First, the drains in the bathroom clogged up and while running the washing machine, we flooded the back of the house.

Then, the turn off valve for the supply line to the bathroom sink leaked and the handle broke off in my hand. Another flood.

Now, it's the garbage disposal, under the kitchen sink (natch). Wife notices that the shelf is wet. Sure enough. Running the dish washer and water is leaking out the bottom of the disposal.

At least this time I didn't try and fix it myself. Call the plumber. Damn gargabe disposal weighs about 50 pounds and it hangs from the bottom of the sink. And you have to maneuver in there, get the old one out and the new one in.

Sheesh.

Here's a beaut.

Plumber comes out, checks things over, no leak. We run a bunch of water through it, no leak. We run the dish washer, no leak. I keep saying, yeah, but I saw it leak the other day. He says, well it ain't leaking now.

You're choice, I'll replace it you want, but if I do, given the angles of some the connections in there, you may be looking at replacing all the piping, the trap, etc. He works up some numbers. To replace the disposal as is, $300. Extra if the other pipes have to be replaced. Service charge to come out, $60. He didn't know what was going on, other than maybe something got lodged in there and caused it to leak. Usually, if they go bad, they leak. Period. Not maybe or sometimes.

Hell, I'll put a little bucket under there and see what happens.

Dang. The plumber kinda reminds me of the bee incident.

It's kinda like when you take the family car into the mechanic and say "it's going cough...cough".

And later they call you and say, "we did the best we could, but it wouldn't go cough cough".

You pick up the car, pay the bill, drive it home, and it goes "cough...cough..."

sigh

Welcome to my world Tom, I fix these kind problems all day long and sure wish I was paid what the
plumbers make. What I hate is the old ladies who never use there tubs or showers, but instead use
the bathroom sink to towel bathe. Talk about clogging up the sink drain all the time. Then some that
do shower, the hair clogs are huge.

Almost every kitchen or bath faucet I have replaced required 1 or both shutoff valves to be replaced
at the same time. Talk about a royal pain on these newer bathroom sink vanities. Drawers down one side
and door on the other. And no room to reach back in there to turn off the water let alone replace the
shutoffs.

Have been running into even bigger problems lately, My water supply lines run through our underground
heated garages long the ceilings. Well, in order for hot water to reach my upper floors we must run
a re-circulation line to both ends of the garage forcing hot water to keep moving all the time. The
aging copper supply lines in my garage were made from a lower grade copper meaning after so many years
the lines begin to erode. Yes, they spring leaks right out the side of the copper pipes. 4 times this
past 4 months. Copper so soft you could poke your finger through it. Lines are covered with insulation
so its often a fun job cutting off long section of it to find the leak. Once I find a leak I call
the plumber to. Big job draining back the lines and replacing bad sections.

it would be better to spend the $300 on something nice for the wife than the darn broken equipment.

Let it fail then replace it.

What you need is a portable localised anti gravity socket wrench with a 4x power magnetic tiped screw driver that would get that thing out of there with no broken bones.

We dont have those disposal units in the UK.

That is why you keep a shotgun at home, for when the Plumber arrives.

Jim,
I don't know you do it. Would drive me beserk. Not just the mechanics, but dealing with the people. They just don't understand.

I went through this with my wife several years ago. She had stuffed the remains of about 8 juiced lemons through the garbage disposal. Supposed to keep your sink sweet smelling.

Uh, it clogged up the pipes and resulted in a $200 plumbing bill. The plumber and I had a little chat afterwards and he said "If people just put their garbage into the trash instead of their pipes, I'd have a whole lot less work to do".

Garbage disposals. Miracle appliances for the new housewife generation of the 50's.

Only one thing, it's not good for your plumbing. Putting garbage down your pipes? Think about it.

Our town like many have outlawed new garbage disposal units since it puts an additional load on the county sewerage processing plant. We never had one because I could see no sense in shovelling your garbage into the drain which never works right to begin with.

JimK
If I was you then you need to add some zinc sticks to keep the electrolysis down or it will keep on eating things up. Moving water will eat things quite fast without some zinc protection.
Bert