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Man vs. bulkhead.
Yesterday I discovered that my return line was leaking. It took about eight hours to figure out how to remove the bulkhead using lots of help from my husband and nearly all my power-tools. I thought I would share the things I learnt that may save someone else time.
1. You need access to your bulkheads. So obvious when you are dealing with a leaking bulkhead but it never crossed my mind before. I basically had no way to tighten or remove the bulkheads. When the tank was installed on a custom stand the bulkheads were put on the tank first, and holes in the stand were cut just larger than the pipes.
The final solution we went for was using a 2" hole cutting bit and a screw driver. It now looks like I have a cloud cutout under the stand but I have access. It was compact enough to get inside the stand and could be controlled carefully without hitting the glass. The side effect is wet sawdust everywhere but what are you going to do?
2. Don't assume your overflow is water tight. After draining the overflow we kept getting drips while trying to remove the bulkhead. It took a while for me to catch on that the overflow had a leak because all my effort was on getting the bulkhead off. This went on for some time. After cleaning all the muck out and whipping it dry I could see the leak. I almost went to bed before this realization as I was exhausted and running out of ideas, which could have been costly.
3. When the bulkhead just won't budge... I couldn't tighten or loosen the bulkhead. The flat edges of the bulkhead were destroyed from trying. We tried a dremel to cut off the nut but it was impossible not to hit the glass. Finally I read that someone else tried a soldering iron to melt through. It worked like a charm. It took four cuts and a screw driver to pry the nut off the bulkhead but it was a glorious moment after midnight. Angels singing and all that jazz.
So there you go. Add a soldering iron to your emergency tank kit.
Yesterday I discovered that my return line was leaking. It took about eight hours to figure out how to remove the bulkhead using lots of help from my husband and nearly all my power-tools. I thought I would share the things I learnt that may save someone else time.
1. You need access to your bulkheads. So obvious when you are dealing with a leaking bulkhead but it never crossed my mind before. I basically had no way to tighten or remove the bulkheads. When the tank was installed on a custom stand the bulkheads were put on the tank first, and holes in the stand were cut just larger than the pipes.
The final solution we went for was using a 2" hole cutting bit and a screw driver. It now looks like I have a cloud cutout under the stand but I have access. It was compact enough to get inside the stand and could be controlled carefully without hitting the glass. The side effect is wet sawdust everywhere but what are you going to do?
2. Don't assume your overflow is water tight. After draining the overflow we kept getting drips while trying to remove the bulkhead. It took a while for me to catch on that the overflow had a leak because all my effort was on getting the bulkhead off. This went on for some time. After cleaning all the muck out and whipping it dry I could see the leak. I almost went to bed before this realization as I was exhausted and running out of ideas, which could have been costly.
3. When the bulkhead just won't budge... I couldn't tighten or loosen the bulkhead. The flat edges of the bulkhead were destroyed from trying. We tried a dremel to cut off the nut but it was impossible not to hit the glass. Finally I read that someone else tried a soldering iron to melt through. It worked like a charm. It took four cuts and a screw driver to pry the nut off the bulkhead but it was a glorious moment after midnight. Angels singing and all that jazz.
So there you go. Add a soldering iron to your emergency tank kit.
