I have a leak in my pipes. I didn’t notice it until about a month or so ago because it is in the basement, near the furnace, in the room with all the spiders. So I don’t go there much.
Anyway I figured if I turned off the water to the furnace I could dry out the pipe so I could sauder (is that the word?) it. A week later after turning the water off, it was still drippy. Not so much drip-drip, but drip, come back in an hour, drip. Still wet, so I noticed a rusty faucet thingy at the bottom and figured that would drain the pipe. Hooked up a hose to it and 4 ft of pipe should be drained in no time. No time took a good long while.
As I sat by, watching the water drain into the sump pump, I heard a periodic glugging noise. Then it dawned on me and I’m quite sure blood drained out of my face, I was draining not only the pipe but every single radiator in my house. My radiators are big and range from 4 to 3 feet high. All that water.
The problem with draining the radiators is that I would need to pump all that water back up and not all the valves are easy to work with. I can use a special key thing to play with the pressure on 3 of my 5 radiators. One needs a pair of pliers and the other…. I don’t even want to think about that one. Maybe I can find a replacement part for that one. *sigh*
Link:
Radiator key and valvy part that I need to replace so I won’t be fearful of bleeding my radiators.