When it rains
it sucks on ice.
Just as I was about to get through week two of the new gig, I come home to a leaking water heater.
Now, the heater is old, and aI’m not surprised it leaked. I’d have been a lot more surprised, in fact, had it lasted much longer. It was old when we moved into Chez og, and it was one of the few things that I never touched, for fear of the cascade of shipfitters disease it would inevitably cause.
The whole installation was a Stupid Previous Owner trick. I was amazed it had lasted this long,. So I ended up redoing the gas, redoing the water, putting valves on, fixing this that and the other. When I finally relit the pilot, an hour and change ago, it was quite the relief. I’m waiting for it to come up to heat, and then I’m gonna take a shower. Damn.
Water heaters are one product that has gone severely downhill in the past twenty or thirty years. The tanks on the new ones just don’t last.
My local electric cooperative has a program that pays for an electric water heater if you switch from gas. I jumped on that deal.
Reminds me of my Stupid Current Owner Trick last autumn. I was in the basement and figured “I’ve never drained the hot water tank in the seven years that I’ve been here. I ought to do that, since everything in my life is running smoothly now, so I have to fuck it up somehow.” After I emptied a bunch of what looked like hand lotion, regular hot water came out. I figured ok, so I turned it off, to discover that the PLASTIC fitting now drips.
Og, you know a thing or two about this stuff. Should I go get a nipple for the end of that faucet (it’s not the emergency pressure valve one, just your garden hose looking one towards the bottom), put pipe dope on it for a seal, then screw it on, or am I better off just leaving the drip pan?
MTs, you can buy a brass garden hose cap.