborhood they had removed several, but who knows why. Maybe for the treasure under those sidewalks. (Maybe they found waterpipes!)

So now plumber, who has been forewarned, has 2 projects tomorrow, while I stay home & showerlessly wait for them.

[kayrharris]

Plumbing problems are never fun, but two at a time is even worse! I hope the plumber shows up on time and things are back to normal soon.

[BigDrawMan]

glad to see that youve maintained your sunny disposition.

[Tocqueville3]

That avatar is annoying.

Fix it now.


nownownownownownownownownownownownow

[mrkelley23]

That avatar is annoying.

Fix it now.


nownownownownownownownownownownownow

I think Kay's avatar is quite nice, Tocq!

I'm offended that you would want her to "fix" that darling baby.

[peacock2121]

I see Beedums has not lost his edge.

[ghostjmf]

So now I have no bathroom floor (I have these nifty plywood planks, though) but we still have the mystery of why the bathtub backfilled itself, & drained itself just as quickly, 3 times over 2 days.

The city (which has been working on water mains in the neighborhood) says "it couldn't be us, & besides the lower 2 floors would have problems 1st if it was us". The plumber said much the same thing. The city also said just for the heck of it the plumber should check the sewer-line air-vent that goes from the roof to the basement, even though a problem with that would also show up on the lower floors (perhaps literally, unfortunately for them) 1st. The plumber declined to check the vent, having already been give the go-ahead to dig up my floor at great expense by the landlord (who has a way of passing this stuff on to me even though technically its not my fault their plumbing doesn't work).

At any rate, I have a new trap now, as well as new pipes to replace several old pipes the plumber didn't like (at great expense) when the plumber saw them (they've been in at least 21 years; that's how long I've been there, & I'd guess the now-history floor, laid down with no clue as to where the trap was, was laid down long before then). But the plumber saw nothing in the old trap that would have caused 3 mystery backfills in 2 days time. Yes, we have had other people in the building doing synchronized flushing, shower-running, etc, just to see if we could provoke the problem. No go.

As for the boiler with the bad water-fill/cut-off switch: Despite the switch being supposedly out of circuit & the boiler drained, the boiler filled its ownself up again. Obviously, we have got "bad valve" here. Plumber to me: "Is someone coming down here & sabotaging your furnace? These valves never go bad." (The old one never went bad for me; the one in the furnace for floor #2 did for floor #2. That was why landlord impelled plumber to have floors 1 & 3 get new valves too. It didn't go bad. It started life bad.) Me: "no, no-one who lives in this building wants the building to flood, & we are the only ones who have keys".

Next thing I heard was "it must be sabotage" plumber on the cell phone talking to the makers of the switch once again. An ongoing problem. But at least we don't need heat this time of year.

[Yahoo Groups Plumber]

This situation is a joke. I'm about ready to stick you with a five figure bill and take my plumber's union approved 3 weeks off for Memorial Day. Don't worry, I think they have showers down at the YMCA....