house
Orangeburg
So, those sewer troubles we had last week? They came back. After snaking out the drains on Friday night, by Monday night they were clogged again. Not good. This time I was going to get a better answer, so I called in the professionals. By Wednesday morning we were again cleaned out, but had our answer: we have Orangeburg sewer pipe on our main line, and it was mostly collapsed.
“Orangeburg” pipe is a sewer pipe that was used abundantly in the 1950’s and 1960’s. Manufactured primarily in Orangeburg, New York, it is comprised of wood fibers glued together with a water-resistant adhesive, and then infused with tar. While it was relatively inexpensive, it turns out that it doesn’t hold up so well structurally after 30 - 40 years; any shifting in the ground or intrusive tree roots can cause structural collapse. And so it was with our drain line. The guy who came and did a video inspection of our line said he could barely get the 1.5" camera lens through the pipe. Ouch.
We did some quick research on sewer contractors and found a good one who could come fairly quick. In preparation for the job, they graced our front yard with some equipment on Friday.
On Tuesday they will come replace our collapsed glued fiber pipe with some good old-fashioned cast iron, and we should then be set to flush away freely for as long as we live in the house. I suppose it’s a good general lesson, too, about engineering using new-fangled technology: sometimes the problems with your solution won’t be evident for a while… it’s wise to try to consider the long-term.
Adventures in Home Ownership, Part 17
As my Twitter stream revealed over the weekend, it turned out to be a busy weekend, but not quite in the ways we had anticipated.
Becky has been wishing for a new refrigerator for a while now - something newer, bigger, and, well, if it had ice and water in the door, that’d be awesome. So Friday afternoon someone at work posted a fridge for sale that seemed to fit the bill. Lightly used, newer, 40% bigger than our current one, and yeah, ice and water in the door. At a good price.
So Saturday morning we drove down to take a look at it. The fridge was in great shape, a good deal, but there was one minor issue: the thing was one inch too tall to fit underneath the cabinet in the kitchen. We thought on it for a while, looked at some other refrigerators at Lowe’s and Sears, and realized that anything we ended up getting that was much bigger than our existing fridge would be too tall. So, after looking a bit at the small cabinet over the fridge, we decided to rip it out.
For not being the carpenter/handyman in the family, it came out pretty quickly and easily. I did manage to poke one small hole in the plaster, but it can be patched. I saved all the trim for reuse, and in the end we don’t lose much usable storage space. That was step one.
Step two was to figure out how to move the new-to-use fridge up from Swisher to our place in Hiawatha. I put a plea out on Twitter and Facebook and got a response from a friend who could borrow a truck (thanks, Bridget!). It took checking three places before I found a utility dolly to rent, but finally it all came together and Sunday afternoon we moved in our new refrigerator.
Steps three and four can be given a little more time. Step three is to get the water line hooked up. Hopefully I can get that done today. Step four means we need to get the plaster patched, get the trim put back up, and get things painted. I’ll post a few pictures when I get a chance.
So it wasn’t the way I expected to spend my weekend, but I was able to put some tasks off and it worked out well. Now I just have to get the lawn mowed before we start losing small children in that jungle.