The Gas Line Saga

So our new house has a gas stove, gas heater, and a gas water heater as well.

None of the gas line was properly installed. In case you're unaware, when you screw pipes together you gotta put some teflon tape on the threads in order to seal the joints. For water lines, you use the thin white teflon tape.

But for gas lines, you must use the thicker yellow teflon tape. Something about the density of the white tape means it can hold in water pretty well, but not natural gas.

One guess which kind of tape is on every gas pipe joint in the whole house. There's almost 2 dozen joints thanks to all the corners, bends, and shutoff valves.

I really need to find out who the inspector was that didn't mention this fact in their inspection report, so I can make sure they never inspect a house again.

We found one gas leak already, behind the stove. I had to pull that heavy thing out of there, sweep and mop the floor because apparently they never cleaned since whenever the house was infested with mice (Literally 2 pounds of mouse poop found so far, I weighed it) and then remove the old flexible gas hookup hose. And the old flare fittings. Well, one of them anyway. the other one was completely rusted on thanks to what I can only assume is gallons of mouse urine. I would have tried to remove it anyway using various means and methods, but it is recessed behind a cabinet. So if I want to replace the flare fitting one day or if it starts leaking, I'll have to rip this entire cabinet off the wall to do it.

A homeowner's work is never done, it seems.

I got the fitting on the stove replaced, as well as sealed with the correct yellow PTFE tape and "pipe dope" which is a sealant impregnated with PTFE bits or something. Tested all my own joints with soapy water and found no leaks first try. Go me!

Now I'm worried about mice getting in again, since apparently they were in here living pretty high on the hog before, so my next task will be looking for and closing up mouse ingress points, probably with steel wool and expanding foam. Hopefully none of the old knob-and-tube wiring inside the walls is still energized, I would hate to stuff a piece of steel wool in to a crevice and have it burst in to flames or electrocute me.

More fixit stories to come, I'm sure.