Less of a bodge job than a coming of age ritual...
Bought our first house earlier this year - Victorian terrace. Needed a whole load of work doing, including getting a radiator moved and a bunch of dead pipe taken out from under the floors.

The plumbers came and went - all good. Mrs. H went off on a Saturday to catch up with a mate leaving me to sort everything out after them.

I was in the middle of replacing the floorboards when I put a nail right through the brand new radiator spur I'd just had installed.

There are 2 lessons in this:

1 - Do not do it.
2 - If you're stupid enough to do it, then leave the nail where it is until you have taken the pressure off your heating system.

I failed on both counts, put the nail through the pipe, and as soon as I heard the water hissing I yanked the nail out, thereby breaking the partial seal it had created and causing the entire pressure of the central heating system to discharge over me, the walls and ceiling.

So I then - completely unnecessarily as it happens, turned off the water at the main and drained off every drop of water from the whole house. An overreaction yeah, but I wasn't thinking most clearly at the time.

I then did what any calm and rational man does in such a circumstance - started wandering up and down the street swearing profusely under my breath, wondering what the bloody hell I was going to do and how I was going to explain to the missus that we had no water and would need to call out a plumber to sort this schoolboy bloody error of mine out. Thinking as a minimum a weekend callout and replace the entire length of pipe... Expense... Fear...

When suddenly...

I passed a van marked "JBW Building Services" (www.jbwbuildingservices.co.uk - I carry their card to this day). In hope against hope I rang the number on the side of the van. Heard the answering voice in my phone, and also in my free ear coming from round the side of the house the van was next to. Not daring to think that there might be a way out of my stupidity, I located the guy in the yard. Turns out he was just in the neighbourhood doing a bit of work for his ex. I explained my predicament and threw myself at his mercy.

Half an hour later he's round at my house. Rather than replace the length of pipe he cut a small length of slightly wider pipe, removed the section where my nail had buckled the original pipe, and soldered a very neat little cuff over the site of the damage. Everything then refilled, up to pressure, good as new.

I had to physically press a tenner on him for this service - he'd happily have walked out of the door with nothing.

By the time the missus got home, I had everything cleaned up and dried off, the boards back in place, and no evidence whatsoever of my complete idiocy. It would have been the perfect crime, but I 'fessed up, purely because I just had to tell someone!

John - you don't strike me as a b3ta person, but if you are and you read this, then know that you are a god among men.
( barryheadwound Mul-ti-pass? Multipass!, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 16:18, 8 replies)

That's the sort of person that restores your faith in humanity
Well played John!
( LemonEntryMyDearWatson This time, Moriarty, the hand is on the other foot, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 16:23, closed)

that was bloody lucky!
if you ever see John out and about buy him a pint, he deserves it.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 16:27, closed)

Bloody right!
Whoops accidentally clicked I like this rather than reply...
( barryheadwound Mul-ti-pass? Multipass!, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 16:30, closed)

Fernox
Probably worth putting some corrosion inhibitor in the system since you'll have drained it all out...
(potato123, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 16:55, closed)

People like that rule.
Good work that plumber.
( Fathter Puddytat Kill Kill dat widdle boid is mine on, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 17:01, closed)

Sounds like a good bloke.
I have noticed that the people who are good at their trade seem also to have to help those in need. Give a good [wo]man* a challenge and [s]he'll rise to it.
(Me, I'm not... in any way intoxicated, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 17:36, closed)

Hmmm...
Recommended Manchester area builder, eh?
*notes*
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 17:47, closed)

Click for John
It is always satisfying to meet good people and good tradesmen.
( number5 has been fighting tramps and losing., Thu 10 Mar 2011, 17:53, closed)