lots of work

[Ivel]

I am trying to help remodle a basement. This house has many plumbing problems. The owner cant afford to hire a plumber. I know some basics and am trying to help her out.

1) Water Pressure. There is no water pressure to anything in the home. why is this, and what needs to be done to fix it?

2) When the water is turned on in the home, hot water constanly runs out the faucet in the bath tub. How do I fix that?

3.) The main level toilet wont really flush. I took of the lid to the tank, there was not a lot of water in the tank, and it takes it a very long long time for the tank to fill up. There is no pressure to the flush.

4.) the valve coming into the home for the water supply, contantly drips water when its turned on.

Please help.

[leejosepho]

I am trying to help remodle a basement. This house has many plumbing problems. The owner cant afford to hire a plumber ...

With all the plumbing troubles you have described, she might have to shift her priority and hire one anyway.

I know some basics and am trying to help her out.

There might not actually be a lot you can do here.

4.) the valve coming into the home for the water supply, contantly drips water when its turned on.

1) Water Pressure. There is no water pressure to anything in the home. why is this, and what needs to be done to fix it?

The water will likely have to be turned off at the street so the stem on the valve can be re-packed, and that might be a good time to check the incoming line and valves for flow.

2) When the water is turned on in the home, hot water constanly runs out the faucet in the bath tub. How do I fix that?

Repair or replace the tub faucet.

3.) The main level toilet wont really flush. I took of the lid to the tank, there was not a lot of water in the tank, and it takes it a very long long time for the tank to fill up. There is no pressure to the flush.

For now, she might place a bucket under the dripping main valve and add it to the water in the tank before flushing.

[jadnashua]

Two things: is she on a well or municipal water supply? Are the supply pipes galvanized steel or some other type?

If it is a well, could be all sorts of things. If it is municipal water, it sounds like the pipes may be shot. This could be the supply from the street, or internal to the house, or both. Depending, that can get quite expensive. If there's no water to the house, technically, it could be condemned I think, depending on where you live.

If there's been any work done on the house, and the pipes are galvanized (or even if not), the action of turning the water on and off can dislodge a lot of rust and crud in the pipes. This can clog up valves downstream, so if you are lucky, removing them or taking off things like the aerator on a faucet and flushing things out might restore some normal operation.

As to the toilet, if you can manually fill the tank with a bucket, you can then flush it. This would be a simple test of the drain system to see if anything there is clogged. One flush may not prove much except the toilet is functioning, as depending on if and where a clog is, it could take several before it filled up the drain and slowed or stopped the flush.

[Gary Swart]

If you had a friend that was ill and "couldn't afford a doctor", would you step in and try to treat her? Of course not, but that's pretty much what you are doing if you try to fix her plumbing problems. It it pretty obvious that there are some serious and extensive problems here that require professional help. For example, the lack of pressure is probably lack of flow and that is likely caused by ancient galvanized steel pipes that are corroded nearly closed. If that is the case, then a complete repiping will be necessary.

[Redwood]

Perhaps that dripping main valve is a broken gate valve that will not open completely...

That would be a lucky fix indeed fixing 2 things at once!

In any case I would recommend having a plumber deal with that one. Those can easily go from having the water company shut off the valve and replace it, to oh-oh I'm in big trouble.