On Thursday, August 31, 2017 at 9:38:29 PM UTC-4, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On 8/31/2017 8:01 PM, trader_4 wrote:


All those are good questions. For something like this, I'd find someone
who's established, licensed as a plumber and appears reputable and see a certificate of insurance. IDK what the specific licensing reqts are for
gas vs water, but I would think any plumber that's licensed in your state
to do residential work would be licensed to do gas.

MA is the only state I know of that requires a gas fitter license but
most plumbers have it.

In my town I see a couple of trucks around for plumbing and electrical.
I've seen them around for years so I'd be comfortable with any of them.

You can also DIY as long as you know what you're doing, at least here,
in the Peoples Republic of NJ. That's a fairly simple job. As I told
him previously, the part I'd be most concerned about is the underground
portion that you can't see, if it's steel. Today they do most of that
with poly which won't corrode. But even if he calls a plumber, I think
they would just go with what's above ground, not worry about what they
can't see.

I'm a little more nervous because I lived in a condo in the 80s where
within about 5 years of being built new, the gas pipe between the
meters and the units started to fail. People found out when their
furnaces went out. Those pipes looked like swiss cheese. If I
didn't see them myself, I wouldn't believe it could fail that badly,
that fast. And you could see why. The pipes had tar going around
the pipe about 80% of the way. They had poured tar over the black
pipe after it was in the trench, instead of properly coating it with
a brush. The bottom never got coated, it even had stones embedded
in it. It's supposed to be taped
and coated. But the poly stuff they use now eliminates all that.
We wound up having to replace pipes on 120 units, which included
having to cut the pavement, a real mess.