We keep several cat carriers in the sun room, so the cats will be used to them and hopefully not panic as much as we are able grab the more feral ones for spays and neuters. Sometimes, I will find cats just chilling in one of them.
Rolando Moon claimed it, this morning. 😊 Rondo Moon is the last of the originals, living here before we moved in, and cared for by my late father, still outside. We were willing to bring her in, and she has actually gone into the house voluntarily, then headed back outside. She has no interest in being an indoor cat!
Today is quite a bit warmer, as far as temperature goes, but I sure couldn’t tell when I did my morning rounds. It was -14C/7F at the time, but the wind chill was at -29C/-20F! The outside cats seem to be handling things well, for the most part. I haven’t been able to do a head count lately, but it does seem like there are fewer of them. There could be many reasons for that, but they move around so much, it’s hard to tell, and some show up for the food later on. I have seen cats going up and down our driveway on the trail cam, though, so hopefully they are just out visiting neighbours.
Speaking of cameras…
It looks like I’ll be returning the camera I picked up yesterday, to monitor the septic pump. It simply would not connect to our WiFi. It doesn’t tell me why. Just that it failed. We have two networks that I tried linking up to – one on our Starlink router, one on our Orbii router, which is there to ensure all parts of the house gets a good internet signal. It won’t connect with either of them.
Our septic pump still has not been triggered, so we still don’t know how well the emergency diverter will work until it does.
Meanwhile, we’re still dealing with the clogged drain to the kitchen and laundry.
My daughters tried to clear it again. This time, one daughter blocked the drain pipe for the washing machine while the other used the sink plunger in the kitchen. That thing does work really well!
Unfortunately, when my daughter uncovered the laundry drain again, gunk went shooting up out of the pipe! So the clog is basically right at where the laundry drain reaches the main pipe in the root cellar, causing anything from the kitchen to go up the laundry pipe instead of the main drain.
Once I had a chance, I made a couple of calls to plumbers. The first call, they were booked solid and new bookings are more than 2 weeks away. I had success with the second call. They, too, were busy, but his first response, when I told him what I needed done, was “definitely not today”. I asked about the next few days.
Long story short, he’s going to make us their first call tomorrow. Since they’re coming from the town to the north of us, they’ll get here around 9-10am. My younger daughter and I have our doctor’s appointments in the afternoon, but it should be done before we leave.
We might finally be able to do laundry without running a hose out the front door! That would help fill the septic tank faster, triggering the pump, so we’ll know how the diverter is working, too. It should be fine, but still… I’ve become as paranoid with our plumbing as with our truck!
I asked for some idea of what the bill will be. He said it depends on a few things, from how long it takes, to which machine he ends up using, etc., but might be as low as $150. I figure it will cost at least $300, but we’ll see.
So we have one more day of not being able to drain water down the kitchen sink.
I did get one thing planned accomplished. While doing my morning rounds, I used the foil insulation in strategic points on the outflow pipe for our emergency septic diverter. The pump has still not been triggered to empty the grey water, so this will ensure any contact point with cold supports will not freeze.
Hopefully. At least, if it does freeze there, it would be much easier to deal with it.
Once my morning rounds were done and breakfast was had, my plan was to head outside and start searching for something we could use to shelter the frozen septic ejector.
Then one of my daughters came over to let me know the kitchen sink was clogged. They’d started doing dishes, and the skinks would not drain. They did eventually empty, but very, very slowly.
My younger daughter – the only one able bodied enough to do this – cleared things stored under the sink to check the pipes.
Note the big crack in the brass fitting above the trap.
There was no way to take the trap off to clear the clog (drain cleaner did not work) without the brass breaking even worse.
Which meant a trip into town to get replacement parts.
That left me in a bit of a conundrum. The truck’s sensor issues are still a problem. I’d been idling the engine to get it to warm up and evaporate the moisture that is triggering the sensor, but the truck really needs to be driven. But the oil pressure gauge is at 0, and that check engine light was back on after I’d cleared the codes, yesterday. I could have taken my brother’s car, but he’s going to need that back, and this sensor thing isn’t going to go away if I don’t actually drive the truck.
But we’ve had so many things got wrong, I was really uncomfortable doing it. The truck had started fine, the engine is running smoothly, and the oil levels are good.
I ended up texting our mechanic and asked him is he was sure it was safe to drive – and to please humour my paranoia! 😄 He said yes.
I had wanted to go into town anyhow, to refill our water jugs, so I grabbed those and headed out, with a brief stop at the post office along the way. The letter mail I am waiting for still isn’t in, but a couple of packages made it, so that was good, at least.
The truck ran fine the entire trip, too.
Once at the hardware store, I got to talk to my favourite person in the plumbing department. He’s been helping me a lot!
After showing him the pictures, he gave me the parts and pieces to replace the brass T, making sure to get me the correct adhesive and explaining about putting it all together dry, first, then taking it apart to use the adhesive. We were pretty sure of the size needed, but if we were wrong, I could return the parts and get the right size.
From there, I made a quick stop at the grocery store to refill the water jugs, grab some pumpernickel bread, as the rye was gone, and ended up getting some lactose free cheese for the girls that was on sale.
When I got back, my daughter set about taking out the brass T – which turned out to have a lot more damage than was visible – then removing the trap to clear the clog.
It got rather messy.
Along with the parts and pieces, I picked up a drain clearer -, I don’t remember the proper name for it, but it’s a long flexible wire with a plastic scrubby tuft at the end. I also picked up a sink plunger. My daughter took everything apart and used the drain clearer on the pipes for as far as she could reach with it.
That got messy, too!
Then she put the trap back and moved on to putting together the new T pieces and do a dry install to make sure everything fit.
They didn’t.
It fit at the top, directly to one sink, and the bottom, to the trap. It was the pipe to the other sink that was the problem. The brass T’s fitting was almost flush, as you can see in the above photo. The new T’s fittings extended further. There wasn’t enough play in the pipe to be able to attach the T to the copper pipe.
That bit of copper pipe, meanwhile, was basically jammed into a length of PVC pipe, likely with the use of a heat gun. My daughter hoped to push it further in, just half an inch, but it just would not move.
Which meant cutting the copper pipe.
The 1 1/2″ copper pipe.
We don’t have a pipe cutter to do it. We could have used a hack saw, but the very idea of trying to cut a pipe in a crowded space – on that wiggles around, at that – was not acceptable.
Time to go back into town.
While my daughter was fighting with the new T, I had taken the time to clean the threads on the trap and was thinking it would probably be a good idea to get a new one. Just in case.
So, off to town I went!
By this time, several hours had passed, so my husband requested I make another stop at the grocery store for some heat and eats. No one was going to be making a from-scratch meal, today, that’s for sure!
I also brought along the brass T to show the guy at the hardware store. When I got there, it turned out he’d stepped out for something. I waited a while, looking at things and, after clearing it with my husband first (since it was coming off his personal budget), I picked up an indoor/outdoor security camera that screws into a light bulb socket, and has an LED light built in as well. This would go in the light socket near the septic pump, so we could monitor it without having to go up and down those insane stairs all the time! It used WiFi and an app to control and monitor it, and had a slot for a micro SD card. We have a couple of those handy!
They didn’t know when the plumbing guy would be back, so after I got the security camera, I went to the grocery store. It turned out to be really busy, and I found out why when I was asked if I wanted to collect extra points, or get 10% off.
I took the 10% off.
The plumbing guy was there by the time I got back. I showed him the brass part, and then pictures of my daughter holding the new T that couldn’t join the copper pipe.
After seeing more of the photos and how the copper pipe was installed, he was rather taken aback. That’s a pretty big no-no, and he was trying to figure out what was holding it in place. I told him, probably just friction. Why wasn’t it leaking? he wondered. I told him, that thing is NOT moving. It is completely water tight, and likely inserted with the use of a heat gun.
One thing was sure, though. I was not going to find a pipe cutter for a pipe that size. If we wanted to shorten it, we’d need to use a hacksaw.
He asked more questions about where the pipe with the copper piece led to, and I told him is was to the second sink.
Well, that gave us a solution.
He showed me a kit for plumbing a double sink. All the parts and pieces I would need, plus a few extras that wouldn’t be needed for our particular set up. He even took it out of the package and assembled it for me, how it would go under the sinks.
I talked to him about the trap, as I’d been looking at one that had a clean out opening. He agreed that would be the best. The only potential issue was the elbow part of it that joined the outflow pipe to the main drain. That part is sealed with adhesive. The U part of the trap screws onto that part and, in theory, we could remove the take off the new elbow and screw the U part onto the existing elbow, but with how old these parts are, the threads might not be the same. If they weren’t, we’d have to cut off the elbow and adhere the new one; there should be enough play in the pipe to handle losing that half inch or so.
There was a fitting that would be needed that I already had, with the parts and pieces of the new T we would no longer need, but I went ahead and bought another one. Having extra parts is always good!
This guy is such a help! It’s great to have staff that knows their stuff so well.
From there, it was home again. By this time, my poor daughter was really struggling. She may be the most able bodied of us all, but she does have other issues! Her PCOS really does a number on her joints, and she was losing her ability to use one wrist. I had suggested taking a break to have food, but since the dishes hadn’t been done, due to the sink being clogged, things to use to cook with were unavailable.
Plus, she just wanted to get it over with!
So I left her to it for a while, after bringing her what she would need to trim the length of pipe between the sinks to the right side, then started setting up the new camera before heading to the basement.
Long story short, I will probably be returning it. It simply will not connect to our WiFi.
*sigh*
It’s possible it might work somewhere not in the basement, but I bought it specifically so I could monitor the septic pump and area, so there’s no point in keeping it if I can’t use it there. There is nowhere else we would want to set up a camera that works by screwing into a light fixture.
Meanwhile, my daughter finally got to the point where we could test the sinks and see if anything was leaking.
Since we’ve moved here, we’ve replaced both sink drains, and installed the flexible water pipes with build in shut off valves, replacing copper pipes with no shut off valves. Now, we’ve replaced the rest of the pipes under the sinks, up to, but not including the trap.
At some point, my daughter used the sink plunger. Apparently, it did an amazing job in clearing crud out.
As we were cleaning up and putting things away – it was full dark by this time – my daughter realized she was hearing splashing noises.
That test we did to see if there were any leaks?
The water had overflowed the washing machine drain in the entry, and was splashing all over the floor under the washing machine.
We grabbed a bunch of towels to soak up the mess as best we could without actually moving both the washer and drier (there is a single step just barely in front of the washing machine, so it can’t be pulled out without moving the drier).
My daughter decided to try using drain cleaner and poured some down the washing machine drain pipe – we have an extra long, flexible funny just to access this drain without having to move the washing machine. She set a times for half an hour, before boiling water would be poured down, then took a well deserved break.
I used that time to set up the basins to wash as rinse as many dishes as I could fit in the dish tray. Once that was done, the dirty water could be tossed outside, since we can’t drain anything down the kitchen sink, still.
Meanwhile, my daughter was able to set a couple of baking trays in the oven for some of what I’d picked up at the grocery store for them, now that access to the oven was no longer blocked by a took kit and all the stuff that had been stored under the sink.
My daughter finally got to eat, after about 14-15 hours.
While all this was going on, I kept my brother up to date. We are at a loss as to why this main drain pipe is so clogged. We had it routered 2 or 3 years ago. The first time it had ever been cleared in almost 50 years. Why is it clogged again after such a short time? And this badly! We’ve been trying to be diligent in making sure nothing goes down the drain that shouldn’t, like grease and whatnot, and using the bacteria and enzyme pipe maintenance stuff.
We do have that commercial drain auger my husband bought for me. We just don’t have what we need to be able to open up the main line in the basement, then seal it up again properly.
My brother wondered if it was possible there was freezing happening. The pipe runs past the old basement window. That window, however, is currently filled in with 3″ thick Styrofoam insulation on the inside, and on the outside, it has what used to be a “roof” above the window, now leaning over it for protection from the elements. That entire corner, on the outside, is well sheltered.
My husband’s bedroom is right above this area, though, and he says he can hear the gurgling in the pipes, and thinks the clog is near that window. He may be partially right. However…
After the drain cleaner got to sit for half an hour, my daughter went to pour boiling water down. She poured straight from the kettle, which is 1.7L
I don’t think she got more than a litre in before it started to overflow the pipe!
Which means the clog is practically at the bottom of the drain pipe.
This drain pipe has been here since the house got indoor plumbing in the mid 70’s. While there is a washing machine in the entry now, when the new part of the house was added on, my dad had a sink installed in the entry, so that they could wash up from working in the barn or whatever, before going into the rest of the house. Basically, it was a mud room. My mother apparently hated have a sink there, so when they stopped having cattle, she put something over the sink and taps, covered it with a cloth, and put decorative stuff on it.
I found the original sink, and the counter it’s in, in one of the sheds.
When my husband and younger daughter came out several weeks ahead of my older daughter and I, my younger daughter helped my brother turn the entry into a laundry room, taking advantage of the existing plumbing, so that we wouldn’t have to go up and down those horrible stairs carrying laundry all the time.
Have a mentioned, my brother is awesome?
He has also been asking me to take pictures of various parts of the plumbing to send to him. I have no intention of asking, but I suspect he plans to come out here to see what he can do. He needs to retrieve his car, anyhow, now that it seems our truck really is safe to drive and is running quite well, in spite of a sensor telling us otherwise. My brother knows how to do this stuff, and has the tools – but they are mostly here, and scattered in different areas.
The alternative is to call a plumber to clear that drain again. Last I looked, it was a flat rate of $300 for a drain clearing plus 1 hour of time. Parts and more time extra, if it turns out to be a bigger problem. That was a few years ago, and I expect the prices have had to go up, with how much more expensive things have gotten since then. I’ve tried calling that plumber a few times since then, left messages and never got return calls. We used this company because it was the only one that had the big drain auger – they cleared the floor pipe to the septic tank, the first time we called them. This time, though, we have our own auger, so really, we could call any plumber.
But not today.
After all that fighting with the kitchen plumbing – which did turn out to be necessary, considering the condition of things under there – we still can’t use our kitchen sink.
At least the line from the bathroom to where it drops down to the septic tank is clear!
I have no idea what we’re going to do at this point. Thankfully, my older daughter was able to help with covering the cost of vehicle repairs and paying the septic guy, but that can get used up awfully fast! Just the stuff I got today is only because she was able to help out.
As for me, I am just tired. Mentally tired. So very tired of things breaking down. It’s been more than a year of one thing after another, and even when things get fixed – like the ejector, or that sensor on the truck – it’s still an issue.
This is really starting to drain everything out of me.
Not that it matters. All we can do is keep chugging along, making do with what we have.
For now, that means things like doing the dishes in basins and dumping the water outside, and having an emergency diverter attached to our septic pump to also dump things outside.
I think I need to make myself go to bed early, and try to get some rest. Thankfully, I’m not the one that had to crawl around under a sink, so I didn’t have any major exertions. Just walking around with my brother as he was checking the expeller and installing the diverter did me in, unexpectedly. It has been a long time, but at about 3am last night, it caught up with me and I got hit with Charlie Horses again. This time, both thighs, all the way around. All I did was try to roll over in bed, and that was it. Thankfully, my daughters were up and heard me calling for help, and my younger daughter was able to bring me some ibuprofen (acetaminophen doesn’t help for Charlie Horses) and stay with me. The attack – and that’s exactly what it felt like – ended as quickly as it started, which was the weirdest sensation. After all this time, going to bed now feels as risky and driving the truck with that sensor issue!
Today, I needed to drive my mother to her doctor’s appointment, but didn’t have to leave until morning.
That gave me a chance to check on our emergency diverter set up that my brother made outside the house, ensuring that things were still sitting where they needed to.
Aside from making sure the PVC pipe my brother found was snug against the house, this is the important part.
The orange tarp partially buried in snow is the end of the insulated tarp covering the septic tank that we did not have to move. It was pulled away from the house, instead. This end gets frozen harder to the ground.
The two lengths of pipe need to be kept straight and slow downwards. At the bottom left corner of the above photo, you can just see the section of chimney flu that is supporting it closer to the house. We used basically what we could find in the dark. They will do the job, as long as things stay where they are supposed to. The shoveled area in the snow will basically become a skating rink.
In the distance, you can see the large flexible hose that was meant to be used. The problem is, it doesn’t straighten out entirely. Ever snake-like turn is an area that water could potentially slow down and freeze. The pipe is about 6″ in diameter, but even that can eventually fill and freeze solid. So it looks like we won’t be able to use it.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Using my brother’s car (and making sure to give the engine time to warm up, first!), I headed out early enough to hit the post office.
Alas, the mail that I’m expecting that didn’t come in due to the postal strike, still has not come in. Nor has anything else. Not even junk mail. The strikers may have been ordered to return to work (as a Crown corporation, the Federal government has the authority to do that), but apparently, that doesn’t mean they are going to actually do their work.
Oh, something I learned about this strike. It turns out that Canada Post has two unions. One is for the regular postal workers we see delivering our mail and in the physical buildings, like in our little hamlet. The other is for the ones that work in the distribution centres and such. Those are the ones that went on strike. So, while regular postal workers still showed up for work, they couldn’t do anything, because the distribution centres were shut down. It was a rotating strike, so every week, a different distribution centre would be active again, allowing for some mail to trickle through. Of course, if it was going from one distribution centre to the next, that really didn’t make much difference.
But I digress.
From there, it was off to my mother’s town and, since I was so early, I swung by the hardware store. After talking to one of the staff, I picked up some reflective insulation. They sell this stuff in sizes large enough to wrap around hot water tanks, to narrow strips that would be wrapped around pipes. Which is exactly what I wanted. I also got a small roll of aluminum tape. I plan to wrap the outflow pipe where it butts up against the house, as that is the area most at risk of freezing. Then I plan to add some between the pipes and the supports. Where the log is, isn’t much of a concern, but the ceramic chimney flu and the brick can both chill the pipe and potentially cause an ice build up on the inside. Just a bit of insulation would prevent that.
From there, I made a stop at the gas station. I didn’t need gas yet, but I knew my mother would be getting her Meals on Wheels today. Though I had a large and late breakfast before I left, she had told me she didn’t like to be eating by herself, with someone watching her. So I picked up some of the potato wedges she likes so much, so that I could snack while she was eating, and she could have the rest with her supper, later on.
When I got to her place, though, she had just finished eating her main meal. So we had some tea while she ate her desert. 😊 We were able to have a bit of a visit before we had to leave, and I updated her a bit on what was going on, and that my brother had lent us their car rather than my SIL driving all the way out to drive both of us around, and that he’d installed the diverter. I’m not sure, but I think she was still living at the farm the last time (and first time) it was used.
We left early to go to her doctor’s appointment, and I’m glad we did. I ended up having to go back to her apartment to get her little folding foot stool. Even though the car is so much lower than the truck, she still needed the stool to be able to get in! That is a definite drop in mobility.
Once at the clinic, we had a long wait, as everyone was being called in late. Once in the examination room, we still had a bit of a wait. When the doctor finally came in, she started off asking if we could move to another room, but then she saw my mother and told us to stay put, she would go get her laptop. It turns out the clinic was having network problems with all the examination room computers, and that was why everything was behind.
So we tried to keep it short. The main thing was to get my mother rescheduled for the MRI we didn’t get to, due to dangerous road conditions. I confirmed that my mother’s file was up to date about her macular degeneration and treatment. The doctor has nothing to do with this, as my mother is being treated at the eye clinic in the city, but as the primary doctor, she is supposed to have all this information sent to her. Then we talked about my mother’s breathing issues. One of her neighbours has asthma and uses a puffer (inhaler), so my mother decided she should have one, too. So could she be tested for asthma?
The doctor just prescribed her a puffer. She explained that she could recommend her for testing, but that is done in the city, and my mother would be on a waiting list for probably a year. Using a puffer won’t hurt her. I don’t think my mother as asthma, but even if there’s just a placebo effect, it would be worth it.
After giving my mother a basic physical exam, the doctor adjusted one of her dosages, and that was it. We knew the doctor was behind because of the computer issues, so we didn’t talk about much else. Which is good, because my mother usually wastes time by asking personal questions, or bringing up issues that she has… opinions on, shall we say.
My mother wasn’t due for any bloodwork, but the doctor did want to see her again in 3 months, so I made that appointment before we headed out.
Since the doctor faxed the new and updated prescriptions directly to the pharmacy in my mother’s town, that was our first stop. I went in while my mother stayed in the car, as it was just too much for her to go in and out. My mother was due to have her bubble packs delivered on Friday, and has started her last week’s current pack, so when I got there, her new packs were already there and ready to go. So that got pulled and adjusted for the new dosage. Instead of delivering on Friday, they will deliver tomorrow. As for the last pack my mother just started, the pharmacist said for her to set it aside and use the new once when they arrive, and the current pack can be brought back and adjusted.
As for the inhaler, it would take an hour before it would be ready, so that will be delivered tomorrow, too. Having been given an inhaler to see if it would help with my own respiratory issues (which we’ve never found the cause of, and I’ve basically given up trying to find one), I was able to explain to my mother how they work and how to use one, etc. She’ll need reminding, of course, but I hope the staff that delivers her meds tomorrow will be able to explain it again.
That done, there was just a brief stop at the grocery store for me to run in and pick up a couple of things for my mother before I took her home. I didn’t stay too much longer after that. I’m glad the days are longer, and I did manage to get home while it was still light out.
In between all this, I was able to send the OBDII scan results on the truck to the garage and he was able to respond. It’s basically the oil pressure sensor again. The one that was recently replaced, and also recently cleaned out because it was triggering the alarm and “shut off engine now” warnings, because it thought the truck was out of oil. This time, it has so far just turned on the check engine light again (though I did clear the codes, so that should be off now), and it why the oil pressure gauge isn’t moving. He told me, even if he replaced the sensor again, it’ll keep happening, because of the weather we’ve been having. There’s really nothing he can do about it. I suppose I could pay him to take it apart and clean it again, but that’s about it.
So really, what I need to be doing is getting the engine warmed up and staying warm long enough to evaporate any moisture in the system and triggering the sensor. It’ll resolve itself as things warm up again, as there won’t be that build up of moisture anymore.
I don’t need to go anywhere tomorrow, and it’s supposed to be a bit warmer, so I’ll run the engine while I’m outside.
Which leads me to my phone call with my brother this evening.
I’d sent the pictures he took to the company that installed the ejector, and the response was the same. The pump isn’t pushing out the water fast enough to create the pressure needed. This frustrated my brother to know end, because he knows the pump is pushing fine. As for how long it takes to drain the tank, he told me that 5 minutes is about right, because our tank is about twice the size of most other tanks. It’s huge. I was so young when it was installed, I was probably not allowed to go anywhere near it at the time.
Plus, that ice wall on the sheet of metal roof the ejector expels the water onto shows just how far and how strong the flow of water is.
Or was.
I know I’ve described the ejector system before, but my brother sent me some info with a diagram. The image was a pdf and terrible pixelated, but I think I got a decent screen cap of it.
I don’t know if ours is from this company, but it’s the exact same design.
With our new ejector, it’s about 2′ above ground, so about 8′ is below ground. I think the original was more like 12′ based on how much more was above ground than the new one. The venturi pipe – the discharge pipe, in the diagram – should never stay full once the pump shuts off. Once installed, the venturi pipe can be (carefully!) removed and replaced, which is what we were supposed to do after using enough hot water to thaw the ice and free it.
One of the things my brother brought up again was electric heat tape. There are all kinds of heat tape, and my husband had sent me a link for one that he’d found on Amazon. As my brother voiced concerns that, if we did try to use heat tape to thaw the above ground portion of the 4″ stand pipe, it might melt the plastic, I sent him the link. It is safe for both metal and plastic pipes, and self regulating. It’s also available in a huge range of lengths. He estimated that a 12′ length would be enough to wrap around the pipe, up to the elbow coming out of the cap. It was affordable, so I ordered it. It’s estimated to arrive on the 17th, though, so we have other things to try.
One of the things my brother thinks is a contributing factor is the new location of the ejector. The old one was about 10-15 feet away, and had a big willow overhanging it. The willow may have protected it from the elements (even though the roots were probably why it was starting to lean backwards and eventually start leaking). Right now, the ejector may be in full sunlight, but it is completely exposed to the winds we get. With the temperatures we’ve had lately, that could be a contributing factor so a slow freeze happening, and to the slow flow I was seeing in the filter. As long as some water was getting through, it wasn’t freezing completely, though, and just building up. I have a theory. The night before I discovered no flow was happening at all anymore, the septic pump had not gone off at all. Normally, between the 4 of us, plus my older daughter working at night, there’s plenty of toilet flushing, dish washing and even at least one shower. That didn’t happen, and it may have allowed for the stand pipe to finally freeze solid, and the venturi (discharge) pipe along with it.
I had already been thinking that, in the spring, I would need to put some sort of fence around the new ejector. Being so much lower to the ground, the renters cows out traipse right over it, even with the metal sheet butted up against it to divert the flow of water. My brother was thinking we’d need to build some kind of semi-permanent shelter over or around it, to protect it from the element in winter. I say “semi-permanent” as we need to assume that, some day, it will need to have work done on it, and we’d need to be able to move it.
At one point, I thought of the catio. It has a clear roof and is wrapped in plastic, making it almost a mini greenhouse. It would fit over the ejector.
Then I remembered the metal sheet. It couldn’t fit on top of that, since it has a curl to it that ensures the water flows away, and not off the sides.
But, there was possibilities.
So, while we wait for the heat tape to arrive, we need to see if we can find something we can use to build a shelter over it for this winter. My brother thinks a couple of pallets set up as a V around it, then something on top, would do the trick. We have no pallets, but he’s sure he brought some. There might also be some scrap plywood we could find somewhere.
Which means, I have a task for tomorrow. Going through the barn and sheds to see what I can find that could be used to build a shelter over the ejector. Just something we can slap together for now, but strong and heavy enough to not be blown over and destroyed by the wind. Ideally, I’d find something clear for a “roof” and add a little passive solar heat.
Trudging around outside will also give me a chance to get the truck running and see how it does! We’re warming up over the next few days, including the overnight lows, which should help, too. The day after tomorrow, my daughter and I have our joint appointment. It would be good if we could use our own truck and return my brother’s car! They really do need two vehicles.
Well, we’ll see how it goes. There’s not much else we can do!
Meanwhile, our septic tank still hasn’t filled enough to trigger the pump, so we still don’t know if the diverter will actually work, yet. It should work just fine. It’s just that we’ve had so many things breaking down for so long, now, I’m getting pretty paranoid about it all!
Today is January 6 which, in our family, is our official last day of Christmas.
Today is the Feast of the Epiphany, also known as Three Kings Day. When the girls were little, they would have put their shoes out last night, filled with “hay” for the three kings’ camels, which would be replaced with a few treats and small toys for them to find in the morning.
The Bible doesn’t actually say there were three kings. Rather, it speaks of the Magi – wise men – from the East, who came bearing gifts for the newborn king of the Jews, and doesn’t say how many there were. It mentions three gifts – gold, frankincense and myrrh.
Matthew 2:9-11
And behold, the star that they had seen at its rising preceded them,
until it came and stopped over the place where the child was.
They were overjoyed at seeing the star,
and on entering the house
they saw the child with Mary his mother.
They prostrated themselves and did him homage.
Then they opened their treasures
and offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
While nativity scenes often have the wise men at the stable with a newborn Jesus in the manger (the “inn” referred to in English translations would more accurately have been translated as “upper room”, and the stable would have been in the lower room of an extended family household, overcrowded by other family members come to Bethlehem for the census). By the time the magi arrived, Joseph and Mary would have been properly married and, as described in the verses above, living in their own house. By the time Herod realized the magi were not returning, enough time had passed that he ordered all males under 2 yrs old in Bethlehem slaughtered. I’ve read estimates, based on what is know of the region and likely population of Bethlehem at the time, that the number of children killed might have been about 17, though of course, no one really knows.
Joseph, Mary and Jesus were safely in Egypt by then. Egypt was also under Roman rule, so this was akin to moving to another province or state.
At this, we have a close to our Christmas season. I hope you and yours have had a blessed time, and that the new year will be one of peace and good health, and may all your needs be met.
Insanely awesome. Fantastic. Amazing. What would we do without him?
After a long drive home (I think it’s 6 hours, possibly 8), he stopped only to pick up a few things, then took their second car to our place. Once here, he went into the basement to look at things there (there wasn’t much to see, really) and change into his ski pants before grabbing his supplies and heading to the barn. Right about then, my SIL showed up. Unfortunately, she’s allergic to cats, so she can’t come into the house, and just stayed in the car the whole time, though we did get a chance to talk for a bit.
My brother looked around in the barn for a while, trying to find some copper pipe. The one corner I thought I’d seen some had a different type of pipe, but there was a length of pipe were I remembered, up in the rafters. My brother was able to reach it. It was only about 6′ long, though. We talked about finding a way to add a safety line, just in case, but its surface was too smooth.
He grabbed one of their super long extension cords that they now have stored in the barn and we headed out to the ejector with the copper pipe. Then, while I secured the end of the extension cord to a fence post, he ran the rest of the cord to the pump shack, which is a bit closer than the barn.
When he finished that, he headed to the car to get the heat gun, while I popped into the house. I’d found a piece of copper pipe in the basement that had a slightly wider part at the end, so it would hold a safety line. That way, if we accidentally dropped it, we could pull it up again.
Not that we ever needed it.
By the time I got there, my brother had opened up the ejector, taken a look, then put it all back again. When I got there, he popped the elbow off and removed the cap to show me what he found.
The first obvious problem was, the venture pipe was frozen right to the top. It should have been empty. When the pump turns off, any liquid in the venturi pipe drains to the bottom, which is about 10 or 12 feet down.
The 4″ pipe around it was also full, though not quite to the top. I stuck the copper pipe I had into the opening until I hit ice to see how far down it went, and it was about 8″ from the surface.
This absolutely should not have happened.
My brother put the pieces back and we headed to the house so install the diverter.
Before we did, we went to the corner of the house on the outside to find the opening. It was higher than I expected, for some reason. I still had the copper pipe I’d brought over with me (it made for a handy walking stick in the snow!), and my brother used it to punch a hole through the spray foam insulation.
From there, it was to the basement, to install the diverter.
Installing the diverter itself was an easy thing. First, he pushed the length of pipe to the outside through the hole.
He had drilled that hole himself, years ago, when they had to do some major work on the septic system, so my parents could still use their plumbing. This is the log part of the house, which is sitting on top of those joists – which turned out to be twice as thick as he expected! It took a lot to drill out that hole.
Once that end was through the wall, it was just a matter of removing the outflow pipe at the top of the pump and replacing it with the diverter.
A simple thing – yet I could not have done it.
I don’t have a heat gun.
After loosening the clamps on the outflow pipe, my brother had to use the heat gun to soften the plastic enough to pull it off. He still had to get pretty physical with it – I was rather alarmed to see the pump being moved around so much. I’d thought it was bolted down to the concrete! Turns out, it’s bolted down to some plywood. Which makes sense, as it would be easier to change pumps that way.
Once the pipe was free, however, black fluid started spilling out. All my brother could do was try to get as little as possible on the pump itself – and not get splashed himself! Me, I immediately went for the broom we keep nearby, to sweep water into the floor drain when there’s seepage in the spring. Once I got as much as I could swept away, my brother attached the diverter – making sure to remember to put the clamps on pipe, first! After softening the plastic with his heat gun a few times, he was able to get the pipe all the way on, then clamp it down.
The next thing to do was set something up to the pipe outside, to get any outflow well away from the house. The big flexible hose (it’s about 6″ in diameter) he’d brought for us before was stored in the barn, so it would have been quite frozen. He was concerned about using it, as it might crack from the cold. There were some old downspouts in the barn, though, so he went to look and see what he could find that could be used right away.
While he went to do that, I got the hose that I use to clear the floor drain and access pipe to give the floor where the fluid had spilled a bit of a wash, and swept that into the floor drain (the floor doesn’t slope towards the drain properly). While I was doing that, I heard some gurgling from the filter as it drained. This was to be expected, though, with the pipes being switched. I left it for the moment, though, then headed outside again to join my brother.
I got there just in time to see him carrying to lengths of pipe, and dragging the flexible hose behind him! He had it by one end, so that it would straighten a bit while being dragged.
I was impressed that he found two lengths of interlocking 4″ PVC pipe in the barn. I have no idea where he dug those out!
I grabbed the flexible hose from him so he could carry the pipes more easily.
The next while was spent setting up the PVC pipe over the diverter hose sticking out of the house. It was very important that the PVC pipe be right up against the house, and as high as possible, so nothing would flow backwards towards the house. The two pieces were interlocked, and we added whatever we could find to support its weight, so that it would be completely straight. The ground slopes downwards there, so that part was fine. The very end had to be raised off the ground, so that there would be no chance of fluid freezing and blocking the end.
As for the flexible hose, that got pulled out further, so that the black plastic could be warmed by the sun, tomorrow. Eventually, it will be added to the end of the PVC pipe, and the outflow will be sent well into the trees.
For now, he made sure to shovel a trench of sorts into the snow, to direct any outflow that might happen before then. Unfortunately, he dug it straight towards our little Liberty Apple tree! I mentioned that it was there, and he was saying “fertilizer!” I said that if it freezes, it’ll kill it.
I have to add, though; this is a Zone 4 tree, and we are Zone 3. With this cold snap we’re getting right now, it may well have been killed off. We won’t know until spring!
Anyhow. Once my brother saw where it was, he just dug the trench more to one side.
Once we were sure of how everything was set up, it was back to the basement. The filter was primed, and the pump turned back on.
From there, my brother headed out to shut off lights and close up doors. He also moved the car they are leaving for us over to where I had set up the extension cord for the block heater. I helped out, then went over to the gate to close it behind them.
Now, we wait.
We can use our plumbing as normal for now. It will take at least a few days before both sides of the septic tank fill and the pill switch triggers the pump. My brother was already fretting that it might not turn on at all, but I don’t see why it won’t. We’ll just have to keep an eye on things and listen for the pump.
We are all, understandably, paranoid about using our water right now. Is it safe to flush? Can we take a shower? Wash dishes in the sink?
The answer is yes…
… but… are we sure?
At least we know the diverter pipe is right here. The pipes outside are wide enough that they shouldn’t ice up, but it would be much, much easier to take care of that, should it happen.
As for the ejector…
Well, I’ll be heading to my mother’s in the late morning, so I should be able to call the company that installed the ejector and tell them what we found. Everyone was saying how I could pull the venturi pipe out and bring it inside so the venturi valve on the bottom can thaw, so obviously no one thought the whole thing could be frozen solid the way it is. Something is wrong, somewhere.
What will come of that, I have no idea.
It will help knowing that the pump is far newer than I thought it was, and that it was the highest end pump my brother could get.
For now, though, it looks like we’ll have our emergency diverter set up for the rest of the winter.
It is what it is. We’ll just have to deal with what we’ve got! I’m just incredibly thankful that we had that diverter, and that my brother was willing to come out here tonight, after such a long drive, to do what he could for us.
Have I mentioned, just how awesome my brother is?
I don’t think I could say it often enough. My brother is the best!
You can see the times I took the above three screencaps, showing this morning’s temperatures. It’s coming up to 1pm as I write this, and we have not only finally warmed up to -20C/-4C, but it’s such a sunny day that the “windchill” is -15C/5F. The last screencap I took, at 9am, was just before I headed outside to feed the cats (I skipped the rest of my morning rounds), and the south facing part of the house was feeling much warmer. The wind direction just managed to be blocked by the trees to the south, which made a huge difference.
Unfortunately, we still have no septic, and the tank was not pumped yesterday, so we can’t use our plumbing. The septic truck broke down and never made it.
This morning, I tried calling one of the plumbers back – they are supposed to be available 24 hrs, according to their website. I left a message, but no one has called back.
So, we’re still using the honey pot in the bathroom. No showers and using as little water as possible to wash our hands. To do dishes, we’ve got basins on the dining room table, then we dump the dirty water outside when we’re done. We’ve even changed how we’re cooking, to try and dirty as few dishes as possible, and nothing that involves washing things, or dumping cooking water down the sink. I made a “use whatcha got” soup this morning out up leftovers – even the last bits of charcuteries meat and vegetable sticks we’d prepared extra of for New Year’s – for a hearty one pot meal.
—— pause for phone calls and messages and more calls and …. everything has changed! ——
Okay, I feel like I’m going through mental whiplash right now!
I will get to that in a moment.
Where was I?
Ah, yes. Doing dishes!
Basically, we’re being careful to have as little water going into the septic tank as possible. It can handle being at least a bit overfull – we’ve certainly gone more than a little over full just this past summer! – but we really want to avoid that.
I’m actually getting used to using the honeypot, because we can’t flush the toilet.
Yeesh.
Anyhow…
The plumber I left a message with got back to me while I was writing this. The first thing he let me know is that they are booked solid and cannot come out.
He also sounded rather upset for me. I’d mentioned the ejector was replaced about a month, month and a half ago. Ejectors are made to work in the winter. He used to install them himself. He has one himself that was installed in the 90’s, and it’s working fine. It shouldn’t be frozen. He suggested I call the company that installed it and get them to fix it. I told him I’d already talked to them, and he asked what they said when I told them it was frozen. I told the plumber that, at the time I called, we were thinking the problem was somewhere else at the time, and he was the one who suggested the ejector might be frozen. I didn’t confirm that until after. I also mentioned he’d asked me to call him back today, which I was planning to do. He told me that, when I did, to tell them they needed to come put and fix the ejector.
*sigh*
I did call the owner of the company back and basically told him what the plumber said. He was quite frustrated by that; apparently plumbers pretty regularly do stuff like that, when they don’t actually know what’s going on.
The problem is not the ejector.
The system we have works like this. The plumbing in the house all drains into one side of our septic tank. The solids sink to the bottom and, once it fills, the greywater drains into the other side of the tank. That side has a float with a pill switch in it. When it fills, the float triggers the pump inside the house. The pump pulls the greywater from the second half of the tank – this inflow pipe is where we have the filter installed, to catch any bits and pieces that might be in the water that could damage the pump – then pumps it out to the ejector. The outflow pipe runs most of the length of the basement and out the wall. The pipe, along with water pipes that supplies the heated water fountains for cattle, and a tap in the barn, runs about 300 or more feet to the barn, then turns away from the barn towards a low spot. From there, the venturi pipe creates enough pressure to draw the water up the pipe and out.
With ours, we’ve got a sheet of metal roofing to reduce erosion and divert the greywater towards a low area, further away from the barn.
That elbow at the top is part of the venturi pipe.
When the septic pump shuts off, any water in the venturi pipe drops down below the frost line and collects at the bottom of the 4″ pipe. The next time the septic pump turns on, the venturi pipe drains what’s at the bottom of the 4″ pipe first.
Here’s the problem.
There has to be enough pressure for this to happen, and that requires a certain gallons per minute rate of flow (he couldn’t remember exactly what that was). If there isn’t enough pressure, the venturi pipe can’t drain the bottom of the 4″ pipe completely. Then the pump shuts off, the water drains to the bottom, but now there’s more than there was before.
Eventually, the water level in the 4″ pipe gets above the frost line.
The septic pump, he told me, should take only about 2-3 minutes to drain the tank.
Ours takes about 5 minutes.
Except, recently, we’ve been having issues with flow.
First, the pump would empty the filter, but there wasn’t more water coming in from the tank. I would have to stop the pump, prime the filter, turn it on again, and it would work. The inflow, however, wasn’t as powerful as it had been, before.
The night before it stopped working entirely, the pump hadn’t gone off at all. The only reason it would was if we were using enough water for the second side of the tank to fill and the pill switch triggered the pump to turn on. That just didn’t happen.
So not only was the flow of water from the pump low, but there was no flow at all during one of the coldest nights we’ve had this year. Flowing water would have helped keep it from freezing entirely – at least for a while longer.
Which means that, ultimately, the problem is the pump and the flow of greywater.
Now, the pump *is* wearing out and needs to be replaced, but that may not be the problem. There may also be an air leak somewhere, affecting the vacuum. Which may have been what I was seeing, with a leak from the filter and the O ring not sealing. Or, there could be an air leak somewhere else.
Now, we could install the diverter and an emergency measure, but we still need to get the ejector thawed out, and we probably still need to replace the pump. I’ve been checking the filter regularly, and even turning the pump on for a few moments. It’s not draining, and the filter is not leaking, which – in theory, at least – means there is no longer an air leak.
Other issues could be that the pipe leading to the ejector is also getting coated with gunk on the inside and getting narrower. This is something we have been aware of and have been taking steps to try and improve. One of those was to use the Septo Bac every two days for two weeks, and we really did see a difference in how things flowed after that. Currently, we’re using Free Flow pipe maintenance twice a week; that is more to clear the pipes inside the house, but it would be beneficial for the tank and the pipe to the ejector, too.
—– Must pause for exciting news. —–
The septic guy just arrived! Our tank is being emptied right now!
We’ll be able to flush our toilet again!
I did get a peek into the tank when he popped the lid off. The level had not reached the pipe that the pill switch cable runs through yet, which was quite a relief.
That guy deserves one helluva tip.
Okay, where was I…
Right.
So there are a number of possible reasons why the ejector wasn’t able to drain properly, which resulted in the freeze.
I then got instructions on how to thaw out the ejector (that doesn’t involve ice fishing tents and heaters, as one plumber suggested trying).
I wasn’t able to pull the venturi pipe out because it’s frozen, but could rotate the cap. I couldn’t take the cap off, because of the elbow.
Well, that elbow has a screw, and it comes off.
We could take off the elbow and remove the cap.
We could then start pouring boiling water into the 4″ pipe, around the venturi pipe. However, he said to put some copper pipe down, first. The pipe itself will heat up and help thaw things out faster, but it would also help get water down more directly and further through the ice on the bottom.
Once it seems like enough ice was melted, someone could turn on the septic pump and, hopefully, it would drain the water at the bottom, and empty the septic tank.
That would take a long time, and it’s still colder than -20C/-4F out there.
—- pause for more calls —-
Oh, my goodness. More changes! This time, for tomorrow, too. I’ll get caught up to that, later.
With all this, I’ve been keeping my brother and his wife up to date, pretty constantly.
Given our concerns with the truck, another thing I had to deal with last night was how to get my mother to her medical appointment on Monday. Plus, I was supposed to come early enough to do her laundry for her. She called last night to tell me she was able to get her laundry done herself and that I didn’t need to come early. I told her a bit about what was going on (I didn’t want to overwhelm her!) and that I wasn’t sure if I could get her to her appointment. She tried calling my sister to drive her (which she didn’t want, as I’m the one who normally accompanies my mother, so I’m on top of what’s going on), but my sister starts her shift at work less than an hour after my mother’s appointment.
I passed that on to my brother as well. Today, I was supposed to run the engine a few times, so see if the problem continued, then decide Monday morning, if I’d be rescheduling my mother’s appointment. Possibly mine and my daughter’s on Wednesday, too.
I got a call from my SIL. They were going to be coming home on Sunday (today), and she offered to drive us. She would pick me up first, then we’d pick up my mother, drive her to her appointment, then she’d drive us both home again, then head home herself.
I was stunned by the offer – that’s a LOT of driving for her! Once I was sure this would not be too much of a problem for her, I gratefully accepted the offer.
Today, I’ve been messaging them the whole time, while they are on the way home. My SIL was driving, so my brother was able to respond to my messages.
When I told him about thawing the ejector and needing to look for a long enough copper pipe (I know I’ve seen some, somewhere!), he called me. I was just bundling up to go outside and check the barn.
Which is jam packed with their stuff.
I’m sure there is one long enough in one corner of the old bull’s stall, but it’s full of my brother’s gardening supplies now. I wasn’t sure if it was there, and I wasn’t sure if I could reach it! I’m pretty sure there are lengths of copper pipe in the rafters, too, but again, I’m not sure I could reach them. The centre aisle of the barn is full of tractors and snow blowers and rotary mowers, and I’m… well… short.
My brother called to tell me not to bother trying to thaw out the ejector. They would go home, then come here with both their cars. My SIL would follow later. He would take a look at the ejector, see what he could do, then she would drive him home.
They would leave one of their cars with us. It’s already parked outside, so they know it can handle the cold.
My truck should, too – it certainly did last winter! – but that’s another story….
The thing is, they were still about 3-4 hours away from home! Add in the time to come here, and he won’t get here until after dark!
But he felt he had no choice. No one is coming out to install the diverter, and no one was going to come out to thaw out the ejector. The one company would have, but they are so far away, it would be a lot more expensive, and they didn’t want to ding us with a huge bill. It’s not like they’d be coming out to fix an actual problem with the ejector they installed, that would be covered by any kind of warranty.
Plus, by leaving us with their car, my SIL won’t have to do all that driving.
Then my brother told me to sit down with a cup of tea and relax for a while. He knows me well enough to know how all this has been stressing me out.
Which is about when my husband called out, saying “are you expecting someone with a big truck?”
I’d opened the gate for the septic truck last night, and never closed it. He was able to drive right in!
He’d backed into the yard, so I threw on my parka and headed out. We went over to where I’d cleared things to make room for the truck and the hoses, and got the insulated tarp freed from the frozen ground. He then went to back the truck up the rest of the way. I confirmed how much we owed him, and told him it might be a couple of days before I can get the cash to him. He was fine with that. We’ve done this before, and he knows he can trust us.
With that, I went back inside and let my brother know the septic truck was here. It didn’t take him long at all to empty the truck, so when my brother said he wanted to call, I delayed it long enough for me to go back out, put the weights back down on the tarp, which the septic guy had put back, and put everything away.
Not before using the toilet and actually being able to flush it!!!
Ooooo… Very exciting! 😂🤣😂
While it was great that the tank was emptied, it does make thawing the ejector a bit more complicated. It will take probably a few days before both sides of the tank filles enough to trigger the pump again. Which means that, if we thaw the ejector, there’s not way to test it.
My brother thinks he should be able to use his heat gun and the copper pipe to thaw the ejector.
We’ll see how it works out, though. We won’t really know what we’re dealing with until we get that cap off and can actually see how high the ice it – or use the copper pipe to find how far it goes.
When they reach their place, he’ll grab a few tools, but we really only need a screwdriver to remove the single screw to get that elbow off.
Of course, things never turn out as expected, so who knows.
They don’t have a lot of tools at their place right now. They brought most of them here, to the farm. However, they’re scattered all over. They didn’t have time to be organized about it, but just jammed things wherever they could. My brother won’t be able to start organizing things until spring, at the earliest.
Well, we’ll do what we can with where we are at.
Meanwhile, they will be leaving a car here, and it will need to be plugged in. So I headed out to the garage to get a 100′ extension cord and set that up through the back door of the garage, so the car can be parked in the more sheltered yard.
While I was at it, I finally got to the truck and got the engine running. Then, after puttering with the extension cord, I set up my OBDII scanner.
The first thing I noticed was that the oil pressure gauge was still sitting at 0 and not moving. The check engine light was on again, too.
I did a full module scan. What I’m getting is “Engine Oil Pressure Sensor/Switch “A” High. Five times.
Looking into more detail, the scanner tells me this code frequency is “very common”. The recommended fix is to replace the engine oil pressure sensor.
Which got replaced not that long ago. Unless “switch A” is a different sensor.
I took screen captures of the results. When I’m somewhere with enough data signal to send images through text, I’ll send them to the garage.
Otherwise, the truck sounded just fine. In fact, now that the MAF sensor has been replaced, I do hear an improvement in how it starts, when using the remote car starter. Definitely smoother. I’d checked the oil yesterday, and it was fine, too.
Phew.
This post took a lot longer – and became a lot longer – than I expected!
As of right now, I’m basically just waiting for my brother to arrive and will accompany him to the ejector.
My brother is the best. So is his wife! I am so glad my mother transferred ownership of the property over to them. I don’t know what we’d do without them!
January 4, the eleventh day of Christmas, is the memorial day Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton – a considerably more modern saint, and the first US citizen to be canonized as a saint.
The first thing he asked when I answered was if we got our ejector working again. I told him no, it’s frozen solid. We’re going to have to install a diverter.
Which is when he had to tell me he wasn’t going to make it. When he hadn’t shown up for so long, I was afraid of that.
We might have to call another company, but this is the only one that has been willing to come out as needed, rather than waiting until there are several costumers needing to be done in the same area. It means paying more, but that’s better than having to wait weeks to get it done.
I just set the honey pot up in the bathroom. At this rate, we’re going to have to invest in a commode. The honey pot is a seat that fits on a 5 gallon pail. Not very comfortable, not very stable.
We actually do have a flushing portable toilet in the basement that we found while cleaning up, but the base is missing, so there’s nothing for it to empty into. It won’t fit over a 5 gallon pail, unfortunately.
I don’t get it. We’ve had more severe cold, for much longer periods, in the first few years we moved out here. We had our vehicles frozen for a month. But we never had problems like this, with our septic system.
And it’s not just us. The Cat Lady had the well pump at their cottage freeze and flood the basement, on Christmas Eve. My brother’s sump pump is frozen, and he’s monitoring it through his security camera to watch for possible overflow. During their drive, they saw semi’s broken down all over. Their own car ran well, thank God. The plumbers all mentioned having vehicle troubles from the cold, and they’ve been dealing with calls for service because of the cold. It may be brutal out there, but we’ve had worse!
Someone just shoot me know. Put me out of my misery.
No, I’m not serious. Just hyperbole, but really?
So we’ve got our septic issues. The pump never turned on during the night. I did check it, and found that m it wasn’t until late morning that I finally heard it turn on, and I immediately went down to check on it.
There was no flow through the filter. In fact, it was still full and nothing had drained out the bottom.
So I did the usual. Shut off the pump, pop the cap off the filter to fill it…
There was no seal.
I primed it, turned the pump back on…
There was no water flow. Nothing.
At this point, it was looking like we needed a new O ring. I’ve been messaging my brother through all this, and he suggested using Vaseline to get a seal. I found a tiny little jar of Vaseline in the bathroom and gave it a try.
Still no seal, still no flow.
I then spent I don’t know how long, calling hardware stores, looking for a 5″ O ring.
No one had.
Even the one in the town to the north of us, which I knew carried their own version of a septic pump filter, didn’t have one. They had a 6″ one.
They did recommend I call an auto place on the same street as them, as they carried all sorts of O rings.
The first question I was asked was, how thick. I never even thought of that, because all the places I called basically had one thickness. It was never a question. I gave the closest I could and he went looking.
They had one.
Yeah!
I started heading to the truck to head out.
As I was unplugging it, the first thing I notice is the front driver’s side tire is really low. So I fire up the compressor to pump it up.
That poor compressor. It was NOT liking the cold!
I got the tire pumped up, then got the truck started to warm up while I opened the gate. As I’m backing the truck out of the garage, I see something odd.
The oil pressure gauge is at 0, and is not moving. At all.
I stopped most of the way out of the garage, so I had room to set up the foot stool to check the oil.
It was fine.
I started the truck again, and the gauge still wasn’t moving. I left the engine to run while I went inside for a bit. I tried calling the garage, but it went to voice mail, so I tried sending a text, instead. Then I went back to the truck.
Now the check engine light was on.
*sigh*
I did not have time to fuss with this. I parked the truck, plugged it back in, locked the gate and headed inside.
Then I started calling plumbers.
Long story short, after getting through to one place and explaining the situation, they recommended someone in the town where the O ring was. I called there and left a message.
Then I went to the basement to try the pump again.
As before, I turned on the pump, but nothing was flowing through the filter. So I shut it off and opened it up.
It was sealed so well, I had to pry it off. It took a while, but the Vaseline made the difference.
I checked things and even switched out the filter baskets, even though that had been done recently, so the one in there was still pretty clean, closed it up and tried again.
So the problem was not the filter, after all. And the pump seemed to be running pretty normally. So why wasn’t any water flowing?
I ended up calling the first plumber I got through to again, talked to the receptionist and explained what was going on, which she passed on.
At this point, I had so many calls and return calls to so many different places – including the company that installed our new ejector – that I’m starting to get them mixed up.
Long story short, it was suggested the ejector might be frozen. With suggestions and advice from different places, I headed out with a couple of jugs of hot water to see.
From how the ice and snow was on the diverter, clearly the expeller had been working all right until now. It obviously had quite a bit of pressure to create that ice wall so far from the expeller.
The cap is held in place with two screws, which I removed.
It was frozen solid. I couldn’t even rotate the cap.
I poured hot water over it and was eventually able to rotate the cap, but the venturi pipe would not move. I didn’t want to use too much force on it, or it would crack in the cold, but there was no way I could remove it to thaw it out, or to pour hot water into the pipe.
This is a serious problem. There is no way we can thaw this out, which means no septic for the winter.
I was keeping my brother updated through all this, though he’s currently out of province. When talking about the possibility of the ejector being frozen, he brought up something I completely forgot about.
With the problem we were having before, he’d brought over a massive hose for the diverter.
We could set up the diverter, if necessary. We would bypass the ejector system completely. A diverter pipe would be attached to the pump and run out hole in the wall, which is currently filled with spray foam insulation. The hose he’d brought over is now stored in the barn. We could set that up and the pipe from the basement would get drained into the maple grove for the winter.
With the ejector being frozen solid, that is now our final option.
More phone calls needed to be made.
One of those calls was to our septic guy. We need to get the tank emptied, since the pump can’t drain it. We can’t use our water. We still are, for small things, but no showers or doing dishes, and even flushing the toilet has to be avoided.
Thankfully, they will be able to come out today, so we won’t have to set up the honey pot. They’re a cash only business, though, and I don’t have any, but I can pay them later, which is something I’ve done with them before.
It will take a while for them to warm up the truck and get here, as this cold is causing all sorts of vehicle problems for everyone. As I write this, we are under extreme cold warnings, still. The temperature is at -21C/-6, and the wind chill is -29C/-20F
Once the tank is emptied, we’ll have a bit of a grace period and can use our water while waiting for a plumber to come in.
So far, I’ve had one tell me they’re booked solid for 2 weeks. I’ve left a message with the other, explaining what I needed and asking them to call back. I’ve also gotten through to the company that installed the ejector and asked if they could install the diverter for us. They are the furthest away and would be charging mileage, so he suggested I keep calling others. He then asked me to call him back on Sunday evening to update him. If I can’t find anyone, he’ll have someone come out. Otherwise, he wanted me to let him know if we found someone closer.
Which is where we stand right now. The septic guy hasn’t arrived yet, but I was able to get the insulated tarp over the tank lid freed of ice and snow and pulled back far enough to access the lid. Then covered it again, until he gets here.
As I write this, I realize it’s been at least an hour since the septic guy called me back. I hope he’s okay!
The extreme cold warning extends into the wee hours of tomorrow. We’re supposed to have a high of -19C/-2F tomorrow afternoon, and the days are supposed to keep warming up after that.
Just checking the weather now, and we’ve already dropped to -22C/-8F with the windchill now at -31C/-24F. Which could be worse; some places are getting wind chills of -40C/F
It’s past 3pm as I write this. I’d better go top of the kibble for the outside cats and – more importantly – give them more warm water. A lot of the kibble bowls are still really full when I head out. The ones in the kibble house may be sheltered, but there is no warmth. The bowl in the catio, wrapped in its plastic, gets emptied, but now the bowls under the nearby shrine. I’m rather surprised the plastic is making that much of a difference. The bowl in the isolation shelter gets emptied completely. So I try to leave more food at the bowls that get empties, so they don’t have to go into the cold to eat. I want them to stay warm and cozy as much as possible! Their winter fur is obviously helping, though, as I’ve been seeing them all over while outside.
The Re-Farmer 