Tunneling under my daughter's room... A very positive experience with plumber

LeeH · 03-13-2008, 11:04 AM

I'm almost speachless after this experience. We had water backing up through the floor in our kitchen, which led me to check the water meter. It was running with no water turned on in the house.

I went to the local Chamber of Commerce site and found Mountain Park Plumbing, a plumber in our part of Phoenix. BBB.com said they'd had no complaints in 36 months. Great. After some observation we discover that we had two different problems. A stopped up drain leading out of the kitchen and a water leak under the slab. The kitchen problem was quickly fixed. The slab was another story...

A locator company came out and marked the route of the leaking hot water line. The leak appeared to be in the hall outside my daughter's room. The equipment indicated it was around 20" down. After popping up two tiles in the hall, jack hammering, and digging for quite some time it became evident that the leak was further down. The locator came back out to point us in the right direction. The carpet was pulled up in my daughter's room and there was a lot more jack hammering and digging. At this point I changed into my grubby clothes and started to help. The guy had another call for the afternoon, but said he'd be back the next day. I figure any help I offer is a plumber rates so I told him I'd have the hole dug out and pipe exposed by the time he returned. The pipe was around 36" down and about a foot over from the mark.

They had given me a flat rate of $950 to do this repair. When Matt arrived this morning to finish the job he said not to worry, that they weren't going to charge me any extra even though they had gone over their time estimate by a significant amount. I was shocked but pleased to hear this. Once he started working on the pipe he determined that the copper was so badly corroded that it could not be repaired. It looks like this leak had been going on for a long, long time. After putting a compression coupling in place there was seepage at another spot.

He said he was sorry that they weren't able to fix the leak, but they would refer me to another company the does replubming. He started filling in the hole. When the hole was filled and concrete repaired he brought me the invoice: $118 for the drain cleanout in the kitchen! The owner made a trip out to assess the situation on Tuesday, the other guy, Matt, was here from 9:00 to 12:45 yesterday and from 8:00 until 10:30 today and they only charged me $118.

By the time he was ready to go I think I had convince Matt that replumbing the line through the attic wouldn't be as bad as they had originally thought. Matt said he would talk to the owner about what he had seen. I'm hoping they'll do the work... it's rare that I'm anxious to pay a contractor MORE money, but I'd really feel better if I were able to give them more business.

The little hole:

Boulder pulled from the hole:

There's a good reason why I look like I'm in pain after three hours of digging:

Mule · 03-13-2008, 11:25 AM

I had to change plumbers too just recently. Here's my new one.

Joeaksa · 03-13-2008, 11:25 AM

Hope that none of us have fun like this with our houses!

I had something like this a while back. The water bill was far in excess of what is should have been. Walking to the side of the yard I noticed a damp spot in the gravel where there shouldnt have been. Started digging only to find the sprinkler line to the back yard had a nick in it. How it got there is a good question as it was 6"- 8" underground.

Went to Home Depot and got a sleeve style fix-it piece and had this taken care of in a jiffy. Water bill went down around $100 a month after that.

TerryH · TerryH's Garage

I'm a little surprised they went that far into the ground. Once a leak is detected underground, it's can be assumed, based on age and neighborhood, the rest of the plumbing is shot and rerouting/repiping through the attic is the next step.

Maybe the price of copper is making it cost effective to try and patch patch.....

Our house has a complete crawlspace, so at least my plumbing repairs are easy relative to slab.

ZOA NOM · ZOA NOM's Garage

Re-route ASAP. Every neighbor of mine had their pipes break in the slab. I ran new copper into the attic the first chance I got during a remodel. Never had a problem, and the pipes in the slab have been long forgotten.

rsrfan · 03-13-2008, 03:44 PM

Had to replumb the entire house (Las Vegas) a few years ago. Look at Wirsbo Aquapex. It is a poly tubing with millions and millions of feet in use for the last 30 - 40 years. (Europe) It is generally cheaper to install due to the relative ease of installation.

JP

MBAtarga · 03-13-2008, 05:53 PM

If you run any water lines in the attic, you won't have any lack of hot water in the summer! (I've lived in Chandler years ago.)

LeeH · 03-13-2008, 09:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MBAtarga

If you run any water lines in the attic, you won't have any lack of hot water in the summer! (I've lived in Chandler years ago.)

Great point! The hot water will be arriving sooner!

MBAtarga · 03-14-2008, 06:44 AM

Unfortunately, it also means that during the warmer months (that's March thru October for non-AZ folks), you will have to run the cold water for a half a minute or so before you put your hands under - or you can get scalded.

LeeH · 03-14-2008, 07:53 AM

At this point only the hot is going through the attic. We have a water softener that's outside so our cold water can approach 100 degrees in the summer.