I am in the process of fixing up an old house I bought and have run into a minor issue with some old pipes in the laundry room. The old laundry hook ups were leaking so I am replacing them with new valves at the moment. When removing one of the valves I noticed that corrosion has caused the pipe threads to fuse with the main water pipe -- pictured here:
I've tried a few tools to remove the small portion of the thread that is fused with the pipe, but nothing is working. I have yet to try a pipe nipple extractor tool but am thinking that might not even do the trick due to the shape the pipe is in (it's in bad shape).
Ideally, I want to make sure the threads are all clear before I insert a new pipe/valve and hook up the new laundry machines. I am worried also that in general these pipes are in really bad shape beyond just the issue highlighted above.
Looking for expert advice on if I should continue to try and extract and clear the corroded portion of the pipe with a nipple extractor and move forward with the small project myself or if this might just need the expert eyes from a plumber or professional.
Any advice is appreciated and I can provide more answers/details as needed here!
My first thought was different types of pipe . But that looks more like crud build up coming through the pipes as opposed to corrosion of iron or steel pipe.
Based on that mess the previous washer valve screen would have to been plugged.
At one time I also had an issue of crud like that plugging the water inlet valve screens on my washing machine. I found that combination washer/screens in the female hose coupling at the washing machine would capture the crud and would make for a much easier job to clean out the crud than digging the screens out of the water fill valve every year. The whole house sediment filter solved the problem completely. The crud was coming from the city water main. Haven't had to clean sediment from a faucet aerator in many years either.
Not a plumber but my thinking is that has got to go. You can try cleaning out the threads in the fitting. I’ve already used something like a pick to scrape everything out and off the threads. Maybe that would work. If you clean it up you can buy a cheap plug like this:
- and use some Teflon tape (and maybe also some pipe dope on top of the tape) on the plug and you can then see if the joint is leak-proof. If so then you could go buy another valve. But if after your best efforts it leaks with a plug, then you are probably out of luck and will either have to solder on a new fitting or use a Sharkbite.
Thanks for the feedback and comments -- the piping that is visible to me is mostly galvanized steel and the water source is a public water system.
I am worried about the level of corrosion and general quality of the pipes here as I work on the area. Here's an image of the laundry hookups and area when I first started working on them - notice the staining on the walls stemming from the valves.
The valve on the left was more straight forward to fix and less corrosion and build up was present. The current set up looks like this as I build out the laundry room in general (with a snapshot of the valve that was already replaced) -
Overall, I am just having some reservations about the valve and pipe on the right since it's in considerably worse shape. I am considering consulting a plumber to get a better eye on the overall situation.
Are you sure your pipes are steel? In post #1 picture 2 that just looks like a copper female elbow and somebody used a steel pipe nipple to connect a female valve to the elbow. I’ve done that already and the nipple corroded after a while, since I have very acidic well water. The copper won't corrode like that. Maybe you just have some corroded pipe nipples and other piping is OK.
But you don’t have to use steel pipe nipples. If you get brass male valves they can screw right into the female copper elbow. Like these for example:
Anyway thought you might be interested in a pic of a steel nipple I used and how it corroded. You can see the buildup inside. My understanding is that usually the steel pipes corrode from the inside. I don't even think I had that nipple installed for that many years. But my water is very acidic. You can see how the water flow would be obstructed in that pipe. I make sure I don't use steel pipe anywhere.
The down pipe above the sink trap is corroded behind it about half way down and actually broken off. Should I just cut it and cap it at the other down pipe, or should I cut it out and and join it with rubber couplings and PVC? If rubber coupling, where should I cut and join?
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can someone point me to a good source for info on removing water from foundation,
there is a lot of ground water under this house. It just keeps coming, doesn't have to have rained recently, there's like a spring underground or something.
There's no basement, house is on a slab with cinderblock foundation along the load bearing perimeter and probably cinderblocks in the middle under load bearing walls.
There's no basement sump pump to get this water to the street. Where I'd put the drainage pipe is below the level of the street, I'd like to run a pipe and send this water to the sewer. Need some sort of pop up or something?
I started digging around the house because crickets and the occasional mole were getting in, I mostly have to caulk the sill plate area, there were a few cracks in foundation near a 4" septic clean out and a large tree root (now removed) made a small crack somewhere. I started digging lower to make sure there were no deeper cracks in foundation where moles could get in.
Then I noticed at the corner the cinderblock is breaking away, and water was pouring out of holes/cracks in it, I'll pack it with hydraulic cement but I'm thinking having some weep holes is good to allow the water to escape.
I'm probably skipping the pipe on most of the house, probably not going to remove the paver patio etc for some areas probably aren't even needed, this is the very-wet side of the house.
01-20-21, 10:32 AM
can someone point me to a good source for info on removing water from foundation,
there is a lot of ground water under this house. It just keeps coming, doesn't have to have rained recently, there's like a spring underground or something.
There's no basement, house is on a slab with cinderblock foundation along the load bearing perimeter and probably cinderblocks in the middle under load bearing walls.
There's no basement sump pump to get this water to the street. Where I'd put the drainage pipe is below the level of the street, I'd like to run a pipe and send this water to the sewer. Need some sort of pop up or something?
I started digging around the house because crickets and the occasional mole were getting in, I mostly have to caulk the sill plate area, there were a few cracks in foundation near a 4" septic clean out and a large tree root (now removed) made a small crack somewhere. I started digging lower to make sure there were no deeper cracks in foundation where moles could get in.
Then I noticed at the corner the cinderblock is breaking away, and water was pouring out of holes/cracks in it, I'll pack it with hydraulic cement but I'm thinking having some weep holes is good to allow the water to escape.
I'm probably skipping the pipe on most of the house, probably not going to remove the paver patio etc for some areas probably aren't even needed, this is the very-wet side of the house.
