Tragedy averted

Michael W. Smith · #1 08/28/10, 09:13 PM

My wife and I were both outside on the front porch as our 12 year old son went in the house to fill up a gallon jug with warm water - to clean some stuff outside.

He came rushing to the door and yelled out, the faucet is broke.

I assumed he meant the faucet head had come off. Our faucet head had started to leak from the top where it had rusted through and I had "fixed" it with black electrical tape. Over time, the tape was coming undone and I thought he meant the tape had come off and the faucet head was leaking.

My wife and I go rushing in and there is water spraying from UNDER the sink!!!!! A hole had opened up in the hot water line and it was spraying water everywhere! Luckily there was a shutoff right there, so we got it stopped quickly.

I had noticed a while back that it was wet under the sink, and had assumed water was somehow leaking from the drain - but I felt around everywhere and could never find any water, so I put a pan under the sink and emptied it every so often. Apparently it was the hot water line that was slowly dripping, and for some reason when my son was running the hot water, it "let go" at that moment.

We are so lucky that it did this today when we were all here. I have to wonder what would have happened if this would have happened if both my wife and I were at work, would my son or Mother-In-Law know to turn the valve? I can just imagine getting a call while at work and my son saying - water is spraying from under the sink what do I do?!?

Or it would have been so much worse if it would have left go if no one was here, or it happened at 2:00 in the morning!!!!!!!!

This could have been so bad!

Kmac15 · #2 08/28/10, 09:33 PM

Glad you were there to take care of it.
This might be a good time to make sure everyone in your family knows were the main shut off is to the house. Better to be without water for the whole house for a little while then face a flood when you are not there.

mylala · #3 08/28/10, 09:37 PM

Providence, not luck.

rean · #4 08/28/10, 10:05 PM

You would have told your son to shut the valve off, duct tape the pipe, and turn the valve back on!

sandc · #5 08/29/10, 10:53 AM

This is why I am going to use a distribution block setup if we ever get to build our own place. Every since I saw a house with one I have been in love with the idea. Open the door and shut off the water to that specific item with a quarter turn of a labeled valve.

tiogacounty · #6 08/29/10, 09:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sandc

This is why I am going to use a distribution block setup if we ever get to build our own place. Every since I saw a house with one I have been in love with the idea. Open the door and shut off the water to that specific item with a quarter turn of a labeled valve.

Most of the plumbers in this area have mixed reviews of these things. Included a fairly high failure rate on the manifold itself, and the need to run a heck of a lot more pipe to get the job done. Personally, I do all my new homes with 1/4 turn ball valves at the fixtures. A 1/2 PEX ball valve is under $4 and it will do what you need it to do for decades. I can't see spending a few hundred more to buy a distribution manifold and run individual home runs to everything. Supposedly it results in more even pressure, but on a rural water system with a 7 gallon a minute pump, and a 40-60lb pressure switch at the pump, all the pressure in the world ain't gonna mean much if it only pushes a few GPM faster.......

brosil · #7 08/30/10, 07:35 AM

As I do repairs around here, every faucet gets it's own shut-off valve. If I have to do a future repair, I don't have to shut off the whole house.

Texasgirl · #8 08/30/10, 08:33 AM

That happened to my parents and it was in the middle of the night when one got up to get a drink and was met with wet floors.

FunnyRiverFarm · #9 08/30/10, 09:12 AM

We had that happen when we were away for a couple days. We pulled in the driveway and noticed that all the windows on the house were steamed up! It was the sink faucet in our bathroom that we JUST finshed remodeling that broke. We have no idea how long the water was running but our entire 2,100 sq ft. basement had atleast a couple inches of water in it...

I am glad that you were home and did not have to deal with the kind of mess that we had!

mary,tx · #10 08/30/10, 09:24 AM

A couple of years ago we replaced the old water heater because we just weren't getting much hot water. Not only did it not really solve the problem, but soon afterwards, DH noticed steam in the back yard. Seems one of those very old, rusted water pipes had just busted, and we had been dumping hot water into the ground for several days, if not weeks.

And you wonder at times why the utility bills are so high.

wy_white_wolf · #11 08/30/10, 10:32 AM

Yes you are lucky.

A few years ago we left for a week on vacation. Came home and the hose to the washer had burst. Luckily SIL found it before we got home and started to get the house dried out. He said that about 3" of water came poring out the front door when he opened it.

Insurance didn't like it because the repair bill was more than I'd paid for the house.

Kmac15 · #12 08/30/10, 10:42 AM

white wolf, ours at least burst with the family sitting in the living room

I now always shut mine off when we are going out of town.

wyld thang · #13 08/30/10, 10:50 AM

that is why we shut off the water when we leave for a long time too. also its just that time in the service life for stuff to fail like that, so we're replacing stuff