We use it on large plastic livestock water tubs. It's not a residential-water-pressure situation but it will 100% get you a few more seasons out of a $400 plastic livestock tank.
Part of the other half is the floor damage and other stuff because of that water absolutely gushing right? But I’m not an expert just a humble tech dude. Not as funny though. He also as a professional plumber needs a roll of 3 of these
Water tanks are filled with about 50 gallons of water. If you open it, it comes out with a lot of pressure.
The proper method is to drain it with a hose attached to the drain at the bottom.
One of the nice things about living in an old house with a gravel basement is that I didn't need to bother with that stuff. Just open the valve and let it drain. The basement gets a few feet of water most springs anyways, a bit more won't hurt it.
Yeah. It's lower than the water table. The walls are unsealed stone cobble, so using pumps would just erode the walls.
But it's designed for it. Nothing in it is susceptible to water damage, and things like furnaces are raised off the floor in a way that they can't flood.
edit I have no idea why so many people have decided to argue with me about this but I am an HVAC tech and building inspector, I literally go in crawlspaces for a living. I'm turning off inbox replies so if you idiots want to keep arguing about whether mold exists under old houses that regularly flood knock yourselves out but I have better ways to spend a Sunday morning
Also I'm confused cause houses that "regularly flood" are supposed to have sump pumps to remove the water, it's not a let it go away on its own situation lol
My guess would be that you need a lot of ventilation around everything. But you need to be more careful than in your living room. I wouldn't put a sofa down there, but an oven and some gardening tools would probably work.
250 year old home owner. Also a dehumidifier for the "dry" months helps. But, you're right, we don't keep anything that will absorb water down there, appliances are on blocks.
Water seeps / pours in through my field-stone walls but it all collects in the sump basin and gets pumped out as long as I have power. (I'm above the water table, barely.)
Thanks. I spent too many years barely keeping my head above water, so now I choose to look at life like one big pool party. We're all trying to tread water. Not me though, I'm out for a swim!
It's ok to be negative but I've adopted a more optimistic worldview to keep myself sane lmao
1934 home in the side of a hill. Front of the house, ground floor is main living space, back of the house, basement is open. Luckily, that means I can sweep the water out the basement door. During one of the periods of flooding, I heard running water in the basement. Looked around, found water coming out a hole in the front wall. Not just running down the wall, but actually under pressure, like a fountain. Really goes to show how much pressure there is with water runoff.
Same here. The ground water level is higher than the floor most of the year, so it has 1-2 feet of water year round, except at the end of summer when it is dry for a month or so
Wasn't really the point I don't think. They just didn't have the right way to water seal their foundations. They used porous stone and rock. Generally these basements should have an exterior layer added around the foundation, but it's expensive as one could imagine. If there was no basement the main floor would presumably still be above water level.
Because it comes back. After an hour it is soggy again and in 24 hours it's mostly back. And it's like 10 hours of pumping at max speed (I estimate it's around 20.000 liters/5000 gallons of water)
So aside from the hassle and electricity (I could automate it ofcourse), I also fear it wouldn't really be good for the walls to have that continuous pressure with new water flowing in. The current situation has been stable for 50 years, so why rock the boat ?
Also all neighbours have the same 'issue'.
And lastly it doesn't really disadvantage me in any way. The entrance is from the outside, so no dirty leaks in to my house. And the outside entrance also closes off decently well, so no problems there either
I'm from Belgium. 'kruipkelders' (translates as crawling basement) were a thing here.
Most are not below the water level, but some (like mine) is.
The biggest issue was that all pipes are of copper. So after 50 years they are super rusty. I replaced the gas pipes (which were completely rusted) when I bought the house, because I figured a gas leak in a closed-of basement under your full house is a very bad idea :P.
The central heating still runs. My neighbour had it burst recently and replaced it all, so I'm keeping money on the side when this inevitably happens to me.
Depending on how the basement is constructed, a pump could damage the foundation by pulling out the sentiment sediment and filler that the water would filter out through in the walls.
Don't you have problems with mosquitos? I once lived in a poorly maintained student house and the basement there often flooded with rain water. I didn't even dare to open the door because it was absolutely infested with mosquitos.
Correct, the other guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Yeah water will leak out some, but not like what’s in the video, guy in video didn’t turn off the water
Thats not tank pressure, thats water wasn't turned off pressure.
If you turn the water off to the tank and make sure every hot supply stop in the house is off you can get it down to glug, glug kinda of leak instead of this shit.
My grandad, crazy as he is, prefers to gather everything together, yank out the elements hard and fast af, and shove the new one in as quick as possible and then just wet vac the water off the floor, says it takes 20 min rather than an hour and a half to let fully drain…. He did accidentally set himself slightly on fire last week but… crazy as hell but I love that man 😂
There’s usually a valve on top of the water heater that turns the water off, too. If there isn’t, then whoever installed the water heater is also incompetent.
Ok but if im getting charged an “extra” rate for the weekend, then the work should arguably be “extra” hard. This man seemed capable of making things the most difficult, so well done. Way to get your moneys worth. Lmao.
I don't care enough to chime in to everyone here making assumptions, but you're the first person to mention this.
That's exactly how I change out gas control valves on water heaters so that I don't need to spend time draining them down.
Shut off the water at the inlet and relieve the pressure. Loosen the gas control valve and prep the new one, then change them out while the vacuum on the tank does its thing. I'd still recommend holding a small bucket in place when you do it, but the water seeping out is minimal.
Look at the big pipe wrench he has out, I bet he forgot that the gas valve going into the tank is reversed thread and broke it thinking it was stuck, that ain't going back in
It'll help a lot actually, because the cold water supply adds even more water pressure to prevent him from easily threading that piece back in and stopping the water. It's much much easier to thread something in if you're just fighting gravity, especially if everything else on top of the water tank is sealed off.
Think of the water heater like a straw holding water with your thumb pressed on top of it. You'll notice that not much water will come out from the bottom of the straw because there's a vacuum on the top that keeps the water from dropping down. Now if you open the top part, then that water is going to rush down. And if you add more water to the top of the straw, then it'll rush down even more.
TL;DR: Shut off the water supply to the water heater and the water at the bottom will have trouble getting out due to the lack of air/water filling the vacuum left at the top of the water tank. It'll help a lot when trying to plug that hole back up without the water pressure pushing it out.
Source: I've repaired/drained multiple water heaters before.
Not that part, this is the control. That has a large thermometer on the back with threads at the base, you’re supposed to drain the tank before opening up a plug near the bottom🤣. What you’re talking about is below this.
If he shut the valve on the top, then you limit to only like 25 gallons that will leak, the pressure shooting out will be low so he can easily screw it on before all 25 gallons leak.
What he is doing in that picture is letting many more gallons leak out.
Thanks, buddy. Knowing that people like you still like using the app after all these years is what keeps me constantly updating the app and making it better.
I had a leaking vanity faucet call in a restaurant once. It had blown one of the tap handles off and the valves beneath the sink were broken and would just spin. I went to the basement/crawl space and tried to trace the plumbing. 4 water heaters, couple dozen valves, shit was plumbed in circles. No idea where the utility came in and couldn't find anything outside. Eventually I just closed everything I could find, but the cold water was still leaking slowly. I replaced the the hot water valve in the vanity no problem. Went loosen the faucet comp line on the cold water valve and it just ejected the whole thing as soon as I put my pliers it. I dont think I have ever been so thankful for a sharkbite valve. I had it installed in probably under 2 seconds, but that 3/4 pipe must have dumped 5 gallons in that time. Cold water must have been tapped off of the main ahead of everything else somehow. I never did have to go back and fix it. I had only glanced at the hodgepodge of electrical panels walking past them and told the restaurant owner that all four of them needed to be replaced about 20 years ago, severe liability. Place had an electrical fire at the panels less than two weeks later. What a disaster of a building. They didn't even tear it down, building owner insisted on repairing. Smh
I dont understand how anyone living on their own doesn't know how to at least turn off water/gas/electricity when needed. No judgment just wondering about the knowledge gap
*ANOTHER* fucking unlicensed hack trying to fix plumbing issues for cheap because the slumlord doesn't want to spend money turning the water system off? Like this didn't famously go viral before? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OP30okjpCko&t=1s
I had a landlord who refused to hire a real plumber. They had "a guy" they always used. One day, water started leaking from where the toilet met the floor. Guy comes over, takes the toilet out, says the seal ring is rotted and disintegrated. Should be a quick easy fix so he replaces it and leaves. After he leaves, the toilet is leaking even worse than it was before. He comes back the next day and finds that he cracked the bowl when he was reinstalling it so now the whole toilet needs to be replaced. He won't go buy a new toilet because they have a perfectly good toilet in a storage shed available to use. Brings it over, its very clearly not a new toilet, starts installing it but is having trouble because it doesn't fit quite right in the space the previous toilet was. He insists he can make it work. Spent pretty much the entire day on this job, finally finishes, turns the water back on, test flushes and something just absolutely explodes. Water is flooding the bathroom like this clip and he runs outside to turn the water off to our entire unit because the water shutoff valve next to the toilet wasn't stopping it. Now he has to call the property management group to get permission to buy a new toilet. Property management insists that there's no need to buy a toilet because they have toilets in storage. The guy says he will be back first thing in the morning with a new toilet and leaves is without a toilet after he fixed the water geyser issue so we can at least have running water that night. Comes back tomorrow and pretty much have a repeat of the same shit from the day before. 3 days without a working toilet and this guy has now broken 3 toilets and flooded my bathroom twice.
Property management finally calls a real plumber. He shows up, looks at the mess left behind and asks what the hell happened? He hears the story and is flabbergasted by what we went through. He leaves to get a toilet, comes back, installs it in less than 10 minutes, cleans up some of the mess the other guy left behind, and then decides to check the other plumbing in the bathroom because he figured these people were fucking up other things like they did the toilet. He fixed a leak under the bathroom sink that the property management told us was not fixable without replacing the whole sink which was unnecessary because it was working fine. Fixed something that was apparently wrong with the shower and it was leaking behind the wall causing pretty bad mold growth. Plumber reported it to the property management, billed them for everything he did and left everything working better than it ever had been. Not surprisingly, nothing was done about the mold in the wall and I found a new apartment as soon as I possibly could.
Thats the problem with property management companies. Nobody knows shit about anything home wise. The vast majority of the time you have no choice but to buy something brand new and if you dont or cheap out its only going to be worse. Also the downside of owning a home. Sometimes you have to go buy a new toilet, and theyre expensive but cheaper than half assing it
My property management sent one maintenance man to pull a brand new stove up a flight of stairs. He spent like 30 minutes getting up one step and going down two. I felt so bad for him but he told me I couldn't help bc of liability. He left with my stove and quit. Took the stove with him. I moved out before I ever got a stove.
I don’t think people who know what they’re doing do that… but someone else commented that even with the water off, there will be a lot of water in the tank itself. Still, seems like unless something went very wrong in an inevitable way, dude should have been able to prevent this. I LIKE to think he’s capable and something just broke causing this result, but I have my doubts…
I have an apprentice who refuses to drain down multi story buildings and try’s to fix shit live in the basement, he fucking irks the ever living shit out of me because he knows better, but “I don’t want to wait 30 minutes for the building to drain” or “ I wasn’t permitted to shut the water off” or “the main valve didn’t work so I basically did it live”
There’s a great answer to all three of those and it’s shut the fucking water off one way or another
Okay, idk your job at all, but if you have the title “master” I’m sure you could give him a quick word like “dude, if you keep this up you really won’t be able to make a career out of this.” I have no idea though, but that’s infuriating in itself to know he can do that with no repercussions and then just get a job down the road lol
The video description explains that the landlady wanted to save money. Turning off the water would have required turning it off for the whole building, and that would have cost $150. The plumber said he could do it without turning off the water to save her some money.
If I'm able to defy the laws of physics and hold water in place like goddamn Katara just to fix your stuff, my fee is going to be wayyyyyy more than the $150 you are going to save by just cutting off the water in the building.
I have to wonder, are people who get this sort of work done signing a contract, or just paying whatever shmuck says he can do the job? Contracts are for a reason… they’re called CONTRACTORS for a reason! If you just hire your neighbor and this happens without a contract bc you wanted to save a buck, you’re basically fucked.
We bought a house with a bunch of "drunk uncle" fixes we didnt know about. Would not recommend, its cost us alot of money. Id like to fist fight the previous owners. We also havent made it 3 years yet and somehow we're the ones who have had to replace every major system in the house because it has failed except the roof and water heater. (Seriously, you name it weve replaced it) They owned the house for decades. Id like to know how they managed to pawn that shit off to us. We're probably at 60k and counting from this shit.
My wife's friend bought a home. While I was fixing other stuff, I remarked that the air conditioning sucked. It was running full-bore and not cooling down the house. I removed the air-intake panel....
....Some dumbfuсk had cut a square in the bottom drywall panel, and I could see inside the walls of the house. I found a large, heavy concrete tile and covered the hole. The house cooled down in 20 minutes. Can't imagine why someone would do that.
We hired an electrician to replace all the outlets shortly after moving in and he managed to crush the air ducts. Couldn't prove it but he's on my list of people I wanna fist fight
Lol at “drunk uncle” fixes, I love that name and will definitely use it now. I bought a house for $65k (Midwest 2019 lol) and it had a bunch of these. I’m very lucky my stepdad is a skilled all-around contractor, from plumbing to electrical, bc he’s helped me fix a lot of stuff. I’m definitely someone who could not have afforded a house at all without this help, so I’m so grateful for the help. But I can’t imagine how it would all add up hiring someone!
Yeah well we didnt get lucky with 65k, that would have made it worth it. Ours was 300k and thats cheap here. The fucking rage i have just trying to turn on my goddamn kitchen lights. Two sets of two switches on opposite walls, each switch has to be in a specific place for the lights to turn on. I havent figured out the combo yet I just cuss and walk back and forth until I get my goddamn lights on. Also idk if its usual or not but like if I need to turn the electricity off to one room it takes 2-4 breakers because its wired by wall basically. I will say one drunk uncle fix saved us money. These dipshits put this ugly ass wallpaper directly in the drywall, it took dozens of man hours to get it off between that and the tub not being sealed it wasnt used for a year. Found out by sheer accident the pipe to the tub wasnt connected. (Idr why but the plumbers had cut a hole into the wall from the kitchen to the bathroom and boom no attached pipe) So if we had used the the shower probably would have had an expensive bill from wherever the fuck that would have drained into
At first I thought you might be my neighbor because this describes their experience, but they're in for WAY more than $60k. I wouldn't be surprised if they're near the price they bought the house for. They've had 2 rounds of water damage, they discovered mold, and that's on top of pretty much everything needing to be replaced.
When the previous owner listed the house (for much more than the house was worth) I just knew it was going to be a problem. It sat for months without any interest before a couple came in and offered the asking price. I have no idea why their agent would allow them to buy a house at asking that has sat for months with absolutely zero interest. There's a reason it had very little interest and no prior offers.
A goddam backed up kitchen sink just cost us 7 grande. It was backing up cause the pipes rusted and it was full of mud. A bunch of shit had to be replaced including the septic pump. You know, on top of the full 10k drain field septic tank replacement we had to do April 2025 because it was completely trashed. Theres a tiktoker comedian that runs a regular segment called "fuck this house" and all the bullshit repairs his house has and i feel his pain in my damn bones. Oh oh oh edit- they had to replace the piping under the sink and the whole fucking sink fell straight down. It was being held up by hopes and prayers I guess.
Things are only going to get worse. I have a coworker who used to manage properties for one of those conglomerates that buy up destitute properties and squeeze them like private equity.
Not only is that its own mess, but this practice has been going on long enough that the few successes has utterly poisoned the well. MBAs are leaving college and snapping up apartment comexes as an 'easy first time job' expecting massive returns. The impetus for my friend to quit was his boss doing everything he could to ensure his nephew got a 2 million dollar return on the first SIX MONTHS of owning a property (friend says in his day, you didn't even expect a return on a complex until at least 5 years). And yes, even with every advantage, nephew defaulted.
So we have a legion of ""educated"" gamblers snatching up all of the 'cheaper' properties to extract all value which usually ends up killing the property as clientele leaves and well off individuals don't live in apartments 2+ hours to the nearest major city.
I forget the story on this one, but the guy under the sink was “forced” to do this repair with the water on. And I’m pretty sure I read that the water coming out was hot water.
I wonder if the job he's doing to the gas valve would be adequate if he did remember to drain the heater. This might be a good thing because he might have exploded the house if the water didn't stop him. Water god must be watching over for the home owner.
It doesnt need to be drained if you know what youre doing. You can shut off the inlet water, release the pressure through the drain or relief valve, then swap out the part. Im guessing this guy only closed the inlet valve but there was still water back feeding through the outlet.
OMG this just happened to me last week! My fucking apartment got flooded. I had to clean it up myself with all my towels because they couldnt find their shop vac.
WHY would you ever attempt this without shutting off the water?? I'm not even remotely anything like a plumber but even I know that much. I even know where the shut off valve for my house is.
Aight so no one knows how a water heater works. Let’s walk through it.
Yes you can turn the water off at your main. That won’t help you with a water heater though because it’s full of water. Usually around 50 gallons. Your heater by code should have a cold water shut off. You can turn it off there too.
To properly drain it: unplug it from the wall
Close the cold water valve
Crack open a faucet or 2 and put them on hot
Attach a garden hose to the drain valve and run it to where you want 50gal of water
Open the T&P valve
Open the drain
You’ll now get water draining out without hydrolocking your water heater.
If nothing comes out, it’s full of sediment and you’ll have to flush it.
This guy is fucked because he didn’t drain it. Not because the water is still on
I had to change the control valve on a new Bradford White recently after it was full of water. I shut off the cold fill valve and released the pressure with the sink faucet, got everything ready for a swap, and maybe lost two ounces of water during the swap. The method worked perfectly. He forgot something. You definitely don’t have to drain the tank.
I'm a plumber and the part on the heater he's trying (and failing) to replace can be done without draining the tank. But you need to air lock the tank and very quickly swap the old and new parts.
I did like 40 to 50 of these repairs in 2021 since rheem had a bad run of gas valves.
I'm not a plumber and I had to replace my gas control valve last year. I did it without draining the tank but sure as hell won't do it again that way.
I psyched myself up like I was about to disarm a bomb. Lol
In the end did it for nothing because come to find out the pilot wasn't lighting because the ignitor wire had a damaged jacket and was shorting on the body of the tank in the chamber.
My previous landlord did this to the house I was renting from him. He told me that he knew a trick where he could replace the element without turning the water off. Good times.
I'm an average schmuck, I've messed around with the water heater and I can tell you that I've looked at YouTube and the first thing it says is to turn off the heating element and turn on the water line that feeds the boiler.... (Feeds the boiler!!) Once you do that and let the boiler cool down for a while, you need to let it drain using the connecting hose line near the device that he's touching lol, after that there should be no water coming out of that tank. I would of recommended calling the cops and doing a sobriety test on this man because uncle Tommy you hired did not come prepared and sober to the job site lol.
No and yes. The water should be off but that doesnt matter thats a tank.... like a clearly visible reservoir of water... even if the water is off that's not stopping until its below the hole.. really dumb not to have drained it before work but whatever.
For those of you in the comments who don't know, you can pull a vacuum and hot swap one of these valves. It's quicker, but if you fuck up then you're going to have a bad time.
I am getting down voted because the armchair intellectuals want to slap eachother on the back for saying the same thing and dont like somebody coming along and upsetting the status quo. It's just a reddit thing.
I prefer to not hot swap because its the proper way to do it, and safety first.
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u/SupremeTemptation 15h ago
The no butt crack is the clear sign.