Warren
dug the trench for the water line with a backhoe, hitting
the gas line (which wasn't marked properly) in the process.
For a couple of hours gas filled the neighborhood right
under the neighbor's tree. Lots of excitement with fire
trucks and everybody in the world watching while the
gas man searched for the turnoff. Warren installed the
waterline, ran another gasline, had a plumber make the
connections and backfilled the 4' deep, 3' wide, 120'
long trench.
The
neighbors complained that the trench edge was about
3" (yes, that is three inches) on their property
line. The City made us re-install the gas and water
lines. This time Warren used a large trencher to dig
a 6" wide, 3.5' deep trench and disconnected the
gas line before digging. We then dug the trench in the
back to bury the phone line, cable and electric line.
We hired an
electrician who told us he was licensed, even giving
us a license number, but asked us to pull the permit
(always a red flag). When Warren went down to pull the
permit we discovered the electrician wasn't licensed.
The City had kicked him off the job before Warren got
home. About 80% of the job was done. We got close to
$800 in materials and labor free. The City gave us the
name of a licensed electrician who finished the job
for about $250. This isn’t the best way to save
money, but if you have a strong contract you can be
protected against people who lie to you. I called this
electrician offering to pay for the equipment. He hung
up on me.
We saved about
$300 when the mason told us he couldn't show for three
weeks, getting another mason within two days. There
was a scary moment when one of the mason's crew of perhaps
12 guys started swinging a large tool at our barking
dog.
