I Hate Plumbing

Last week Kris sent me a message at work saying that the sprayer hose on the kitchen sink was leaking.  It had apparently developed a pinhole from rubbing against the water lines under the sink.  So when I got home I had to go look for a replacement hose.  

Living in a house that is now 60 years old, I expect to have to do upkeep on it.  But there are certain things I just dread doing.  One of them is plumbing (another being electrical work).  Doing the work isn't so much the problem as much as having to find the right size pipes and make sure that things fit up right, etc.  Having to make multiple trips to Home Depot, or Menards, is just not something I look forward to doing.  I would rather do it once and have things work our successfully.

I managed to get a hose for a decent price (who knew that the cost of the sprayer hose went up to $40?) and got home to start switching it out.  As with most plumbing projects, nothing is ever easy.  The fitting for the hose was in a space between the sink and wall that just barely wide enough for the nut to hold it on place.  This meant that I couldn't get a wrench in there to loosen it (and by extension, tighten it once it was changed) or even get my fingers in there to turn it by hand once it was loose enough.  So yes, it was a huge pain in the butt.  What was something that should have taken me about 10 minutes ended up being about an hour long job because of how long it took to get it out and the replacement back in.  

Then once I got it replaced and working I came across another problem.  Because of how I had to crawl into the cabinet to get the hose replaced and maneuver inside to get leverage, I ended up hitting the sink drain, knocking it loose.  I figured it wouldn't be a problem until I tried to tighten it back down.  The threads on the bottom of the drain to where it connected to the J-trap ended up getting stripped.  So now I fixed one leak, but created another.  See...  no home improvement projects ever go easy.  The good thing is that it wasn't leaking enough to drip all over under the sink.  It was only when the volume of water was so great that it would back up in the drain, such as if I had the stopper in to wash something in the sink, and then pulled to plug to drain it.  Then it would leak.  So I had time to go back to the store and find a replacement part, which I did today.  So it appears that things are finally all put back together and working properly.  Bring on the next project.  Maybe I should do the water softener next.