Thank god.When I run across things like this, I wonder. I mean, whose fault is it that the framing has been hacked down to something the size of a furring strip?
Quick....you blamed the plumber, didn't you? But is it his fault? I mean, the tub and toilet have to go where they have to go, don't they? That's what it says on the plans, right?
Okay, maybe it's the carpenter's fault, for not taking the time to locate all of the plumbing locations BEFORE he laid out the joists. It's not tough, with a little forethought, to shift your layout a little bit, to accomodate things like traps, & drain pipes. Then, as now, few carpenters bother, and just figure "Oh well, I'll fix it when I have to."
The plumber doesn't care too much, one way or another. He'll just get out his sawzall (or, 60 years ago, his handsaw & rigging hatchet) and MAKE the pipes fit. Ouch.
So, the carpenter takes a little beating here, but look at the joist pockets in the brick. the carpenter didn't put them there, the mason did. He didn't give a rat's ass where the plumbing was going to go. He was hired to get the walls up......quickly. And who told him (or didn't tell him) what was going where? The contractor, that's who.
In my world, that's ME. I can bitch and moan all I want about subs or trades that don't care, but, in the end, they are doing what I tell them (or don't tell them) to do. The mason? He'd be happy to put joist pockets wherever I want them........if I tell him. The carpenter? He'll put the joists wherever there are pockets to put them in.........if they are there. The plumber? He loves it when he goes to install his drains and finds.....miracle of miracles.....space for his pipes!
There were builders who didn't care 60 years ago, and there were builders who did. The same is true today. So, when people say "They don't build 'em like they used to anymore", that can either be praise for the old, or praise for the new..........depends on who "they" was!
1 comment:
I will never forget the day I came home to have you tell me that you would have to remove ALL the bathrooms in the Jenifer Street house because the floor simply couldn't take any more holes... there has never been a sinking feeling like walking into that house and looking up through all three floors to the underside of the roof, where there used to be bathrooms neatly stacked. But i also remember the thrill of when you found the penny left there over the door jamb by that original carpenter. I have actually been by the house, and it's holding up well - the new owners have been taking good care of it. That house was built almost a century ago, and I have no doubt that, urban renewal permitting, it will be standing there a century hence. They may not have plumbed a bathroom very well back then, but it was after all, pretty new technology ;-)
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