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November 27, 2006
Evil Commode - My 100th Norcal Blogs Entry
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| I spent most of last week in San Francisco, and the rest in Marin County. There are times when I miss living in the Bay Area. We went to a lot of places where I had been taken as a kid so the trip was nostalgic. Actually, what I miss is living with my parents who did all the work while I enjoyed the locale. When I left my parents house at 18 I left the Bay Area as well. When I got back to Chico it was less about reliving a childhood, and more about getting in touch with my "inner adult". A toilet had begun leaking just before we left, and whenever flushed would cause puddles on the bathroom floor. The cost for a plumber was about $250, and I had never replaced the floor gasket of a commode before. But hey, I'm an electronic engineer, so with oscilloscope and digital multimeter in hand I began disconnecting my toilet from the floor. |
| The mounting bolts weren't corroded, and besides some interesting smells and a lot of old congealed wax, the porcelain throne came off and cleaned up pretty quick. In short order it was reassembled with a new wax and rubber gasket. After giving a silicon bead around the base time to dry I turned the water on. It was perfect! There was no leak from the bottom of the "bowl". I tried to ignore the fancy hydraulic display reminiscent of our new plaza emanating from the "tank". I thought "perhaps with some new backlighting my wife would think I did this on purpose". Realizing that I'd have to return to the hardware store for the lighting, I opted instead to repair the gaskets and mounting screws between the tank and bowl that failed when I laid the toilet down in the bathtub to remove the old bottom wax gasket. Of course, one of the mounting screws was corroded, and had to be cut in half with a Dremel tool (a simple 20 minute job with grinder, flashlight, and a good view of the bottom of the potty). I reassembled the tank to the bowl, cleaned up the smoke and soot stains from the Dremel escapade, reconnected the water line, and turned that puppy on! Hmmmm, I didn't recall water spraying out of the water line before. But then I realized that this plumbing connection (installed in the 70's) was probably designed to fail if disconnected more than twice. Back in the 70's "Big Plumbing" and the Plumbers Union were in cahoots to ensure a constant need for their parts and service (by the way, this occurred when the auto companies stepped on the 100 mile-per-gallon carburetor). I made my third trip to the hardware store, and this time returned with a water valve and hose manufactured in China. The Chinese are always looking out for American consumers. In the end I fixed the leak (fingers still crossed), and replaced 90% of the stuff in my toilet. I even learned the names for many of those strange rube goldberg-ish apparatuses in the "tank". I did this for less than the cost of the plumber, with an additional expense of about 5 hours of my life and accelerating my kid's understanding of profanity to a 2nd grade level. In addition to the accomplishment above I realized how many toilets my parents probably fixed, and how hard they worked while still finding time to take me places like the Exploratorium, Steinhart Aquarium, and Japanese Tea Garden when I was young. My mom passed away a while ago, and I have said thanks before, but I should probably send my dad a thank-you card. One with a toilet on it. And the next time a toilet leaks in my house, I'll be installing one of these. |
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Posted by Lon at November 27, 2006 12:55 PM
Comments
best blog ever - toilets, the givers of pleasure and pain.
Posted by: juanita at November 27, 2006 04:52 PM
So will you still be "blogging" from there as you mentioned on Dan NT's blog? Will there be "blog clogs" in your future?
Posted by: Anthony Watts at November 27, 2006 06:04 PM
For those that missed the joke I mentioned on Dan's blog that I blog from the toilet, which gives the ER's "blog log" a whole new meaning.
I don't really blog from the toilet. I was just making fun of the ER photo that showed me "blogging" on the couch.
I hope there's no "blog clog" coming up. But my home heater has been making a decidedly "failingish" sound. I suspect I'll be in the attic this evening.
Lon
Posted by: Lon at November 28, 2006 09:40 AM