Jadnashua
Retired Defense Industry Engineer xxx
I guess I should have known better than to touch an old main water shutoff that hadn't been used in quite awhile on a weekend. I needed to swap out a leaking tub/shower cartridge, so needed to shut off the water to the house. That all worked fine, but the stem broke to the gate, and I could not open up the valve to restore water! These things do wear out, and I replaced it with a new ball valve. But, I live in a row of condominiums, and while I have my unit shutoff, to actually shut off water to replace my shutoff, I had to go to the end unit and shut it off for the whole row. So, to get the water to stop dripping would have required draining ten units, without access to each one to open a valve...it would have likely continued to drip for maybe days, which was certainly not possible to wait to solder in a new valve. And, even if it slowed to a stop, as soon as someone opened up a faucet, more water would have come out. The more common choices were, a compression valve, or a Sharkbite. I opted for a Sharkbite, which meant I only needed to have the complex water off for about 10-minutes and didn't need to get any wetter since it went on in less than two minutes after cutting the old out, cleaning it up so it wouldn't damage the o-ring seals, and shoving it in place. Holding a compression valve up (it came out of the ceiling) would have required trying to juggle three things: hold the valve from falling off, and two wrenches to tighten a compression valve in place while water was coming out (gravity, not pressure anymore, but still). The connection to restore it to the rest of the house was fairly easy, but it, too, wasn't really setup to drain fully. There are some dissolvable plugs you can use, but I ended up using a Sharkbite slip joint to make that connection, too. Normally, I'd solder everything, but sometimes, you just have to do what you have to do.
Anyway, if you have an old gate valve, especially when it isn't used often (and maybe even if it is!), consider changing it out on a weekday, early in the day, in case you have to call a plumber and don't want to pay emergency weekend rates! You'll have more choices on where to shop, too, should you then need to pick up some parts.
Lesson learned....
Anyway, if you have an old gate valve, especially when it isn't used often (and maybe even if it is!), consider changing it out on a weekday, early in the day, in case you have to call a plumber and don't want to pay emergency weekend rates! You'll have more choices on where to shop, too, should you then need to pick up some parts.
Lesson learned....