Getting rid of the water heater.

[mm]

"Stormin Mormon"

wrote 2 years ago

That is why there are junk guys. I hired a company to get rid of my >old chicken coop, and the routine was "anything that 2 guys can carry, >and you pay by the qtr truckload". In my case it was a half truck >load worth.

Just a story.

When I started yesterday looking to get rid of MY water heater, I thought I could call bulk collection.

20 years ago it was on a monthly schedule and free. 10 years ago I had to call a private party who worked with the county, make an appointment and send a check in advance for 10 or at most 20 dollars.

Now the county does nothing except refer me to the wrongly-stated category in the yellow pages. The yellow pages has 4 columns plus display ads over 4 pages. Most were dumpster companies!

I found one whose truck I had seen around here 3 or 4 times in the last 2 years, 1-800-Got-Junk.

Something like the one you mention, Chris, they have a minimum 1/8 truckload, of 10x8x5=400/8 = 50 cu. feet, but the water heater is

5'feet high by 2 feet in diameter, at most 20 cu.feet.

They charge 167 for an 1/8th of a truck, and 119 for anything less than that.

That's a lot compared to 10 dollars.

But the guy on the phone was very nice.

So I'm going to wait until the next Pennysaver comes and see what they have there.

Some people have posted that the WH can be cut with a reciprocating saw. If so, I figure 3 pieces, plus scooping out the bottom, to get it out of the basement fairly easily.

So maybe I should cut it into ten pieces and throw it away with the regular garbage??

I can cut it up on a tarp or in a big box, like the box the new one comes in, maybe, and pour all the broken glass into a garbage can.

Then I'll find out how good my Harbor Freight recip saw is. I've only used it for 3 minutes and so far, so good. :)

[mm]

I forgot to say that for this money, they send two guys and will go down to the basement to get it.

And if I had more stuff, it might well be worth 119. Of course I have a small house and lot, and can't wait until all that stuff piles up, esp. since the county takes most of it away for free.

[Goedjn]

What you need to do is find a scrap metal dealer. If you deliver it, they ought to take it for free.

[Roger Shoaf]

This is a good idea, but you will save yourself a bunch of time if you use a skill saw with a metal cutting blade.

The outside of the tank is tin, and when you peel that off you will find fiberglass insulation. The burner and the control are screwed or bolted on, and then all you are left with is the inner tank.

Another thing to check is scrap metal places. They might take it for free if you deliver.

If you do decide to cut it apart, please post an update I would like to hear a description of the anode if your water heater was retired due to leaking.

[Steve B]

Be nice to your trash truck drivers. I believe I could get mine to knowingly take a corpse. I'm not kidding. They have taken cabinets, big pieces of sheetrock, two water heaters, big stuff.

How am I nice to them? I take them cold bottled water or a Coke on a hot day. My daughter's a PO, and she gets tablets of free BIG GULP coupons. I give them a couple of them. I go out there when they come and help them when there's a big load of stuff I want NOT to make a trip to the dump with. Last Christmas, the driver was one of the regular guys, and I gave him a twenty. The helper was new, and I figured fair was fair. Many times through the year, they took stuff I thought I'd have to drive to the transfer station.

Steve

[mm]

I'm 60, but I think I missed a lot of things in my youth.

I want to relive the day when you were 17!

I'm not really kidding. There's no chance I can date a cheerleader, and this may be the best I can do.

I'll try to get back to you all with follow-up, but I can be very slow at getting things done. I have two different friends who are out of town. I evern have the keys to one, maybe both of their homes, so I think I'll stop doing sponge baths and wash there, subject to their approval.

[Jeff Wisnia]

Just a thought, but do yo have any land around your place where you could just dig a hole and bury the thing?

They aren't all that hard for a couple of guys to carry once they are drained.

Jeff

[gfretwell]

If I went to the trouble to load it up I would drop it in the mayors driveway.

[mm]

You're daughter's a post office, and you offerred your daughter to the trash men!! That might be going too far, but if not, I don't have a daughter to offer anyhow.

I'll keep all this in mind. They took a 4 drawer file cabinet this past year. I don't know if that was beyond the rules or not. I took the drawers out to make it lighter.

I am slightly nice to them, in that I smile and say hello when I see them, although I don't usually know when they are coming. If I am bringing something late, I carry it right up to one of them, so he can throw it in, instead of putting it on the curb. I don't feel close enough to them yet to throw it in myself.

I started putting the trash cans not on the sidewalk behind the parked cars, but on the cement section of the corner island, which is as close to them as you can get without putting the stuff in the street, and now everyone near me puts it there. And the driver doesn't have to back up to get close to the trash. That's why I put it there.

None of this is much, but it's all I can do except Christmas gifts.

And a couple months ago I started thinking about giving them Christmas gifts. This is the first year I managed to give the mailman his Christmas gift when it was still Christmas season, 3 or 4 days in advance even. Up until now I had been running two to eight months late. Although sometimes I don't think he earns it, since in the years he has had this route, whenever I get a certified letter, he never has it with him. I guess he expects me to be at work when he comes, and even if I'm working at home that day, he hasn't brought the letter. Strangely enough 2 weeks ago was the first time I got one, adn that was after a fiasco a month or so before then when I went to the post office, couldn't find the slip, because it was in the console of my car and I didn't look there, and never got the letter. Even after I talked to him about it, all he brought was another slip.

But none of this is the trashmen's fault, and I should start tipping them on general principles, and not because I need them to do something special.

After a post earlier today, I suddenly remembered that I have a tiny trailer in Dallas, that I am supposed to assemble and bring back to Baltimore with some of my childhood furniture on it. Was supposed to leave this Thursday, but will be a couple weeks late. When I get back I'll have the trailer with me.

I still may cut the WH into pieces to get it upstairs, but just this evening, I bumped into a friend of mine who reminded me that I had taken his water heater out of his basement! I barely remember this. He said it wasn't heavy, but he's still ready to help me. I might well have asked him even if I hadn't done the same thing for him. We're friends. It doesn't have to be tit for tat.

So if I get it out, I can use my tiny trailer to take it somewhere.

He also has a stove he wants out of his basement, which he says is heavy, but that I'm 99% sure we can disassemble.

[mm]

No.

That's what my friend said, and I may have the wrong impression becasue last time my helper was a 5 foot, 150 pound woman, and the extra weight wasn't muscle.

My guy friend is probably a heck of a lot stronger.

[scott21230]

Either that or cut it into enough pieces to fit in your car and drop off at nearest dump or apartment complex dumpster.

[Anonymous]

In my last community, the "idiots in charge" passed an ordinance saying they would no longer accept appliances at the landfill. "Problem Solved"

Shortly after, the rural roadside was littered with dumped refrigerators, washers, water heaters, etc.

I wonder what it cost them to clean it up ??