Got Water?

Yes! We've got water!

It was 7 pm last night before we did. I'd already given up for the night, but, well, once I through enough money at the right people, the problem got fixed. Fixed really fast, too!

Okay, here's the thing. Mark Pugh was here painting and we both looked high and low for the leak. The meter was running at about 3 gallons a minute, so there HAD to be a very big, and very visible pool of water somewhere!!!

Mark crawled under the house and even dug a hole next to the foundation looking, but he couldn't find anything. It had to be somewhere!!

Eventually, I called American Leak Detection. They had a guy there in 30 minutes with equipment to look underground. He made a pass from street to house...nothing. Then he asked, "Do you have a faucet out in  the yard somewhere?"

"Well, no." I replied, "There used to be a faucet way back in the 80's at the pump before we went on city water, but that's been gone since then."

Guess what? It wasn't. Okay, here's the thing. When my folks had this house built way back in 1959, they had a pit dug where the pump and tank could be placed underground to protect them from freezing. That pit has been covered with a wooden cap ever since with just a faucet sticking up through the cap. It's way back behind shrubs at the back of the back yard. I'd forgotten it was back there.

The ALD guy found it. That's where the leak was! Water was shooting though a hold in the galvanized pipe against the bottom of the wooden cap and was close to 6 feet up the 8 foot deep pit. Once the leak was found it was simple for them to cut the pipe and remove the section that had developed the hole and replace it with PEX (I think they called it).

Turned the water back on and Bob's your uncle! We now had water.

It only cost $500 to make this fix and get our water back. 

I have no idea what my water bill is going to be this month after all this, but I bet it's going to be through the roof!

Now, the continuing bad news. All the pipework is galvanized iron. That doesn't last forever...clearly...and it's all probably reaching its end of life. More leaks are going to start appearing in the underground pipe. We're going to have to replace the water line from the street to the house, at least. (The piping under the floorboards is probably still good, so that's going to be left alone.) It won't happen in the next few weeks...I hope...but soon we're going to have to have a trench dug and a new pipe laid...and new connections to the house's plumbing made. More $$$$!

Next week the whole home generator is being delivered and installed. I'm thinking I better check on the water line and gas line as I don't want them driving over either with heavy equipment when they move the generator to the back of the house.