Canturbery

I got here a good twenty minutes before Coleman. It looked straightforward. Walking up to the box on the side of the house, you could see ¾” copper going in with a small gash that faced out. I went back to the van to see if I had the parts. 

hello copper, my old friend

Coleman shambled over with a hand made wooden tool box and a torch screwed onto a camping propane canister. A shutoff valve stood ready to separate the heater from the house supply, but the gash was in the ¾” copper supply for both. When the water to the house was turned on, it emitted a geyser which would soak the yard and, in the evening, would surely create a beautiful ice sculpture. The house had been without water for over a week. An old man had been moved out and his son, the owner, had called us. I had reservations about doing tankless repairs because they are typically found on fancy houses, but this house was not fancy. According to the son, it had been put there by a charitable city program that provided water conserving plumbing upgrades to underserved people. That was enough vetting for me. 

It was an obvious problem and an obvious repair. I happened to have some stock from which to cut a replacement piece and Coleman found a ¾” union in the bed of his truck. He noted the original installer had failed to clean off the flux used to sweat the pipe, which created a turquoise patina in a descending drip pattern. His need for things to be done as well as possible seemed artistic but I didn't know enough about plumbing to know the difference. “That will eventually weaken the pipe, I think. Flux is terribly corrosive.” I had waited for Coleman because I wanted to see him do it and I was eager to have company when I committed to cutting pipe off a house that belonged to someone I had only talked to briefly on the phone on behalf of an organization that barely existed. When sweating copper, I am often concerned that the solder might not travel fully around inside the union, especially when I have to spend a long time heating it and the flux has boiled away. Coleman re-applied flux after the pipe was hot, it sucked right in, and then followed with the solder, which rushed into the seam until a distinct moment when it stopped going in and beaded off the edge. He didn't spend time trying to build up a mound of solder, just cooled it down with a wet rag, which hissed as he wiped the pipe clean of residual flux. 

We re-pressurized, it held, and cold water was restored. An easy success, though the tankless water heater was still broken. With the face off, you could see the copper pipes inside burst where they curved back around to go into the stacked heating fins. One on the left and one on the right. This was the fourth busted tankless unit I'd seen in two days, and they all broke in the same way. This fellow was on his own getting hot water, our mission was complete.

This essay series is part of a project to document Texan’s experiences during the 2021 freeze. Do you have a story to share about the 2021 Texas freeze? Share it with my publication, Freeze Stories, on Medium. If its not filled with filth, I’ll publish it. Ok, I’ll publish it even if its filled with filth.