08-13-11

HI,

Well, it’s Saturday and I am back from IC. I went up Tuesday afternoon and had planned to come home on Sunday but ran out of parts; and I had forgotten to bring up a propane canister for my torch so I couldn’t do any soldering.

I got to the cabin around 4:30 on Tuesday and spent the rest of the day getting settled in and planning what I was going to work on for the next couple of days.

We have always used 1/2” plastic nipples to connect the black 3/4” poly-pipe waterlines together and as connections to valves, etc. We never needed any clamps in the past so I was unprepared when we turned the water on last week and had leaks at many of the joints. As it turns out the last batch of pipe I bought is just slightly larger than the older stuff. I only had a few clamps with me at that time so we tried stopping the leaks as best we could.

I brought a bunch of clamps with me this time so Tuesday evening after it cooled down a bit I tried fixing all the leaks in the water system. Well, the standard hose clamps that I had aren’t up to the job. Buy the time I could get them tight enough to slow the leaks down the clamps strip or just won’t get tight enough.

Wednesday morning I carried the new drum for the camp spring up the hill to a spot just below the spring.

I dug a trench and lade the barrel in the trench. Then I made all the connections to the barrel and when I was done I camouflaged it.

After setting the “tank”, I consolidated the valves on the system into two groups; one down at the camp

that takes care of the Main (top), the dining hall (left), Dave’s camp and the wash house and central hose bib (bottom).

And one group about halfway up the hill.

This set covers the cabin spring on the right with a valve and a check valve because the camp spring tank is a little higher up the hill than the cabin spring tank. The line to the cabin is on the bottom. To the left is a valve to separate the two tanks. I still need a valve to shut down the line coming from the camp spring.

I also worked on the overflow for the cabin spring tank.

Thursday, I started assembling the mixing valve for the shower. That is when I realized that I didn’t have any propane for the torch. I went ahead and cut all the pipe I needed and assembled everything that I could without soldering.

Next, I set about installing the new Farmer style sink in front of the Bath house.

I had the same problem doing the plumbing for the sink as the mixing valve (no torch) so I did what I could.

Friday was pretty warm so I took it easy for most of the day. In the evening when it cooled down I started digging the ditch for the drain to the sink at the dining hall. The ground here has been bull-dosed so many times that it is almost down to bed rock so digging a ditch can be pretty rough. I scratched the ditch for its full length but couldn’t get it very deep. I ran water through the ditch for a while to soften the dirt a little and let it set all night.

This morning I took another stab at the ditch but was only able to get it dug about half way across the flat. I’ll get it dug eventually Maybe next week.

Okay that’s it for now…