Oh the joys of owning a home....

[turnipkiller]

Hey all I haven't really been around the last little while except for quick visits and being kind of surprised at things going on in other forums. Anyhow I've been playing construction supervisor (of myself) and plumber for the last few days.
Our home has two septic tanks and one wasn't draining properly. So I decided to see what was what, lo and behold it doesn't have a drain field. Fine I figured, we shall just attach those pipes to the other tank. I was going quite mad trying to figure where the kitchen drains went to as the wife swore up and down that they went to the tank I was moving everything to. Finally I realized what was happening; I turned on the kitchen tap and crawled under the house (I miss having a basement!) to find the kitchen is draining right under the house onto the ground from a hole in the pipe.
The pipe from the bathroom going to the new tank has a 2 inch hole in it, and a newer addition to part of the house has a footing placed directly on top of it which has pushed the pipe 1 inch down. All of these pipes are cast iron. So in the long and short of it, I am replacing every single sewer drain pipe with new PVC. I thought my old home in Canada was poorly plumbed, but this is a nightmare. The only good thing about it is all the pipes are within 2 feet of ground level. Back home they would be at least 4 or 5 feet down to avoid the frost line.
Aside from falling from the attic through a freshly drywalled ceiling in my old house, this is the best fun I've had in a while working on a house.

Anyone else got a "fun" home repair story? I surely can't be the only one with this kind of luck.

[adlabs6]

Yikes, draining under the house?? When I was a kid we had that issue come up in an older home my Dad was modernizing. Had to stop the water ASAP to prevent the pier and beam foundation from shifting around.

A guy I know told me that his son bought an older home last year, and added a new high-tech washing maching when he moved in. The washer output such a high pressure on the drain water lines that it blew the old iron piping joints apart under the house! He had to replace all the lines with PVC as well.

[dunkelgrun]

No horror story to report but I've spent the entire day chipping off masonry paint where a load of ivy got underneath it. Now all I have to do is reskim the wall, paint on some sealer then more masonry paint.

Not my idea of fun. Sympathies with the drains problem - nightmare.

Cheers!