Wish I knew a plumber who would come out and do a little work for a hundred bucks.
Wish I knew a plumber who would come out and do a little work for a hundred bucks.
And who says Socialism isn't alive and well in the US? MAN that would seem to ivite careless abandon in your water usage.
DJay
In alt.home.repair on Sun, 27 Feb 2005 13:17:10 GMT "Edwin Pawlowski" posted:
Well, I think it is cheap, but now that you mention it, I'll check.
Well there is no one like that in the n'hood, because the townhouses all have one big bedrooom and two little ones. Quite a few single people and those with one or two kids.
Most households have two cars, none more than 3, and the ones I see washing them really don't use much water. Both use a bucket, and one uses the hose to rinse it off when he's done, but only for a couple minutes. Another guy would wipe it down every morning using the dew. I'll pay more attention to this maybe when it is warmer.
I have one car and never wash it, except at the car wash. I only go to the good car wash after it snows, to get the salt off the underside of the car. When the top is leaking, which is 2 years out of every 7, I don't wash it at all.
Most people don't water the lawn much either, I think, since it rains every month of the year here. I watered one year after I planted some bushes and another year after grass seed. Last fall I watered new sod every day for more 2 month (because I put a few pieces in every week for 4 or 6 weeks.) And most of us have the same size lawn. Actually I'm at the end of a group and my lawn is 3 times the size of the people in the middle, 3/4ths of us. (I have a 20th of an acre, counting the land the house is on. :) )
I take baths, usually a bath every day, which probably uses as much water as 2 or 3 showers, but I wouldn't change that even if I were paying for exactly what I use. I have to remind myself what size water heater I have, and then I'll ask a question about my water heater. I can only get a little more than one bathtub-full of water out of my almost new water heater before the water turns cold.
I run the dishwasher no more than once a week. And the washing machine the same. Hey, I'm losing money.
The people who came up with this plan didn't have large families or lots of cars or water their lawn much. I don't know how much they were going to charge us for reading the meters, but I think that was their only motivation for not having it done.
Meirman
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"Your local building department might have construction drawings for the original building permit, which might show where the shutoff is. "
How many building plans for a house would show that level of detail? Usually, this is up to the plumber doing the work. And why even bother? It's not rocket science you know. In a new house it should be very easy to just follow the cold water pipe and see if there is a valve or not.
"I can't find where the water service comes into the house and I'm WAY too claustraphobic to do more than just poke my head into the crawlspace. All I see in the crawlspace are plastic drain pipes. I think I'll just buy the tool at home depot and turn the water off at the meter if I have an emergency and while I do plumbing repairs. The meter is less than 40 feet from the front door. "
I wouldn't rely on that as the primary shut off. Definitely not if you live somewhere in the north, where ice and snow occur. Imagine the water heater springs a leak or a washing machine hose were to burst. Maybe your not even the one home when it happens. Is someone else going to be able to find the key, figure out where the street valve is, dig through snow/ice, etc? I'd trace the pipe, find out if you have a valve, and if you don't, get a quarter turn valve put in.
We've got plenty of them. The best one in town just charged me $60 to fix a pipe under my kitchen sink. That was more work than it would take to install a main cutoff valve. I would have done the work myself if it wasn't so affordable.
There are some benefits to living in a small town. Not many, but some.
C.
Collin wrote: ...
I'd reverse that, myself... :)
Hey! You're the Kathy the cute blond that used to live next door to me a long time ago, that I got so attached to, but later who moved to LA and broke my heart?
No matter, wadda ya need done?
Shoot, even if he has (or has installed) a inside shutoff, it's gonna be down in the crawlspace. That's where mine is, and I can guarantee if a pipe bursts, it's gonna be a lot faster to shut off at the meter than to do the G.I. Joe belly crawl (probably right through the water from the burst pipe) to the main shutoff.
The meter is very accessible. WE will get the key to turn it off and keep it on the front porch.
Andy Hill wrote: ...
Never having to deal w/ house w/ only crawl space, would definitely be a pita if isn't where readily accessible (and sorta' defeats the purpose, for sure).
I'd surely strongly consider making it where it accessible if it were mine...
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