whistle Posted February 22, 2004 Posted February 22, 2004 Many years ago when installing a system into a rather large nice house it was aboust 15:30 and the job was going good when i started drilling in the hall up behind the victorian coving for the passive in the hall. My mate was on the landing with the boards up waiting. Drilling and Drilling nothing only a metal noise, i shouts up see anything or any pipes NO, so i carry on drilling. Then you see it the spiral of waet down the meter bit. I ran up stairs checked to find we had drilled up in the airing cupboard and into the bottom of a 57 gallon hot water tank. Well 2 hours latter water is still running through the roof all over the place where the halogen lights are fitted. All ended well the plumber came spent ages fixing the tank qand the roof never fell in, the customer was ok after a few hours the calm down.
Steve K Posted February 22, 2004 Posted February 22, 2004 I can relate to this all too well Whistle! A similar thing happened to me almost exactly 12 months ago. Drilling the wall for the sounder from the outside inwards. I had measured and double measured everything, and off I went! Managed to drill through the joints in the old granite boulders that this cottage was built out of, and then through into the cavity. Felt the cavity, into the inner skin, everything fine, bit of a gap, yep, thats the dry lining and plaster board. Keep on going - a little further and great - we're through. Went inside to the other side of the wall, opened the built in wardrobe door, and instantly my specs steamed up! Thought that was odd! It didn't happen 5 minutes previously. Oh dear! Found my 1 metre drill bit in the back of the hot water cylinder - the dry lining gap was not that, but the small gap between the wall and the cylinder! Why does it always happen at the end of a day? 4.30pm! In the middle of Cornwall, no local plumber available! Managed to plug the hole with a drill bit wrapped in tape, and two hours later father and son arrive to repair the hole! It was only the consumer unit immediately below the leak downstairs! Sweaty palms for an hour or two! Customer was brilliant - we often joke about it now! I still blame the plumber for putting the cylinder in the wrong place! Steve Kendall Plymstock Security Systems CCTV, Intruder Alarms, Security Lighting & Access Control Covering Plymouth, Plymstock, Plympton, South Devon and South East Cornwall
Guest Samholland Posted February 22, 2004 Posted February 22, 2004 After instructing my apprentice to get the 500 wartt flood light pod out of the Van ready for the false roof bit. He'd Plugged it in FACE down ,switched On and gone to set up the ladders,, I could sort of smell what i thought was burning rice which it was around lunch time. The smell got more and more intense. As i went on to the landing upstairs to check,,,guess where the smell was really coming from..You guessed it The floodlight had burned thru the carpet and underlay leaving a perfect square.. The carpet was a one piece hall stairs and landing job, so we ended up owing the customer money that day....We were told by our boss that this young lad was a real bright lad when being interviewed, how true this was !!!!
Guest Adrian Posted February 23, 2004 Posted February 23, 2004 B) I drilled a RAD pipe once did all the checks looked up down left & right, the closest rad was nearly 5 meters away (on the same wall) was going into the next room to put a passive up. started to drill (on hammer) when water shot up the drill bit and all over my face. As normal the customer had gone out 30 seconds after we arrived and wasnt back for hours. When she did turn up she was greeted by the plumbers van blocking her drive. the plumber had to open up the wall to do his repair. destroying her lovely felt wall paper, and me and my mate where doing everything possible to mop up the new carpet (only a month old) The look on her face was pure maddness. As she had only just spent the best part of 3 grand on getting the room redecorated after an electrical company had drilled into another pipe in the ceiling above. I think she got free services for life after that. Adrian B)
davidhodgkinson Posted February 27, 2004 Posted February 27, 2004 Someting similar... After installling a system and about to leave we notice a floorboard loose near to one we disturbed. As a matter of "pride" one of our lad's decided to screw it back down without checking what was below, stright through a waterpipe. After an hour of earache the customer eventually calmed down. luckily a local plumber helped! www.randall-hodgkinson.co.uk
bellman Posted February 28, 2004 Posted February 28, 2004 many years ago... A recently qualified engineer called Chris drilled through a high presure central heating pipe in a house that was fed by a community boiler with a 25mm auger bit. virtually sliced the pipe in half did the usual pipe check routine first as several other engineers do, close by radiators and the like... the force of the boiling water coming out of the hole tore the 24 volt Bosch drill i was using out of my hands and made a nice "fountain" effect on the landing. worse luck, the house had concrete floors downstairs so all this very hot water just built up on top of the ground floor shrinking the carpets in the process , the hot water also pulled the wallpaper off in the lounge (wish i could strip a room of wallpaper so fast!!!). it took the council nearly 2 hours to shut the boiler off and by this time you could have canoed down the hallway. customer was less than impressed i can tell you.... that day's valuble lessons, 1, don't assume upstairs and downstairs walls are inline with each other. 2, check twice, drill once Regards Bellman Service Engineer and all round nice bloke ) The views above are mine and NOT those of my employer.
Guest TONIC Posted March 20, 2004 Posted March 20, 2004 on a job for bovis housing authority once apon a time,I did the enivatible did the same thing looked for local pipes rad's etc nothing not even detected anything on my stud / metel detector (you know the ones that you can pick up from b&q for pennies, anyway started to drill with a 25mm spade bit thtough a stud wall on the ground floor ready for pulling all my 8 cores through from the room behind to put into my panel then suddenley I got hit in the face with 2 bar pressure from the central heating system, not only was the water pissing in,but the owners who just bought this house had their 2 year old running around the wet floor with nothing on but a nappyI saw from the corner of my eye a double socket by the skirting board eater streaming down the wall around this socket, I quickly grabbed this tot lifted him in to the lounge ran for the fuse board and shut down the main switch,luckly no-one was hurt . checks out the plumber had placed this pipe illigaly into the wall (crossing planes) if you need the correct term and had used 10mm PLASTIC pipe (quite common these days) so no tester on earth would have picked that up! SO BEWARE! I had no change from £3000 claimed from my insurance later re-funded by the plumbing firm Turns out the firm had used an unquilified fitter!
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