What a day, It all started 2 days ago when my wife Tammy saw water leaking from the water supply line to the fridge. It's under the floor joists in the basement ceiling. She shut it off with the little valve that's connects the hose for the fridge to the copper waterline.
The next day she noticed the water that leaked on the basement floor, had dried up. In the mean time, she and my step-daughter Tanya went to the store, as they usually do on Saturday, and decided they could buy a new water supply kit and repair it themselves.
In order to change the 'little &%$%#oops! valve' that attaches to the copper pipe, they had to turn off the water with the main valve coming into the house. This is when it got really interesting... OK, Water off? A-OK. Valve replaced? A-OK. Water turned back on?...... Mucho problema!..... Water spraying out of the top of the main valve! "Ay, chihuahua!"... "Houston, we have a problem..." (for those who are 30 and under, Apollo 13 had just experienced an explosion and astronaut Jim Lovell called mission control in Houston to report the problem.) Tammy had to turn the water supply valve off... now we have no water... and it's Saturday. Now what?
We need to turn the water off at the street to replace the main valve in the house, but it's Saturday and how do we contact anybody at the water company? Well you can't...
Now I'm worried... but was lucky to find a plumber who was willing to come and repair it.came Sunday afternoon and had difficulty finding the underground main valve in the alley. The standpipe ('curb box' for access to the valve, ) was leaning and had been pushed over at some point. It was also full of rocks and dirt because the lid was broken.
Richard dug by hand for a few hours before finally exposing the valve and used a special wrench to shut it off.
He then installed a new 'shut-off' valve inside the house and fixed the supply line to the fridge.
We found "Jay" to be a pleasant and courteous man and would recommend him highly and without reservation. read more