I rebuild my main water installation

3 months ago by redlemace to c/diy

The water heater started leaking, the hydrofor started leaking, the pipes had several dead ends, no of it fastened to the walls, and what's not clear in the 1st picture is the complete mess at the pump.

New water heater, new hydropress, pipes mounted to the walls, re-routed electricity. Re-used what I could, but much is new. My pride: I could not get a flens that fitted the pump (yeah, an industrial one of twice the price of a similar jetpump). I found I could remove the flens and fit a coupling I have in a box for over 30 years and survived 3 moves. Removing it was exciting, it had been in place for 40+ years but I managed without damaging the cast irons pump housing.

There is still some 'floating' pipes to fix, but over 95% of the job is done. Man, did that improve the water flow !!!

Lem453 3 points 3 months ago

Good job! Looks really clean.

What are some things you learnt that might help someone else doing this for the first time?

save

path: 0 25047050, hotness: undefined, score: 3, children: 1

redlemace 2 points 3 months ago

It pays off having cleaned up the whole area so I had room to move and place stuff
Assure you have good lighting
I always used some regular wrenches in the past, but bought pipe wrenches a while ago just because I liked them. Pipe wrenches are absolutely worth it
Water would be off for hours, so I had:
- filled the water kettle and coffee machine
- 20 Liter Jerrycan with water to drink/cook,
- 10 liter bucket to wash my hands before breaks,
- 10 liter bucket to rinse/clean stuff,
- small bucket to go and get rainwater to flush the toilet.
Take breaks. It's (probably) not your day job, you grow tired quick.
A vacuum that can suck up water is easier than a mop (also much more expensive so if you're not doing a lot of DIY see if you can rent/loan one)
Buy more than you need (keep receipt to return what's left) to avoid having to go to the store in the middle of your job and maybe even find out the part you need is sold out.
Install valves to close off different sections separately. super convenient in maintenance and with problems. I can isolate
- the whole house
- hydropress
- bathroom
- kitchen
- cellar
Plan in which order to work, whatever you need to have going first. (I wanted water to the bathroom first so we can wash ourselves and use the toilet. There you can also get water to drink cook etc etc.) This is also where valves come in handy. Once the valves are there, you can open up the water supply. So the bathroom had cold water while I was still working on connecting the kitchen, the cellar and installing/connecting the water heater.

save

path: 0 25047050 25050570, hotness: undefined, score: 2, children: 0

CMDR_Horn 1 point 3 months ago

BUT NOW YOU DON'T HAVE A BLACK BUCKET!

Well done. looks great. Was there much buildup in the pipes?

save

path: 0 25043608, hotness: undefined, score: 1, children: 1

redlemace 1 point 3 months ago

A bit but not much. Most was at the pressure switch which sat in a dead end before the filters. That made me extra happy I got rid of the dead ends there where and validated the filter install I did after I bought the place.

save

path: 0 25043608 25050259, hotness: undefined, score: 1, children: 0