You know, I’m the first to admit I’m not the sharpest tool in the shed. But I had pretty good public school education at a pretty well-respected public school here in Upstate New York (no ‘Intelligent Design,’ but they learned up pretty good). So why do I insist on calling it a ‘hot water heater?’ I really do know better.

Oh well. Mission accomplished on the heater replacement. I wanted to go tankless (just so could say it was a ‘tankless job’), but they were triple the cost, and given my fairly short life expectancy (and having to worry if there would be a problem using a common vent with the furnace – the install manual said not to do that, and that you should use stainless pipe; I doubt it would have mattered, but I didn’t have time to research it properly), and at $1,000+ vs. $369, I figured I’d go with the tank. If I’m still alive and living where I am now when this one goes (tried this; too many hoops to jump through, and none of the final results appealed to me), I’ll think it over.

Of course, while it’s a simple job on paper, it turned out to be a pain in the ass (and other locations). First, since I hurt my arm a couple weeks ago, doing anything that requires gripping and/or twisting hurts like hell. If you’ve ever twisted wrenches for a living (or for fun), you know how much fun it was to cut copper, clean fittings, and twist pipe wrenches all day with a crippled arm (in a the type of confined space that’s typical whenever doing a happy homeowner plumbing job).

And since it’s just the two of us here now, I went for a smaller tank, which meant a fair amount of replumbing (nothing too major – just enough to be a pain in the ass) of the water and gas lines (and the goddamn vent, too). It took me forever at the store to get the fittings I needed (it’s not like I needed anything out of the ordinary; back when I did this type of shit for a living, I had a much better parts collection), and a line of severe thunderstorms went through in the middle of things, so I had the dogs up my ass and quivering in fear while I was trying to solder without setting the house on fire.

I couldn’t get all the water out of the pipe for my final joint, so I wound up having to shut down all the water and drain the house (and pulling apart my half-soldered joint and cleaning it up again) to get it. Not a huge deal in the scheme of things but, as I said, annoying.

Only one leak when I filled the tank (and on a fitting that I bench soldered, so I’m pretty disappointed in myself for that one; at least it was easily fixed), and of course I added unions where there were none, and added a ball valve past the gate valve that required a pipe wrench to shut off. When you need to shut shit off in a hurry, you can’t beat a ball valve.

So, anyway, while my arm is aching and nearly unusable (typing this more or less one handed), I’m just glad I didn’t have to pay somebody to do it (on a Sunday, no less). I sure could use another day off, though.