I have a 4" cast iron waste pipe coming into the basement of a property. It appears to be coated with a woven mesh material which has then been painted. I wondered if anybody had any idea as to what the material could be. I've also come across similar on a 1/2" copper water pipe . Any help gratefully received as looking to bond the pipe subject to further investigation.
We are back in lock down and my job for today has been postponed, so I should be doing other things, but I am just reminiscing for a couple of minutes.
Thirty years ago I was working as a carpenter on a small site of new houses at Malvern around this time of the year.
I had fitted the kitchen and the plumbers had connected the pipe work, but the water meter box out in the footway by the road had a blanking cap in it.
I was driving to work first thing in the morning and as I got to Malvern fire station the doors opened and two fire tenders pulled out in front of me. I dropped in behind one of the fire tenders, then after a couple of miles I started to get the feeling we were going to the same place.
As we pulled into Bluebell Close I could see a huge flame coming out of a hole in the ground, the groundworkers and the artexers were stood by the hole and one of them had a dustbin in his hands that was half filled with water, he threw this at the flame knocking it out. The fire crew pulled up and cussed him for knocking the flame out, because there was now a major gas leak, whereas it had actually been burning quite safely.
Apparently the artexers could not get any water out of the tap and seeing the water trench still open with the blue MDPE pipe exposed in the bottom of it decided that it was probably frozen, so got some empty artex bags out of the van and set fire to them thinking they would thaw the water pipe out.
Unfortunately the yellow MDPE 75 mm gas main was just under the surface and they had melted this and set fire to the gas main, which then both thawed and melted the water pipe on the mains side of the meter.
So the hole was now filling with water that had a gas leak bubbling up through it, there was a quick debate about throwing a lighted match into the hole to reignite the gas to control it, but the fire officer said no.
The groundworkers had to get the JCB and start digging a sump and trench to get the water away, then there was the magic moment when one of the groundworkers went into the hole with a roll of Denso to stem the gas leak. The water pipe was easier, being a small pipe it could be bent back on itself.
Having determined that the Denso did actually make a reasonable seal on the leaking gas main the fire brigade went back to finish their breakfast.
Bear in mind that this was thirty years ago, the final bill for the damage came to over £1K.
But I can say that in an emergency a roll of Denso tape can be very useful.
We are back in lock down and my job for today has been postponed, so I should be doing other things, but I am just reminiscing for a couple of minutes.
Thirty years ago I was working as a carpenter on a small site of new houses at Malvern around this time of the year.
I had fitted the kitchen and the plumbers had connected the pipe work, but the water meter box out in the footway by the road had a blanking cap in it.
I was driving to work first thing in the morning and as I got to Malvern fire station the doors opened and two fire tenders pulled out in front of me. I dropped in behind one of the fire tenders, then after a couple of miles I started to get the feeling we were going to the same place.
As we pulled into Bluebell Close I could see a huge flame coming out of a hole in the ground, the groundworkers and the artexers were stood by the hole and one of them had a dustbin in his hands that was half filled with water, he threw this at the flame knocking it out. The fire crew pulled up and cussed him for knocking the flame out, because there was now a major gas leak, whereas it had actually been burning quite safely.
Apparently the artexers could not get any water out of the tap and seeing the water trench still open with the blue MDPE pipe exposed in the bottom of it decided that it was probably frozen, so got some empty artex bags out of the van and set fire to them thinking they would thaw the water pipe out.
Unfortunately the yellow MDPE 75 mm gas main was just under the surface and they had melted this and set fire to the gas main, which then both thawed and melted the water pipe on the mains side of the meter.
So the hole was now filling with water that had a gas leak bubbling up through it, there was a quick debate about throwing a lighted match into the hole to reignite the gas to control it, but the fire officer said no.
The groundworkers had to get the JCB and start digging a sump and trench to get the water away, then there was the magic moment when one of the groundworkers went into the hole with a roll of Denso to stem the gas leak. The water pipe was easier, being a small pipe it could be bent back on itself.
Having determined that the Denso did actually make a reasonable seal on the leaking gas main the fire brigade went back to finish their breakfast.
Bear in mind that this was thirty years ago, the final bill for the damage came to over £1K.
But I can say that in an emergency a roll of Denso tape can be very useful.
