The Daily Pen #3, The Bathroom Sagas

Unix Epoch: 1562716800

Well... In 2011, we moved into a house that had been built in 1929. The house looked just fine when we moved in. The configuration was a bit awkward, but workable. The kitchen looked fine with some new nice looking but not upscale cabinets. There was a tub upstairs, which was important as we were expecting a new baby. And the general feeling of the house was old but with moderate modernization.

This turned out to be entirely false.

The upstairs bathroom worked fine for about 6 months. Then the sink stopped draining, and the tub started draining very slowly. So, I snaked the sink and got it working and figured I would get to the tub one day soon...

At about 18 months, the kitchen ceiling started dripping water. So, I cut a small hole in the ceiling to take a look. And that's when I discovered the hidden secrets of the previous owner.

It turns out, the original galvanized outlet pipes had completely rotted away. Rather than fix the problem, the previous owners stuffed insulation between the joists and put in a second kitchen ceiling over the top of the water damaged and soaked preexisting ceiling. I stripped out the water logged "dry"wall, removed the soaking insulation, and got to work on the pipes.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the galvanized pipes came apart in my hands. A friend and I worked on installing new copper pipes from the basement up. And things continued for a while longer. Until...

The toilet flange began leaking furiously. Upon taking the toilet out, I discovered that the flange had completely rotted away along with the flooring.

So...

A Diablo sawzall blade and 45 minutes of cutting the cast iron wye resulted in the removal of the original lead closet bend and the ability to install PVC into the stack.

Ahh! The joys of homeownership. Actually, I love working on the home... I just find it difficult to perform the work while also living in the home and caring for my kids simultaneously.