Hi all
I just bought a home and the water heater is going to need to be replaced soon. It is 11 years old and it was not installed with dielectric unions causing heavy corrosion on the water fittings and some on the top of the heater tank. I am pretty good with plumbing. I am also a chemist and work a lot with gas lines though I am used to Swagelok and other compression fittings. I live in stupid Illinois which code requires all rigid connections so I can't use the yellow flex line.
How do you work with black pipe that is threaded on both ends. I assume you can't loosen it on one fitting without tightening on the other so you need to find a union with a compression fitting and take it apart from there then once it is free from the union you can unscrew the whole set from the water heater? Is that right? Also I naturally don't have the cutting and threading tools so can I go to the hardware store and ask them to cut and thread the pipe to length if I end up having to alter the gas pipe length? Any tips on lifting the big old heater alone?
I just bought a home and the water heater is going to need to be replaced soon. It is 11 years old and it was not installed with dielectric unions causing heavy corrosion on the water fittings and some on the top of the heater tank. I am pretty good with plumbing. I am also a chemist and work a lot with gas lines though I am used to Swagelok and other compression fittings. I live in stupid Illinois which code requires all rigid connections so I can't use the yellow flex line.
How do you work with black pipe that is threaded on both ends. I assume you can't loosen it on one fitting without tightening on the other so you need to find a union with a compression fitting and take it apart from there then once it is free from the union you can unscrew the whole set from the water heater? Is that right? Also I naturally don't have the cutting and threading tools so can I go to the hardware store and ask them to cut and thread the pipe to length if I end up having to alter the gas pipe length? Any tips on lifting the big old heater alone?