Fixing the Bathroom Sink Drain Pipes

Nothing Exciting About Leaking Pipes

I guess it's pretty obvious, not every post here at 173 can be exciting and glamorous (although I'm not sure anything here is actually glamorous!).  Some things are just mundane, gotta do - things.  This post is just such a story, after all, there's absolutely nothing exciting about bathroom pipes.  So, the other day, the bathroom sink drain sprung a leak.  Things are pretty busy at work right now, so the repair had to wait 'til today.  I know, doesn't sound like a big deal - bathroom sink out of commission, but it really messed up my morning routine.  For someone like me, who is definitively not a morning person, the morning routine is rote and it doesn't take much to mess that all up!

See the darkened floor tiles behind the sink?  Wet.  Of course we all know water is the #1 enemy of a house, so this was obviously an important job.  Besides that, experience showed me the damage water can do.  Back in December of 2011, the setting ring on the toilet finally surrendered, resulting in damage to the kitchen ceiling:

Well, earlier this year, the kitchen here at 173 was remodeled a bit, and after all that, there's no way I want to take a chance on the new ceiling getting damaged!  But, because it seems every project here at 173 ends up becoming more involved than I plan for, this one made me nervous.  The pipes are still the ones that were there when the house was bought in 1997, and I just figured something would go wrong.  But, it actually went pretty smoothly - surprise!  First I removed the pedestal, which I was worried might cause the sink to sag - or worse.

Luckily it didn't! But wait 'til you see the old pipes! Oh, as you can see in the picture above, the sink drain flange was new when I installed the new sink years ago, but look at what it drained into...ooooold pipes!

Here's a closeup...as soon as I put the wrench on the wall pipe, it pretty much crumbled:

And every coupling nut was about rusted off altogether!

What a mess!

I'm just shocked there wasn't a leak a long time ago!  The new stuff went in pretty smoothly, with only one extra trip to the hardware store for one coupling nut.  

Here it is - all new!

Hopefully, not to be seen again for a long time!