Year: 2016

Underground Plumbing Inspection

March 10, 2016 / / 2 Comments

It’s done. The final hurdle in the underground plumbing has been completed. Last week the plumbers installed the final bit of cast iron to connect our epoxy-lined sewer to the existing drain stack. All of the other underground basement plumbing was finished way back in October. This past Tuesday was the sewer lining inspection and today we passed the underground plumbing inspection. We’re finally able to start work on the concrete floor slab.

Underground plumbing

Underground plumbing

To that end we’re in contact with our contractors, but there’s a couple of things we want to finish before the floor goes in. Our plan is to stain and seal the concrete floor rather than put down any kind of flooring. We don’t want to lose a half-inch of head room in the basement to tile, since even with the dig out it’s not all that high, plus it will be radiant-heated, so we don’t want to use carpeting. Because of that, we want to finish some of the work that might make a mess of our nice new floor before we put it in. First, the basement ceiling is currently just exposed floor joists and subfloor, so we’re painting the whole thing with a sprayer. By painting it before we have a floor we don’t have to worry about drop cloths or splatters. We would have done this sooner, but the basement isn’t heated and the weather has been too cold. Fortunately for us, it’s been unseasonable warm recently.

Second, I realized I should do some of the prep on the front window and back door. We’re waiting to put them in until the floor is poured, but I don’t want to be grinding and drilling brick and getting dust all over the floor, so I’ll get as much of the prep done for that as I can. In the case of the door I can’t really install the buck until the slab is in, but I can get the opening smooth and flat and pre-drill the anchor holes. I can put the buck in for the front window and just leave the window out. I’m planning to finish both of these projects by this weekend.

Once they’re done, our next step is to have Mario, our concrete mason, prep the floor with crushed stone, rigid foam, plastic sheeting, and steel mesh. Then Lester, our radiant heating contractor, can put in the PEX tubing loops. Finally, Mario comes back and pours the concrete. We’re hoping that with the underground plumbing behind us we can start making progress again.

Sewer Lining

February 24, 2016 / / 1 Comment

It feels like a long road to get to this post. We were hoping to hire a plumber in August, but we ran into delays getting reliable quotes and we didn’t wind up signing paperwork until the latter half of September. At the time, we were told it would be “roughly six weeks” depending on permit, a qualifier that stretched and stretched and stretched the plumbing work into months and months of very little getting done. It’s been nice to have a bit of a break from working on the house all the time, but it’s a strange, frustrating sort of limbo since we don’t know how long it will take and we had hoped to not spend another winter living on the second floor with an unheated first floor.

The below-grade rough plumbing in the basement was done in mid-October, and the new water service went in back in mid-December, but the sewer lining was delayed by the city requiring the sewer “tap” to be repaired. That was finally done a couple weeks ago (mid-February), after which they needed to come back out and re-scope the sewer because the city couldn’t locate the first recording. Permit was finally issued yesterday and they “shot the liner” today. Because this —like the rest of the plumbing— was not DIY, I don’t have a ton of pictures of the process. Also it’s underground and there’s not a ton to see, but we’ve done what we could.

If you’re not clear on what sewer lining is, the short version is they make a new plastic pipe inside our existing clay sewer pipe so that we don’t have to dig everything up and lose the tree in the front yard. At the same time, said tree can’t grow roots into the pipe because it’s seamless all the way out to the sewer under the street. Here’s a video that explains the process:

With this work completed, the plumbers need to come back (possibly tomorrow) and finish the underground work by connecting the newly-lined sewer to a short section of new cast iron pipe (instead of temporary PVC), so we can finally start work on the basement floor.

Sewer Repair

February 10, 2016 / / 0 Comments
Work begins

Work begins

Finally, something got done. Apparently, CDoT (Chicago Department of Transportation) had a moratorium on permits for street work over the New Year, so that was the primary cause of delay (this time). The plumbers also said their sub-contractor’s plumbing license with the City had expired and they were trying to resolve that, but they eventually wound up hiring a different company. Either way, the sewer repair work in the street has been completed as of about an hour ago. Presumably that means now the city will come out and re-inspect the sewer line to confirm that everything looks good so it can be re-lined.

Nearing completion

Nearing completion

The biggest frustration is that from a permit perspective, this work probably could have been done back in December. I’m still not entirely sure why it wasn’t. Instead the street work permit expired and getting a new one took over a month. In the mean time I need to clean up the weeping trench, since it’s a bit of a mess where the new water service comes in.

Cold Weather Blues

January 29, 2016 / / 0 Comments

Last year one of our primary goals was to finish the basement before winter. At a minimum we wanted the floor poured because it will have radiant heating. That way we could get the water heater and the washer and dryer into the heated basement. Because of the plumbing delays none of that happened, so everything is still on the unheated first floor. Knowing the risks (from previous year mishaps), we put heating cable on the new water main that runs down the beam in the basement and insulated it. The pipes in the first floor already have heating cable and insulation from previous years.

We’ve been fortunate to have a fairly mild winter this year, but we had a cold snap earlier this month and the first casualty was the water heater. We have a high-efficiency condensing gas water heater that I really like, even if a wall-mounted inline water heater would have been more convenient, given our basement renovations. Unfortunately, the condensing aspect means there is a drain line at the bottom of the exhaust vent. It’s a plastic tube that wraps around the water heater at near-floor level and out a hole in the side of the house. It’s supposed to go to a floor drain, but since the water heater is temporarily on the first floor, it’s draining outside. That drain line froze, so the water backed up and blocked the exhaust vent. When I tried to melt the ice with a heat gun I melted the tube. When I tried to disconnect the tube I broke the connector to the vent and cut up my hand on a sharp sheet metal edge. I managed to replace the connector and the tube and so far it’s been fine.

The second casualty was the washing machine. Two years ago the water inlet and valve assembly in the washing machine froze and cracked and we had to replace it, so since then we’ve been careful to drain the lines when it gets cold. Last year we had some bitterly cold days and managed to get through without issue. This year I thought I was being clever by turning off the water and then starting a fill cycle on the washing machine to drain the lines instead of unscrewing the hoses at the back. As it turns out that wasn’t clever and the assembly froze and cracked again.

The third issue was the next day when we got home from work and the cold water wasn’t working on the second floor. Apparently, even though all the pipes are insulated and heated all the way up to the second floor, the inaccessible area in the second floor wet wall got cold enough to freeze. I used a heat gun in the bathroom and got it flowing again.

This past Saturday, still waiting for the replacement washer part, Sarah got home to discover a torrent of water spraying all over the basement and the front yard! When we got the new water service, we asked the plumbers to install a spigot at the front of the house. When I installed the heating cable and insulation on the main, I skipped over this small branch line. Apparently it froze, but didn’t leak until it melted when the temperatures warmed up. The joint between the spigot and the copper pipe popped free. I had to turn off the water at the meter, run to Home Depot and buy a valve, and install that on the branch line. That way we can at least turn off and drain the branch. Later that day the new washer assembly arrived and I got that installed as well.

We’re hoping the coldest weather is behind us. The latest update on the plumbing is that if they can get the permit by today, they can repair the sewer tap by mid-next week. What that means for the timeline on the re-lining isn’t clear, but I’m guessing we’re looking at the end of February. I still need to clean up the weeping trench in the basement, but there hasn’t been any urgency on that.

Back to Waiting

January 5, 2016 / / 0 Comments

It’s a new year, but we’re still waiting for the basement plumbing. With the city insisting that we needed to repair the sewer tap, the plumbers had to hit us up for more money (a lot more money). The alternative was to run a new sewer line under the house that then tied into the existing sewer line in the front yard instead of re-lining the existing sewer. There are several reasons we decided against that. The first is that we already got a quote for that (from another plumber) and it was still more than doing the re-lining (even with the tap repair). The second is that the tap would still be broken and could fail in the future. The third is that the existing clay sewer line in the front yard goes under the maple tree and will need regular hydro-jetting if it doesn’t gets re-lined with epoxy. Basically, even with the additional cost, this is still a better end product for (probably) less money. Unfortunately, it’s not as much less as it was originally.

We made payment and signed paperwork on the 18th, which was of course the week before Christmas. They came out and resprayed the lines in the street and easement and put up the little marker flags, but so far nothing else has been done. I appreciate the lengths that the plumbers went to to try to save us money by getting the water department to let us skip the tap repair. At the same time, they knew this was likely back in October. If they had just relented then we’d probably be done by now. Instead this project has been going on for over three months when it was originally projected at six weeks. Now there’s snow and ice on the ground, it’s undeniably going to be more difficult, and we’re still living on the second floor and contending with our water heater, freezer, and washer and dryer running on the unheated first floor. Simply put, we’re frustrated, and the huge extra bill right before Christmas didn’t help anything.

We’re resigned at this point to another winter on the second floor, supplementing our undersized radiators with electric heaters and struggling to get the temperature up to 68°. I really hope they are able to continue work if the ground freezes.