A simple tube patch job took me 6 hours yesterday

I was working on a boiler in an old building downtown and a 2 inch tube had a tiny pinhole leak. I thought I'd knock it out in 30 minutes but the tube was so rusted in place I had to cut it out and weld a new section in. Has anyone else had a small fix turn into a full day project?

3 comments

3 Comments

anthony_campbell8829d ago

Question whether it was really a six hour job or if you were just messing around half the time. I've seen guys say something took forever when really they spent two hours on their phone looking up YouTube videos. A pinhole leak on a two inch tube with rust? That's annoying but not six hours annoying unless you didn't have the right tools from the start. Did you even try penetrating oil before cutting? Seems like you might've gone straight for the welder without the easy steps first.

val_williams29d ago

I had a VERY similar job last fall on an old galvanized line where the rust had built up so bad that it basically turned into what looked like solid metal. I swear I spent the FIRST two hours just trying to get penetrating oil to soak in, and it still felt like I was fighting it every step of the way. What finally worked for me was switching to a little propane torch to heat the area first, then hitting it with the oil while it was still warm, that loosened it up enough to get the line apart without needing a welder at all. So I get what you're saying about skipping steps, but sometimes that rust is just so caked on that even the "easy" stuff takes forever to do right.

smith.anna29d ago

Yeah heat and oil is the only real shortcut with rust that bad.