JoeThePlumber
Member
Hey fellow plumbers. I wanted to take a moment to say thanks! There are some very knowlegeable people on this site and I've already learned some and am always ready for more. I thought it would be fun to share some battle stories to help us all gain a little more insight. We all have had some close calls and have been caught with our pants down and we have also came up with some pretty unique stuff so I'll start it off.
In a nice little neighborhood there was a home with a leaky water main underground. The water authority made it mandatory for residents to put meter pits in within ten feet of the curb box when the main needed replaced. It was not a large yard and the house had a big open basement. I had the excavator digging the meter pit and I was dreading going underneath the huge concrete slab front porch. I demo a new hole in the foundation big enough for the chase pipe and the dirt looked nice and clean on the other side and it gave me an Idea. I took a 20 ft length of 1 1/2 black pipe and fed it into the basement through a window I put a 1 1/2 by 3/4 reducer coupling on the end and capped it. I put the end in my foundation hole and began beating the end of the 1 1/2 with a big sledge hammer and noticed It was getting somewhere. I had a guy turning the pipe with a pipe wrench while I drove it through the foundation one smack at a time. after 20 or so swings I made it 2-3 feet roughly and switched off with the other guy and let him swing while I twisted. Praying we wouldent hit a rock, we drove that pipe about 18 feet. to our luck we found the end of the pipe within 5-10 feet of the meter pit hole and didnt even dig a trench. we chased the new main through the 1 1/2 and amazingly we were able to work the black pipe back out with wrenches quite easily. I try this method religeously ever since then it worked so well. I'm sure I was not the first to do something like this but I can remember times I didnt know the trick and could of used it! I often think It would be cool to make a flat end plate for a jack hammer, lay it on its side on a heavy duty cart and drive the pipe that way...havent got around to trying it yet but will someday. has anyone else tried this method??? hopefully I'll hear some good tricks out of you guys after work 2maro. Maybe I think about plumbing to much...haha,
In a nice little neighborhood there was a home with a leaky water main underground. The water authority made it mandatory for residents to put meter pits in within ten feet of the curb box when the main needed replaced. It was not a large yard and the house had a big open basement. I had the excavator digging the meter pit and I was dreading going underneath the huge concrete slab front porch. I demo a new hole in the foundation big enough for the chase pipe and the dirt looked nice and clean on the other side and it gave me an Idea. I took a 20 ft length of 1 1/2 black pipe and fed it into the basement through a window I put a 1 1/2 by 3/4 reducer coupling on the end and capped it. I put the end in my foundation hole and began beating the end of the 1 1/2 with a big sledge hammer and noticed It was getting somewhere. I had a guy turning the pipe with a pipe wrench while I drove it through the foundation one smack at a time. after 20 or so swings I made it 2-3 feet roughly and switched off with the other guy and let him swing while I twisted. Praying we wouldent hit a rock, we drove that pipe about 18 feet. to our luck we found the end of the pipe within 5-10 feet of the meter pit hole and didnt even dig a trench. we chased the new main through the 1 1/2 and amazingly we were able to work the black pipe back out with wrenches quite easily. I try this method religeously ever since then it worked so well. I'm sure I was not the first to do something like this but I can remember times I didnt know the trick and could of used it! I often think It would be cool to make a flat end plate for a jack hammer, lay it on its side on a heavy duty cart and drive the pipe that way...havent got around to trying it yet but will someday. has anyone else tried this method??? hopefully I'll hear some good tricks out of you guys after work 2maro. Maybe I think about plumbing to much...haha,
