No leaks now

On New Year’s Day I was unfortunate to find that I had a water leak behind the floor cabinet in the corner of my kitchen. This was doubly unfortunate because as well as being an unpleasant start to the new year, this cabinet was the first one that I had fitted, so you could call it the principal cabinet, and initially I thought that access to the source of the link would be impossible without ripping all of my kitchen cabinets out again.

And the leak also came at a bad time for me personally, just before the end of my eight months of chemotherapy treatment, so I was at a very low ebb physically and mentally. As a result since then I’ve limped along on a daily basis managing the leak by mopping it up when I had to, catching what I could with a container and turning the water off overnight and whenever I left the house.

But even the latter became ineffective because the stop-cock controlling the water supply was very old and eventually let enough water by even when in the ‘off’ position to allow the leak to continue.

So things had to be brought to a head and this started a month or so ago when I at last had the physical and mental determination to tackle the problem head-on. I started by cutting a section out of the back of the cabinet to get a better idea of what was going on and found that the source of the leak was a pressure reduction valve that I knew was there and had thought about renewing at the time I began fitting the kitchen but didn’t, so more fool me.

I tried to take it apart ‘in situ’ but couldn’t, but in doing so managed to slow the leak down a bit. However, this was nowhere near enough and it became obvious that I would have to take the bull by the horns and do whatever was necessary to deal with the problem once and for all. So a couple of weeks ago I enlarged the cut-out in the back of the cabinet so I could clearly see what was going to be involved.

And what I found came as a pleasant surprise. With better access I could see that with care, I could replace both the stop-cock and the pressure reducing valve without having to move the cabinet at all, so with that in mind, I researched and ordered a modern replacement pressure reducer (much smaller and neater) of the required size on line.

It arrived a day or so ago so yesterday I popped down to les Briconautes in Montignac to purchase all of the other fittings and other items that I would need and today I did the job. But with all of the usual problems.

The pipework in which the old valve was fitted is 16mm in diameter so that was the size of the fittings that I bought. I wanted a ball valve rather than a stop cock because all of the latter that I’ve bought while in France have been of appalling quality and have failed early, whereas my experience with ball valves has been better.

I wanted the type with a handle with ears but of course, that being the most popular, it was naturally out of stock, so I had to make do with the type with the longer lever handle. And I also picked up a short length of 16mm diameter copper tube. Or so I thought.

Unfortunately, I didn’t check closely enough and it was only when I had cut a short length to finish the installation off that I realised that what I’d actually picked up was 18mm. So back I went to Montignac having had to wait until les Briconautes reopened after their lunch break and what did I find? 16mm diameter copper tube is the most widely used for general plumbing purposes so, of course, yet again they were out of stock and had none at all on the premises.

So that left me with just one choice – to drive all the way to Brico Depot in Trellissac, the UK owned store (same owners as B & Q) who rarely go out of stock of anything and on whom you can usually rely to have just what you need on their shelves. And this was the case, of course, with 16mm diameter copper tube.

So I have made a decision once and for all, to stop trying to source ANY items locally that I need for jobs in my house and garden. It’s always the same – I always end up going to Trellissac/Périgueux anyway and like today, spending more time driving backwards and forwards than actually doing the work. So that’s it, for the last time.

The job itself turned out to be much simpler than I had ever anticipated and was soon done, as the following shot shows. So at last I’m without a leak in my kitchen.

All I have to do now is cut and paint a plywood panel to cover the hole in the back of the cabinet. If I cut a slot in it to slip over the handle of the ball valve, it will be held in place by the cabinet shelf and there will then always be an access panel should it ever be needed again. And what a relief it will be to get all of the stuff back into the cabinet that has been standing for months on my kitchen table and at various other locations, in my spare bedroom and elsewhere.

I’ll sleep a little easier tonight 😉