Plumbing - The Start of Serious Renovations

Plumbers, Day 1

4 October

Armando's bid came in at MX $12,000 with a prediction of two weeks to completion. The other plumber never got back to us, so lucky Armando and crew won the SolCasa plumbing project. "They" tell us to always add 20% to estimates, and there's no telling what to expect as far as estimated completion date. We also have tacked a few more little projects onto the original list, so we won't be surprised when the bill comes in significantly higher. We paid MX $7,000 up-front to get them started on materials, and we've asked for heavy-duty sewer lines.

The line straight
down to the septic tank (the cockroach hole)

Stan's Spanish is getting so good, we were able to personally coordinate the hookup to city sewer with CAPDAM (we think). It took three trips, one to the main office in Salagua for a letter, and two to the Santiago office, one to deliver the letter and another to verify coordination with the work crews. On our crew's first day of work the CAPDAM truck cruised by and Armando discussed the project with them, so we're assuming the connection to city is actively in everyone's schedule.

On paper the project didn't look half as involved, nor as dirty, as in actual fact. The list of tasks for simply decommissioning the septic tank, connecting to city sewer, and roughing in the kitchen, laundry and bathroom, was fairly long and involved:

• Dig up, disconnect and decommission septic tank;
• Break up the elevated portions of concrete over existing lines and finish at floor level;
• Install sewer lines to the street;
• Install sewer inspection/clean out ports;
• Install all fittings at the curb required by CAPDAM for city connection;
• Rough-in kitchen plumbing;
• Rough-in bathroom and laundry plumbing;
• Rough-in electrical connections for kitchen, bath and laundry;
• Close up and cement the floor at a level with the main floor;

Plan of the original plumbing

Plan for the new plumbing

Our plumbing plan feels a bit awkward, but we're willing to live with it because it simplifies ditch digging. I had wanted a bathroom shared by the two guest bedrooms, but that would have entailed running new water and sewer lines. Disapproved! We've got enough mess going just digging up the existing lines and lowering them, and running a new line out to the street. Therefore the guest bathroom and the laundry room will share space with a dining area ... a little awkward, but we'll make it work.

Plumbers, Days 2 thru 8

Gale surveying the filled in septic hole

The first day the septic tank connection was dug up. On day two, the opening was cemented up and the hole filled back in. That's all there was to it, poof! one septic tank decommissioned. In the process, two bathrooms are now out of commission, too; we're using the septic tank in the back yard and the yucky bathroom until city sewer hook-up.

Trench from house to curb
inside the side retaining wall

Curb-side parking

CAPDAM requires an inspection port and special connections at curbside, which required punching a hole through the house and through the front retaining wall, digging up both sidewalks, and building a little well to house the fittings. Except for the inspection well, most work this first week has been demolition, inside and out. It's been impossible to clean, and equally impossible to keep the kitties clean.

The wrecking crew, Juan, Stan and Rafa
- the güero in the center fits right in

The plumbing in the original kitchen ran underneath a raised floor. Juan whacked it, only to discover that the plumbing was laid after the original-original floor was laid. There was still a layer of concrete between Juan and where he wanted to lay the new plumbing, a foot lower.

Juan and Rafa and Stan get to chatting and maybe some work gets done, but maybe less work and more chatting. That's okay with us, having no schedule and enjoying the language and culture lessons as much as the work. Besides, they're paid by the job (by us) and not the hour.

Juan revealed that he receives MX$1600/week for the plumbing work he does. He's 32 and has a wife and two boys to feed, one of them's a teenager. He's also considering a job opportunity in Canada.... Rafa is more experienced and tackles the more technical labor, soldering the copper tubing and cutting and fitting the sewer pipes. He's got three boys and would never consider going so far away as Canada for work.

None of the three workers on this job is a native of Manzanillo, and they don't seem to particularly like the city. When asked why they live here, they all say that it's because there's lots of work for them here. And there is, Manzanillo is booming.

Even with many breaks for snacks, water, lunch and beer at the end of the day, thanks to the benevolent gringo who loves to chat, progress has been made. By about Day 8, the plumbing for the washer (left to right), bathroom sink, toilet and shower have all been installed. The week ended with Rafa cutting and braising away at copper tubing, making all of the different connections and shut-offs to carry water to the kitchen, guest bath, laundry and master bath. This will include connections to our existing 2-gallon water heater and a new one that we'll purchase sometime in the future that will serve the kitchen and new shower.

Roughed-in sewer lines

10 October

Plumbers, Days 9 thru 12

Sewer line buried where new kitchen will be

Juan mixing cement in the street

Starting out on this job, Juan's favorite saying was, "Oyé, amigo, ¿qué pasa?" As the days rolled on, Juan, Rafa and Stan worked together and shared languages. Now, Juan's favorite saying is, "Okie dokie." He swears he got it from Stan, and Stan swears he doesn't say it that often.

The sewer line in the front room, the new kitchen, was finished, so they filled it back in with dirt and cement, up to the point where Rafa still needed to fabricate and install water lines. The street was full of sand, run-off from recent downpours. It was like having home delivery for Juan as he measured sand from the street and mixed it with bagged cement. After cement mixing, Juan transferred the goop from street to wheelbarrow, then drove it inside to slop into the trench, spread and smooth.

Stack through ceiling

They vented the sewer system up through an existing hole in the roof, which had been a stove vent. Unfortunately, the night after they installed it, it poured buckets ... and that's what came through the unfinished hole, buckets and buckets. Thunder had already bounced us out of bed to unplug antennas and computers, so we had our wits about us when the waterfall started and it was time to scramble for catchments.

The plan for the shower end of the new bathroom is to install a false wall to hide the stack and shower plumbing. That will be another contract, another day.

Rafa and sewer connectors

On about the tenth morning of work, Armando and Stan made the CAPDAM rounds one more time. We'd already hit them three times, and they'd driven by the house and talked to the boys (all of whom worked for CAPDAM at one time or another), twice, but now it was time to pay and receive our permit ... back to the main office in Salagua, then over to the branch office in Santiago. In less than an hour we had our permit and Rafa went to work cutting into the city's line.

Rafa tying our sewer pipe into the main line

The line was bone dry, nobody above us on Calle Dos has hooked in, yet. Gee, a sewer line all to ourselves.

And patching up the street

Then they started putting the street and our outer wall back together. While they had a trench dug up, we had them run the roof gutter to a downspout and out to the street through a hole in the wall (top drain in picture, but then they chopped it off so it appears much less intrusive). It'll dump on the sidewalk, much better than draining down the side of the house.

Rafa putting finishing touches on sidewalk

18 October

Plumbers, Day 13 to fin

Rafa installing the downspout drain

When it rained, what passed for downspouts on the roof used to dump straight down the outside wall. Stan figured that a downspout could be installed in the same trench as the sewer line, since the boys had it all nice and dug up, anyway. So they attached a drain pipe to the hole in the roof, ran it down the side of the house into the trench, L-ed it and ran it out to the street, cutting yet another hole in the retaining wall. Great system, if only the wavey roof would cooperate and drain that-a-way. Unfortunately, lakes form in low spots in every other part of the roof.

Downspout drain in the retaining wall and
sewer access cover in the sidewalk, streetside

When it rains three inches a day, however, the new drain works wonders for funneling off the overflow, which means it's neither running down the outside wall nor splashing up from the ground, soaking the wall. The water sprays on the impervious sidewalk, keeping that little portion nice and clean, and then wanders down the street to the storm drain.

Juan and Rafa mixing concrete

And speaking of sidewalk, it's all rebuilt and pretty, again. Juan and Rafa used two planks for forms and reshaped the new little step by hand. Pretty nifty, and about as low-tech as you can go - not unlike their water delivery system, which sure beat carrying buckets.

New laundry
and guest bath all plumbed and sealed back up

Finishing up the concrete work, inside and out ...

Concrete and
cobblestones finished off the street trench

Cleaning up after knocking down

Finally, my chance to get in there and clean up the mess. And boy was it dusty! Stan and I were hacking for days, the kitties were gritty and left gray pawprints everywhere they weren't s'posed to be, tables, counters, clean clothes....

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