"Carl Byrns" wrote in message
news:xhapj.8002$ds2.4229@trnddc05...

"Ed Huntress" wrote in message
...

Oh, yeah. I should tell you about what I'm doing this weekend: snaking
out the tub drain, which is cast iron (yes, cast iron, not the
welded-seam galvanized steel stuff). Not fun. And then I have to hope the
cast bronze J-trap ($40 now for a direct replacement -- and the joint is
a tapered, machined joint that won't mate with anything else) fits back
in properly.

I'd rather be ice fishing.


Ah, yes. Old house plumbing. I remember it well. A big part of why I sold
my 1856 brick house 12 years ago. The nightmares have diminished over
time.

-Carl (don't even ask about the 1949 Fairbanks- Morse oil furnace. I am
the world's leading authority on that alleged heating appliance)

I think we'll move after my son is out of college. I've about had it. My
furnace is an early -'50s Burnham Pacemaker that I had converted from oil to
gas 28 years ago, after my oil delivery company tried to put 350 gallons of
oil into my 220 gallon tank, which was 1/4 full at the time, and the balance
wound up on my basement floor.

That's the last time anyone else worked on my house, except for one paint
job. Nobody else could keep most of it going. g They'd have to rip things
out and replace stuff wholesale.

The blower on my furnace, for example, is powered by a little motor that the
maker tells me had a reasonable service life of five to eight years. It's
now 28 years later. The floating Oilite bearings on it have to be hand-oiled
every two months; the contact points on the centrifugal throwout switch for
the starting capacitor have to be filed and re-gapped every two years. I had
to remove and polish the armature shaft in the lathe when it seized up, the
first time the Oilites ran out of oil. Starting the system up every year
requires delicate balancing acts with water bleeds (it's an open hydronic
system) to avoid overpressure until it's been running for three days or so.
I have to rap the water pressure regulator with a wooden dowel to get it
working every season. g

If I had to write an instruction manual for someone else to keep it going,
it would be ten pages long. BTW, the reason I haven't replaced that blower
motor is that they don't make it, nor a replacement for it, anymore.

And don't get me started on the plumbing. I've had to turn faucet washer
seats from bronze shaft because they don't make them in this size anymore.
And I turned two faucet stems, a tapered gate valve, and a few other parts.
You really *need* a lathe to keep this house running.

--
Ed Huntress