Boooooring

There's no way around it: What we're doing this week is just super tedious. If it's boring to us, it must be coma-inducing to anyone reading this. So I'll keep it short. Between Tuesday and Wednesday, we:

--ran pex between the heat exchanger and the incoming line from the outdoor boiler


--put up some studs on the second wall for mounting the pumps and manifolds


--ran copper around the corner


--put stub-outs in the mixing valve and connected it to the copper coming around the corner
--put up the plywood panels that will hold the pumps and manifolds
--put the pumps in and put on fittings downstream from them




John is getting a lot better at sweating copper, but we ran into trouble at the end of last night when he was trying to solder a very large brass fitting onto a copper pipe. It's tricky. We'll have to get some tips on that; the solder isn't behaving as it should and we end up with a bad seal. How do we test it? By blowing in one end and pouring water over the joint, then watching for bubbles.

Random details:

--bowls of water with damp rags for cooling stuff off and wiping extra solder
--John burned his wrist
--I work in a basement and now we spend our evenings in the basement too
--getting better at the copper-cutting tool
--I continue to have trouble with the concepts of right and left when it comes to circular motion

- Erika