No more hose

This weekend we knocked out a bunch more odds and ends around the house. A big thanks goes out to Tom for helping us clear out the massive brush piles that we left last weekend. He brought his big trailer over and loaded it up with his tractor. As we pulled in late Saturday night, it was really nice to see a clear side yard. It was unexpected as well, which made it that much nicer.

Yard clean up

Sunday morning we started with yard clean up. I started filling in the holes around the yard from looking for Tommy’s water lines as well as from running our new water lines. Oceana took to raking all of the debris up in the new side/back yard and got it looking stellar. We loaded a bit of additional debris in Tom’s trailer and then started cleaning up the junk that was uncovered in all of the brush.

120 year old pine

While Oceana cut up all of the old plumbing pipe, I got out the chainsaw and cut down the stump of the pine tree that’s been in the front yard. Tom tried to push on it with his big tractor but couldn’t get it up without completely tearing up the yard and driveway. No problem. I made quick work of it with the chainsaw. After cutting it, I decided to count the growth rings. I put this tree at 120 years old give or take a few. Also, evidently it’s called lighter pine. All of the sap was down in the tree when it was cut (based on the time of the year) which lets the wood burn real easily. It’s used for starting fires. Very cool. I kept the stump and will split it and use pieces of it for starting the smoker.

The back story

To give some context as to what we’re about to get into, I’ll explain the situation so what we’re about to do makes sense. I hope. We’re going to re-plumb the house – both water and drain lines. We recently ran a 1″ PVC water line to the house and stopped it near the existing bathroom on the north side. This line also splits off and feeds the irrigation system. However, this line doesn’t go through the foundation wall – yet. Also, based on the location of the bathrooms and the main drain line to the septic tank (which is newer PVC and is not going to be replaced), it makes the most sense to bring the 4″ main drain line through this same area as the water line. For us to be able to finish up the mulching as well as fill in the remainder of the holes in the side yard, we’ll need those lines ran.

Water line into the house

First up, the water line. We shut down the water at the new main shut off by the meter. With the water shut off, I got out the chipping hammer and made a hole through the foundation big enough for a piece of 1 1/2″ PVC that I used as a sleeve. The water line goes through this and it prevents chaffing against the side of the concrete block. I then plumbed up and into the house. While doing this, I brought the chipping hammer into the crawl space to see if I could open up a hole in the block wall to get access to below the existing bathroom as there is no access to the crawl space below this bathroom.

Another mystery

I chipped out a few blocks and found a set of concrete steps leading up to a concrete stoop. Interesting. The floor of the crawl space below the front bedroom is concrete – like it was a carport at one time. Then evidently there were concrete steps leading up to a concrete front porch which is all hidden below the rear bedroom. The floor framing of the rear bedroom is just overtop of the concrete stoop so you’d never know it was there. With all that being said, I still don’t have access to the crawl space below the bathroom. There is, however, enough room between the floor joists and the concrete stoop to run a piece of 3/4″ PVC pipe. So I ran a new line to the crawl space below the bathroom and tied it in to the new water line that we just ran through the foundation wall.

Busting out the block

Time to get access to the crawl space below the existing bathroom. There appeared to have been an access to the crawl space near the back corner of the bathroom that had been filled in at a later date. We opted to use this area as our entry point. I showed Oceana how to use the chipping hammer and let her chip away until she needed a break. I finished up the hole, which is much smaller than I’d prefer, and peeked inside. It’s tight, but there’s enough room to do what needs to be done.

A garden hose? Yup.

The cold water for this bathroom is fed from a garden hose. Yes, you read that right. A garden hose. Why is it like this? I have no idea. But it was finally time for it to go away. The garden hose was connected to a piece of braided hose (like for a washing machine) which was then tied into the copper plumbing for the bathroom. I added a threaded adapter to the end of the new 3/4″ pipe that I ran and then attached the braided line to the threaded adapter. With the hose now disconnected, Oceana pulled it out of the crawl space and put it away.

No leaks. Well, kind of.

We turned on the main water and tested the system. No leaks. Great! While I was below in the tiny crawl space, I had Oceana run the shower, the faucet, and flush the toilet. The toilet and faucet were all good. The shower though, leaks like a sieve. It leaks around the drain and the pipe itself has rusted through on the bottom. Water just pours out. One more reason that everything is getting replaced!

Odds and Ends

Monday morning Oceana spread some grass seed on the side yard and I took care of some odds and ends around the house. We visited with Tom and Kay for a bit as well as Bud and Diana. Bud and Diana brought us more Avocados. Thanks guys! We met Joe yesterday. He stopped by in his golf cart and visited for a bit. Joe is the trend setter – just like we’re doing with this house, Joe completely remodeled his house by himself over 2 years. He gifted us with some Avocados as well as a few bites of a late season mango. Awesome! Kay brought us over a dragon fruit. That’s a very interesting fruit. It’s bright pink inside and kind of tastes like a kiwi. She gave us a dragon fruit tree as well as a turmeric plant. Thanks so much everyone! Lastly, we got a real heavy rain Sunday night. Tom said his gauge showed 3 1/4″ of rain. The lake came up quite a bit and there’s a few docks nearly underwater.

That’s all for this week. Thanks for following along and have a great week!