View Single Post
  #8   Report Post  
Posted to alt.home.repair
Nate Nagel Nate Nagel is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 2,679
Default Toilet Supply Line Hazard

I actually do this if I'm leaving for more than a day. Too much
"vintage" plumbing in the house that hasn't been completely checked out
by Yours Truly yet.

nate

Steve Barker DLT wrote:
Here's some better advice. Turn off the water when you leave the house.
Even if it just to go to the store. To leave it on in an unoccupied house
was just asking for a disaster.

s


"Steve" wrote in message
...

In February the master bath toilet supply line in my unoccupied house
failed. By the time the next-door neighbor noticed water coming out of
the house, all rooms but the front two bedrooms were flooded, and the
drywall was damp as high as 8" in some places.

This line was installed by the builder in 1998, and has a plastic coupler
at the toilet end. This coupler is what failed - it split open. The
result was approximately $25K in damage - most of the carpeting, vinyl
floors in both bathrooms and laundry, all of the MDF baseboards, and
repainting of rooms except the previously-mentioned front bedrooms.

State Farm took great care of us, and between the work done by a local
company to remove ruined stuff, dry everything out and do some of the
repairs, plus the work I did myself, we were able to move back into the
house starting in May.

But here's the thing: I inspected the coupling on the hall bathroom
toilet, and it was starting to crack too. So when I replaced them, I
tried to find supply lines that had metal couplings, but no joy. They're
ALL plastic now. But I noticed the new ones are made with more solid
thicker plastic than the ones that failed.

So my advice is this: Check those toilet supply lines, and replace them
if they look like they're starting to crack - it'll save you a lot of
grief!

--Steve






--
replace "roosters" with "cox" to reply.
http://members.cox.net/njnagel