Wednesday, May 13, 2015
Improving maintainable-ness
Houses and humans both need attention as they get older. My house has a winter shutoff valve for the outside faucet. The shutoff valve is under the floor, reached through a little trapdoor inside a kitchen cabinet. It's a tricky spot that requires some flexibility. I've aged and weakened to the point where I can still turn the valve, but can't do anything fancy in there; can't maneuver a wrench easily. This year when I turned the valve on, it started dripping, and I couldn't make it stop by tightening the packing nut.
So I found a plumber (via Angieslist) and had him replace the old valve with one of those 90-degree lever units. This lever can be moved 'by fingertips', so it should continue to be usable for a while.
Mainly it doesn't drip. After I got rid of termites in 2008, I vowed that I'd never let the crawl space get wet again, because deeply damp soil is what attracts them.
The plumber also replaced the outer faucet, which looks nice but (unlike previous repair) isn't really noticeable and doesn't really matter.
Expensive at $400, but worth it.
Maintainable-ness has two sides. Parts should be replaceable, and adjustments should be reachable. This old house doesn't score well on either side. Everything is non-standard and hard to reach. Every step to improve maintainable-ness helps both me and the house to age better.
Expensive at $400, but worth it.
Maintainable-ness has two sides. Parts should be replaceable, and adjustments should be reachable. This old house doesn't score well on either side. Everything is non-standard and hard to reach. Every step to improve maintainable-ness helps both me and the house to age better.
Labels: coot-proofing, Shack people - Cottage people
¶ 3:14 AM
