Plumbing on Grafton Street, Worcester
The photographs show the kind of opening. The street is where the job was.
The kitchen tee had been weeping into the cabinet long enough to swell the shelf. Tom sweated a new tee from inside the cabinet and did not open the plaster. The stop under the sink was seized, so that was replaced in the same visit.
The tank was twelve years old and the flue would not draft. June replaced the tank, recut the flue connector, and ran water through the pan into a new drain rather than onto the floor. The gas valve on the old tank was left with the scrap, not reused.
Every stop on the second floor was orange. June opened the bath wall, found galvanized all the way to the attic tee, and called before she kept going. The job became the bath and the kitchen riser. The bedrooms are still the old pipe, and the owner has that in writing.
The floor was warm along the washer line and cold everywhere else. Tom cut one square, found the pinhole on the hot line, and patched the slab the same day. The vinyl came up in one piece and went back down.
First and second floor kitchens were backing up together. The cleanout in the cellar was buried under stored bins. Once it was clear, the cable took a grease plug at the stack. No digging. He told them the yard line was not the problem, and he did not sell a camera they did not need that day.
The ell froze on a night the rest of the house was fine. Tom thawed it, found a split in the galvanized where the insulation had fallen off, and replaced that stick. The water stayed off until the split was out. Insulation went back on before he left the crawl.