How to stop leak when main shut off

[ajmckinlay]

I am replacing a leaky silcock. I am sweating in an entire new one. I have the house main shut off and all the faucets open and hot water heater shut off. The silcock is on the bottom floor of a three story house. It is still leaking out water with no pressure 3 hours after everything was turned off. Why is it doing this and how can I fix it? I can't sweat new pipes until this one stops draining right? I have opened everything I can think of but still the water drains at a steady trickle. I'm guessing at the rate of 1 gal/30mins. Any ideas?

 

[johnjh2o]

Try turning the valves off at each toilet. There is a good chance water is syphoning out of the toilet tanks.

 

[Chris]

Either that or you have a valve that is not completely shutting down. How about using the bread trick to stop the water long enough to sweat the copper?

 

[ajmckinlay]

I'll try those. Thanks. How much bread can I safely cram into the pipe before causing a problem? The leak is significant enough it might take a little more than I would like.

 

[Chris]

I have shoved a few pieces before with no problems, make sure you use white bread. Pretty sure it just dissolves and gets washed out.

 

[ajmckinlay]

We'll I appreciate all the ideas. I tried the toilet supply shutoffs and that didn't work. I was still concerned about the volume of water to use the bread. Soooooo....I cheated and bought a snake bite coupler in the one place I couldn't sweat the pipe in. Seems to be working fine for now.

Thanks for the help