Your recent repair? - 2021 to ?

[Palmtree]

Have you bought some R-410a? I happened to check the price at the same place I bought mine less than 4 weeks ago, and the 25-lb cylinder for which I paid $179 is now sold for $249.

No, but I should have. I looked into it and the price was a little higher at the time. Since I was going out of town for a few days, I thought I'd wait to order it. By the time I did get back, I'd forgotten all about it.

 

[Bamaman]

My hot water heater went lukewarm, and I assume an element went out.

Went to drain the tank, and silt has stopped up the drain plug. I've got to take the intake pipe off the top, and pump the water out before removing the old element(s).

I'm just hoping to avoid spending $400 on a new hot water heater. I have two 50 gallon tanks the same age.

 

[Sunset]

My hot water heater went lukewarm, and I assume an element went out.

Went to drain the tank, and silt has stopped up the drain plug. I've got to take the intake pipe off the top, and pump the water out before removing the old element(s).

I'm just hoping to avoid spending $400 on a new hot water heater. I have two 50 gallon tanks the same age.

Couldn't you run a small hose/wire/drain declogger plastic thing into the drain plug to push the gunk out of the way to drain it ?

 

[REWahoo]

My hot water heater went lukewarm, and I assume an element went out.

Went to drain the tank, and silt has stopped up the drain plug. I've got to take the intake pipe off the top, and pump the water out before removing the old element(s).

I'm just hoping to avoid spending $400 on a new hot water heater. I have two 50 gallon tanks the same age.

I cringed when I read this.

A handyman is due here within the next 30 minutes to replace our 11 year old WH and I expect similar problems draining the old one. Didn't ask if he had a pump to do this if needed but it's too late now!

 

[Chuckanut]

I have a simple wood couch table, the kind where the legs slip under the couch so you can pull the table up close to you. Well, after 20 years, one of the legs split where it is attached to the rest of the table. The table was wobbling to the point nothing that will break or spill could be put on it. A little wood glue and a clamp, and the table is stable again. It's not a big deal compared to you guys who overhaul your John Deere tractor transmission in a weekend, but it's a victory for saving money and not adding a fixable useful item to the junk at the dump.

 

[homestead]

My hot water heater went lukewarm, and I assume an element went out.

Went to drain the tank, and silt has stopped up the drain plug. I've got to take the intake pipe off the top, and pump the water out before removing the old element(s).

I'm just hoping to avoid spending $400 on a new hot water heater. I have two 50 gallon tanks the same age.

Did you try turning the water on to the tank and connecting a hose to the drain so that the tank is pressurized then turn on the drain faucet to help force the silt out. If that works then you can turn off the WH inlet and drain the tank.

 

[Philliefan33]

Today I replaced the crank set and shifter cables on my hybrid bike. Of course that meant I had to adjust the front & rear derailleurs. Checked the chain and it still has some miles to go before it needs to be replaced.

The bike is ten years old and I put a lot of miles on it in recent years. The past couple of years I’ve been learning to do my own maintenance. I enjoy doing it and it saves time & money compared to taking bikes to the shop.

 

[6miths]

Repaired my pool robot cleaner. A Hayward TigerShark. I love how it works but man the quality of the build leaves a bit to be desired. And it's like trying to build a car by buying the original parts - a bit of an expensive repair with components that are way over-priced.

 

[travelover]

Big DIY day for me. I replaced the charge controller on my camper. I got the bright idea of putting an Anderson quick disconnect on the battery cable to make it easier to take out the battery from its cave on the side of the camper. What I forgot to do was to turn off the solar panel connection to the controller. When I disconnected the battery, it fried the controller.

Next, I replaced a door lock set leading from the garage. I wanted the key to be the same as the other locks so I took it apart to re-key it and somehow botched the part where you push in a sleeve to hold the top pins in place and the darn pins went everywhere. After crawling around on my hands and knees for half an hour to find everything, I put it back together and installed the lock in the door. Jack of all trades, master of none.

 

[tb001]

It must be water heater week. Woke up to no hot water this morning. We have a home warranty (don’t ask) so we called them. The company promised they would be out today, but never showed. Calling a real plumber tomorrow.

 

[Jerry1]

Repaired my pool robot cleaner. A Hayward TigerShark. I love how it works but man the quality of the build leaves a bit to be desired. And it's like trying to build a car by buying the original parts - a bit of an expensive repair with components that are way over-priced.

That’s a disappointing read. I have a Tiger Shark but it’s only a year old. I’m glad it can be repaired, but I’m already feeling the pain of the cost of new parts. Probably have to deal with availability issues too. I just recently bought a new set of filters and that hurt bad enough.

What broke on yours?

 

[Walt34]

Went to drain the tank, and silt has stopped up the drain plug. I've got to take the intake pipe off the top, and pump the water out before removing the old element(s).

I'm just hoping to avoid spending $400 on a new hot water heater. I have two 50 gallon tanks the same age.

I cringed when I read this.

A handyman is due here within the next 30 minutes to replace our 11 year old WH and I expect similar problems draining the old one. Didn't ask if he had a pump to do this if needed but it's too late now!

This is one reason why I flush the water heater every two or three months. I hook up a 3/4" hose to the (brass) drain drain valve, zip tie the other end to the faucet at the utility sink and draining into a bucket sitting in the sink, and turn it on, let it run for a few minutes, shut it off, and repeat four or five times.

Why put a bucket in the sink and drain into that? I'm not yet losing my marbles, it's to catch the calcium granules that accumulate, and give me an idea of how many are still draining. When the "catch" dwindles, I stop flushing.

A new natural gas water heater is a lot more than $400. The last one, installed, was $1,200. So it gets lots of TLC.

 

[REWahoo]

This is one reason why I flush the water heater every two or three months.

Walt, I want to be just like you when I grow up!

Fortunately our WH did drain OK, although it was very slow.

My total cost for replacing our electric WH was $500 and half that was the $250 I paid the handyman.

 

[stephenson]

Bama,

Got me thinking ... maybe shut off breaker/gas, then cold water side, then open hot water valve in house, then shut off hot water at water heater, then hook up hose and flush back INTO the water heater?

It might push silt and mix up enough to get it to drain?

 

[aja8888]

This is one reason why I flush the water heater every two or three months. I hook up a 3/4" hose to the (brass) drain drain valve, zip tie the other end to the faucet at the utility sink and draining into a bucket sitting in the sink, and turn it on, let it run for a few minutes, shut it off, and repeat four or five times.

Why put a bucket in the sink and drain into that? I'm not yet losing my marbles, it's to catch the calcium granules that accumulate, and give me an idea of how many are still draining. When the "catch" dwindles, I stop flushing.

A new natural gas water heater is a lot more than $400. The last one, installed, was $1,200. So it gets lots of TLC.

Sounds like a potential for a hard pipe system and a solenoid valve to open and close the drain valve. Then you could put the valve on a timer (3 month interval) and you could be fully automated.

 

[Jerry1]

Got off lucky today. Garage door would not open via the garage door opener. Investigated further and it ended up being a spring that broke. Called the repair company and they came out today. I was expecting something like $300 to $500. The lucky part was that it got fixed today in rather short order and the bill was only $230. Only downside is that it would have been nice if it happened next year when I plan to do the entire garage which could include a new door.

 

[stephenson]

Unless changing door spring types (center over door or older side springs), you can probably reuse it all ...

 

[Sunset]

Got off lucky today. Garage door would not open via the garage door opener. Investigated further and it ended up being a spring that broke. Called the repair company and they came out today. I was expecting something like $300 to $500. The lucky part was that it got fixed today in rather short order and the bill was only $230. Only downside is that it would have been nice if it happened next year when I plan to do the entire garage which could include a new door.

Hopefully the other old spring will last until next year..

I changed both of mine at the same time, as I only wanted to do the job once. For me, the each spring was $35.

 

[John Galt III]

Ordered a brand new needle for my record player. Installed it yesterday, and the system sounds a lot better. I think the old needle was pretty worn. My only worry about ti is that the needle is not pointing straight down into the groove on the record. It's at a pretty big angle, I'd say about 5 degrees. It was the same way with the old needle too. I looked for ways to adjust it, but there isn't anything. The internet says it isn't supposed to be adjustable, and you're stuck with the leaning needle. But it also says you can McGuyver it by taking apart the assembly that holds the needle and cartridge, and insert a shim to level it out. I just hope I'm not ruining my records with this brand new sharp needle digging into the vinyl at a weird angle. Probably not, since the old needle was the same way, and my records survived.

 

[tb001]

Well, we got lucky and our water heater problem turned out to be a pilot light issue. The strange thing is that we have two water heaters linked together and *both* pilots were out. No disruptions to gas and other gas fixtures we have in the house are fine. I’m completely bewildered.

 

[JP.mpls]

I have a love hate relationship with plumbing.
I think it is physically demanding hard work, but very satisfying when you get it all done, and work properly.

I do it, because I'm too cheap to pay the pros, and I seem to have the skills to do most of it.

I've been living with a very old questionable toilet in my old home for 35 years. Rebuilt multiple times, doesn't flush very good or look very nice.

The problem is that the bathroom is extremely small, and the cast iron flange in the floor is offset 15" for some reason.

Almost all modern toilets have a 12" offset. The Japanese manufacturer Toto makes one with 14" offset, but it must be ordered online with high shipping costs, and it cost $500/600. I've held off doing this.

My toilet was ready for another rebuild, and I found a Kohler toilet at Home Depot with a 14" offset. It was $400, but I could just get it from the store, and return it if it didn't fit right. I purchased this a few weeks ago, and recently installed it.

Wow it works and looks nice, and yes, I'm on this forum gloating about it. Take care, JP
View attachment 39362

 

[NW-Bound]

Well, we got lucky and our water heater problem turned out to be a pilot light issue. The strange thing is that we have two water heaters linked together and *both* pilots were out. No disruptions to gas and other gas fixtures we have in the house are fine. I’m completely bewildered.

Is it possible that a wind gust hit the vents of the heaters just right, blew down the stove pipes, and extinguished the pilots?

By the way, I thought gas appliances now have electronic ignitors.

 

[tb001]

Is it possible that a wind gust hit the vents of the heaters just right, blew down the stove pipes, and extinguished the pilots?

By the way, I thought gas appliances now have electronic ignitors.

They’re in a locked cabinet, so I would think very unlikely? We have outdoor lamps with a gas flame instead of a bulb. These go out and need to be relit at the slightest disturbance, but no problem at all with these.

The only thing I can think of is when we had the house inspection they mentioned the gas lines didn’t have a filter that is now required by code. Maybe some sort of particulate came through the line feeding them? Just so weird to have them both out at once.

 

[Telly]

Is it possible that a wind gust hit the vents of the heaters just right, blew down the stove pipes, and extinguished the pilots?

By the way, I thought gas appliances now have electronic ignitors.

Gas water heaters do... You push a button repeatedly that fires a piezo sparker while holding down a button that mechanically allows gas to flow to the pilot

After the pilot is lit, a super-thermocouple (now called a "thermal battery" because it's output is higher voltage to run the electronics than the age-old millivolt thermocouple and gas valve method) then powers the small electronics board that controls the gas valve. An LED blinks out a fault code, or an OK code. Honeywell is a big maker of them.

The design driver of using a remote ignitor rather than a match held by needle-nosed pliers, is the sealing-up of the burner assembly to try to avoid unexpected conflagration due to possible flammable vapors (gasoline and the like) near the WH.

 

[Sunset]

I replaced the 12 yr old blade on my lawnmower, as it had a big chip out of it. Probably have been hacking the lawn with it like that for years

Then I decided I should check the air filter, again never even knew it had one for the 12 yrs. It was filthy and full of seeds. I banged it a bunch to knock off the seeds and dirt, and can actually see some light when holding it up.

I'll pick up a new filter, and replace it over the next could of weeks.