April 10, 2006
Puddle jumping
Surprise, surprise, there's still water in the basement. I need to lug the ShopVac down there to suck up the last of the water, but, because there was evidence of further water infiltration, I decided it was best to work outside today. So, I spent several hours pumping the contents of a huge puddle--which had increased significantly in size--to a safer location on the opposite side of the driveway.
Using the jerry-rigged sump pump from the other day (where I pumped a different puddle from one side of the driveway to the other), I managed to substantially decrease the size of the monstrous puddle. It was over Ricky's head before I started, but only about 6" or so deep once I gave up for the day. Bascially, I just let the pump run until it shut off, which took a while, considering that it was completely submerged when I started. You can see, in the following picture, what the puddle looked like just before I left. The high water line is visible on the trees on the far side of the photo.
And, the gratuitous puppy picture . . . Ricky's quite happy with his new stuffed toy (thanks Mom!).
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April 06, 2006
Receding water
Thankfully, the water in the basement appears to slowly be dissipating. There was much, much less yesterday than there was the night before. The worst of the leaks--which Dana christened the "faucet in the foundation"--has slowed to a fast seep, and no longer has enough velocity that it's projecting away from the wall. The sump pump's hole still has some water in it, but not nearly the amount it'd had the day before.
Dana & I pumped out more of the large puddle underneath the deck, and it shouldn't increase in size (at least, not that much) over the next day or so because there isn't much snow left to feed it. It's significantly smaller now than it was to begin with.
Finally, we were successful on the east side of the house in our attempt (via eavestroughing) to move water away from the house. We've got a huge pond about 8 feet from the house, but it's not against the foundation. This is likely the source of the water in the sump pump's hole, but the pump should be more than able to deal with it because, as the soil's dense clay, it's not going to be able to seep underneath the house at any great speed.
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April 04, 2006
Noooooo . . . .
Damn it, I thought we'd seen the worst of the water problems for the year. I really should've gone out to the house yesterday to check the basement, but, in reality, there's not much that I could've done today. So, the sump pump's hole had 8" or so of water in it, there's about an inch of water throughout most of the basement, with two inches or so underneath the laundry room, and we've got our very own interior water fall.
The water was coming in far too fast for the Aqua Plug to have time to seal, and I couldn't stuff anything into the crack on the inside to slow down the flow of the water. While I could see the water draining from the large outside puddle, there's no spot on the exterior wall (at least that's above ground) that could see, never mind actually plug.
So, I assembled the second sump pump put it in the middle of the lake underneath the deck. I pulled the ends off two of the downspouts (no longer needed, for the moment, because there's no snow left on the roof), and dry fitted a 90 degree elbow and a 5' length of 1-1/2" ABS pipe onto the pump. In order to do this, I had to back my truck up and aim its headlights at the side of the house, as we've currently only got one light outside the house (at the back door). I'm sure that I made a mess of the already very muddy driveway, and I have to wonder what the neighbours thought of my watery escapade.
On the plus side, I managed to get most of the water pumped out of the hole, but won't be able to deal with it any further until the morning. I managed to get rather wet during this process, as I had to crawl underneath the deck and into the middle of the lake to get the sump pump at the lowest point. Thankfully, the flow of water into the house appears to have slowed, at least a bit, but I'm not holding my breath.
I can't get back out there until lunch time tomorrow, as I have to wait for the carpet cleaners to come to the rental house in the morning (to deal with the water problems that we're having there). While I'm waiting, I'll see if I can find another pump that can deal with smaller depths of water (probably one of the ones used to pump water off swimming pool covers). If I can get one of those, I'll put it in the basement and plumb it into the existing sump pump hole. *sigh*
All this is on top of the marking I need to get done tomorrow, never mind the three term papers and one short paper that I need to get finished in the next week. Oh, and there's a couple of final exams in there that need to be written. :-(
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January 26, 2006
Didn't you hear what I said?
Trent & I went this afternoon to pick up plumbing bits for tomorrow's project--installing a new main shut off valve for the house. The incoming line is rolled copper pipe (as evidenced by its curves and verdigris, among other things). We didn't measure it the last time that we were out there (I know, I know, we should've done this, but hindsight's 20-20, n'est-ce pas?), so we're not entirely sure as to what size it is. It's definitely not 1/2" ID, as that's what's directly beside it. It's bigger, but we don't think it's 3/4" ID, as there doesn't appear to be that much difference between the two.
When we asked the fellow (obviously on commission--way too much hovering) for 5/8" fittings, he automatically assumed that we were talking about 5/8" OD (which is 1/2" ID). It took us five minutes to convince him that that wasn't what we wanted (not to mention that we really did know what we were talking about, as the intake line isn't 1/2" ID, nor is it 3/4" ID). He actually told us that 5/8" ID copper pipe didn't exist (*sigh*), then eventually went to find another salesman . . . we left with a bunch of fittings, but I'm not convinced that they're the right ones. I'm seriously contemplating leaving the existing malfunctioning gate valve in place and adding the new one after it, just because that'll be less hassle. Yes, I know that it's the easy way out (which is one reason we've had so many problems with this house), but the fitting isn't leaking, it just won't shut off . . . so there's no reason that it can't stay where it is, at least for the time being. Regardless, tomorrow I'll get the town foreman to come out to inspect the water meter. But, knowing my luck, it'll be bone dry when he comes to look at it. Hmmm . . . can you tell that I'm not too particularly fond of plumbing? ;-)
On the plus side, we spent some time this afternoon drooling over bathtubs. We won't know how much space we've really got until we get the uber-hideous fire-engine tub out of its existing home, so there's no point deciding what's going into that space until we know exactly how big it is. I've seen some nice ones, but not any that I'm really enamoured of, so we'll just have to wait and see.
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January 21, 2006
In-house pond
*sigh* It's not every day that you walk down the basement stairs, look into the old cold room, and find your very own in-house pond, especially when the high for the day is a balmy -22C. We currently have a 1-1/2" to 2" deep pond, about 12 feet long and 5 feet wide, in the middle of the cold room . . . underneath the main floor bathroom.
This leaves little doubt that the main water shut-off for the house is faulty. In the 30 minutes or so between the time Dana cut the cold water pipe in the bathroom and our discovery that it was leaking significantly, we managed to end up with all of this water in the basement. As we only saw the water on the bathroom floor, we assumed* (incorrectly) that the shut off valve was at least partially functioning. Thankfully, the in-line shut off that Dana & I installed, after discovering the problem, appears to have worked, so the only water that's in the basement is what ended up there yesterday afternoon. It's a good thing that we stuck around to clean up, as I hate to think of the amount of water we'd have had down there if we'd left for the night. No pictures, though, as I left the digital camera sitting on my desk in Saskatoon :-( Although I'm sure that the water won't have magically evaporated by tomorrow morning.
On the plus side, the area of the basement that's flooded is almost entirely separated from the rest of the basement by 6" thick concrete walls. And, because we're finished, for the time being, with the laundry room, there's nothing in there but a pile of old bricks left by the previous owner. So, the water won't hurt anything, but I'll likely mop up tomorrow any that's still there, just because the idea of having our own personal interior pond is a bit creepy.
No sign today of the town foreman, so I guess I'm going to have to call the town office on Monday to make sure that this gets dealt with. Tomorrow's plumbing involves stuff that we've already put in-line shut offs on, so we should be able to get the basement bathroom's toilet and sink installed without issues.
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* As Dad has always said, to assume anything makes an "ass" of "u" and "me". I should know better by now, especially when dealing with plumbing, to triple check everything.
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January 06, 2006
You know you're having a bad week when . . .
I had hoped that it wasn't true, but I now have confirmation, thanks to SaskH20, that Aberdeen is currently under a boil water advisory due to the presence of Escherichia coli. Neither SaskHealth nor the town/RM are sure as to exactly how this happened, nor do they have any idea as to when the advisory will be lifted. Not only is this a pain for the residents, but this weekend there's also a large minor hockey tournament scheduled for the new rec. complex . . . this definitely isn't the first impression that the town wants to make, especially when it's hoping to become the next bedroom community for Saskatoon. :-(
This just hasn't been a good week (or a good start to the year)--Dana's cousin Fara passed away unexpectedly on the 4th (funeral tomorrow), Dana's been arguing all week with the bank about his student loans (and the bank's blatant ineptitude), I discovered this morning that my truck appears to have a blown head gasket (which we won't know for sure until it's pressure tested on the 11th), and, according to Bob, someone (or several someones) stole the bumper, headlights, winch, license plate, etc. from the front of the F550 last night while it was parked in the lot at our store.
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