Glugg

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.

3 thoughts on “Glugg”

  2. That’s pretty funny, well it’s getting colder so you better figure it out. If you do have to “re-sweat” the pipes in order to fix the leak you’ll have to drain the entire system. In order to do this you’ll have to find the spot where its leaking. Than cut off the water supply to the boiler (that’s were mine leaked) Heat it up and pull the bad connection apart(probably an adaptor,elbow or valve) dry it out and clean it off with a wire brush or emery cloth, or get a new one, than re-sweat it with flux, good quality tin solder, and a torch (try that great plumbing store over on 9th and V that’s closing). I shore miss my hot water radiator heat, force air heating ain’t worth piss.

    Better check and be sure it ain’t black pipe screwed together before you drain the system and start sweating pipe. Or you could use a a pan and a flash light.

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