Recent content by tomtheelder2020

It has been, like, 15 years since I did a bunch of research on this for my own home, so I can't offer specifics. The bottom line I came to was that the people recommending duct cleaning are overwhelmingly people who make money from that recommendation. I recall seeing an EPA website that said...

In the past 20 years, the largest OK earthquake was 5.8 which doesn't seem like much to get excited about (discounting New Madrid activity). Based on 8 years as an engineering geologist, 22 years related to foundation construction, I think you should talk to a geotechnical engineer before the...

Your replacement riving knife does not need to be metal. Much easier and cheaper to make one from wood:

I have only heard of this for pipes larger than anything residential.

If that contractor is still in business, give him a Yelp review. Great work deserves accolades.

Not specifically relevant to this thread, but as general info regarding concrete work: The early part of my career was mostly writing soil engineering reports for residential construction and our work occasionally included investigating the cause of failed slabs in existing houses. Every one of...

Nobes, my post you commented on is over 2 years old. You are much more likely to get responses if you start a new thread. Pictures are also much more likely to garner responses. Imperial units would too.

Let us know how it works!

I am very happy to hear you think my solution will work. I went ahead with it because: a) I was under time pressure to make the bathroom usable; b) even if it doesn't flush well, it likely buys me a year or more; and c) it is really easy to remove and start over. I considered this option but...

Soaked it a couple times over two days ... ... but nothing budged. No doubt in part because the cramped area limited my leverage and the size of tool I could use (I have a 24-inch pipe wrench I have never used. If only I had known this was going to be a problem before ai installed the vanity)...

Good idea.

My version of a trap will not doubt have trouble sooner than a standard one but replacing one of the elbows with something like the sediment filter I showed should improve it substantially and make it easier to clean. I saturated that nut with penetrating oil and tapped on it with a hammer...

Snoonyb, my computer shows I did post in the plumbing forum - is that not where you see it? I had never heard of a sediment jar but I presume something like the one below is what you have in mind. When it becomes necessary to clean the trap, I can simply replace an elbow with one of these...

Here is the solution I came up with. I didn't want the deep trap that would have resulted from using the J trap shown in the 2nd of my original photos. Instead, I used two elbows, an extension tube, and an extender on the tail piece to turn everything under the sink into one big trap. it is...