Drain Stack Replacement

How many hundreds do you think I should charge for this hazmat experience?

I just got these pictures by email for the job I'm sucked into doing tomorrow. $85/hour doesn't seem to be enough for this task either. That hot water rad has got to go in order to open the floor up to get to a decent piece of pipe to reconnect to. No access underneath; crawl space.

I also had a call on a Basement Watchdog, battery backup sump pump that the alarm went off. I get there, the negative lead to the battery is melted off, acid visibly boiled out of the battery sitting inside the case and the brain box is making all kinds of crazy noises when plugged in.

Worked fine till today; HD is taking the battery back but it looks like it is going to turn into a complete replacement of the system to get it working again.

Anyone have any idea on why it would melt the negative wire off at the post? The wing nut was tight....loose connection was not to blame.

price for cast experience

thats not considered a haz mat experience
unless you have to lay on your belly in the
crawl space, man handling and wresstling with
your trusty cast cutter
that you can really truely chaulk that one up as mean....



I suppose you can get onto a clean
spot above and bleow without makeing a three
day project out of it???


my guess it is worth about $700 -1150 depending on
what kind of troubles you have getting
to the decent pipe...


I had one much , much meaner a while back i
quoted for $1900 and was sort of glad or lucky
that i did not get it

it is a no-win situation. no mater what you charge
..cause the second you tie into it
the phone rings with tons of easy work you have to turn
down justt to have an old cast pipe pissing down your
arms and back all day long...
...murpheys law...






with the battery,
it would sound like the battery shorted out
or has a power surge through it ....???

I'm hoping I got something right up in that ceiling to connect to.....possibly a fitting. It's only 10 linear feet but I'm going to try for $780.

I asked the same thing about the power surge but she discounted the fact that the lights didn't flutter or reset the clocks. I think a power surge did have something to do with it.

I was a little fearful of the battery though; never had one explode but it sure did show signs that something bad was going to come out of that.

I'll follow up on the results.

Yes.......there are meaner jobs out there like you said. I try to avoid them more and more the older I get. This one though I'm committed.

you are comitted

good luck and have fun.....


On the battery, I rhad one on a Aquanot LL that did something similar two years ago....

something went bad in it and it stunk the whole house up

about caught fire...tried to get me to pay for a 4 year old battery that they never checked for water and smoke --smell damages to the home....

Every battery backup I install........the customer pays for it and brings it to the home and I install it, that way I don't own the responsibility of the product......just the guarantee the workmanship was done right at time of install.

If this lady wouldn't of removed the trickle charger and the negative lead wouldn't of disconnected.....it probably could of led to the same situation you speak of.

That smell is horrible as well and would be very difficult to remove that sulphur smell.

lazy cusotmers

what really gripes my a// sometimes....


they have great jobs, beautiful homes,
make more money than god, 5 cars in the driveway
The Wife looks like a model with all the plastic surgery ect.....



but dont have the common sense to change the
air filters in their furnaces....or even check to see if their
battery operated sump pump still works once a month or two

someone else must maintain everything for them...
( I suppose that is why everyone desires to be rich)..


5 years down the road when that Aquanot ll dont work
no more because the battery has gone bad..and smokes up the home...
they come crying to me ..

Here is an idea that others are probably doing....

perhaps I should get them to sign a warranty agreement
to where I come in every year on a specific date and
just check everything out in the home for $175.00...

just like my wife does with Chem -lawn...

pipe

I hope you are not desperate enough to try to give quote beforehand on the job. There are so many unknowns, that unless you quote about three times what you actually think it will cost, you will probably lose money.

I'm a time and material kinda guy



Here's how it went:

15 minutes and I pulled that entire 12ft section of cast iron out in one piece; busting the bell tied to the tee serving the toilet was 3 hits to pop it loose.

I ended up spending 3.75 hours total on this job and that included me going to a hardware store for an hour and between a long lunch and buying the $40 worth of materials that was needed to repair the line. Had to use my large machine off the truck for all of 3 minutes to unclog the 90 at the base of the stack. $70 for the large machine charge since I was already there.

In total I charged $605. I couldn't drag it any farther and even though I averaged almost $100/hour.........the customer was worried about going over $1000 and breathed a sigh of relief when she got the bill.

I'm sure my expertise made the job go like a snap and yes for the filth factor it should of been a $1000 job easy....but it was only 12 linear feet of pipe with only one fitting.....a cleanout I made sure went in at the base of that pipe since I know that pulling a toilet on a second floor to get to that large line is high on the difficulty level.

I can't complain though. This lady was handing me tools, rolling up my cords, holding the light, had one of those fancy ladders that extends out 10 feet that absolutely no way I could of done the top connection off a 6' ladder without serious danger between the rotting floor and the drop ceiling grids.

She helped me clean up and hosed down the patio where I broke that cast iron into sections. On top of all of this......I'm going to get a glowing Angie's List report. That's all worth it and I'm pretty sure I'll be working a great deal more at the above residence......plenty to fix.

Felt damn good to come home and take a shower.......sheesh!

on the other side of the coin

When you think about it.....

you made more on that job today than
many make in a week...

aint life grand and glorious??

It's not bad.....been a good week too. The business however could never survive on just $600 a week. Thousands spend like hundreds, hundreds spend like dollars.

And I'm graced with the luxury of spending an hour with my accountant tomorrow to finish up the necessary evil: taxes.


I can't get that effin sewer smell out of my nose though. Short of snorting comet I don't know how to get rid of the horror of today. I'm calling dr. phil hotline.