[Final update in OP]: House almost flooded, just in time...

[RearAdmiral]

Update 11/30/16:

We wrapped up putting everything back together over the weekend. My contractor took a while to get into the house to fix things up. I'd rather wait for my good contractor. When they were in the ceiling we had a look at why the previous owners had such a dumb setup for the tub drain(bread pan collecting drips). There was also a small piece of plywood that he figured the water would run down and then into the bread pan...lol. So the tub turned out to have a fairly bogus area for a seal to mount. There should be a flat area maybe 1/2" around the drain hole for the gasket to seal properly. Well my drain's flat area tapered off at one end to almost nothing, which caused the leak. The guy installed a very thick gasket then which seemed to stop the drip.

Anyhow more drywall was cut out, paint peeled back and everything repaired. I then went and bought more paint / primer from Lowe's which of course didn't match in color or finish. I have flat ceiling / walls since it is my living room / theater. The new paint looked more eggshell. I then went and bought some Benjamin Moore paint, the guy at the store just had me get Ultra Spec 500 since they didn't have tintable ceiling paint(508) on hand. I was a touch worried but the paint turned out great. It dried a little fast but turned out just fine, very thick and nice to work with. Just had to repaint the entire ceiling which is huge but I had family help. Everything is a-okay and look great again!


OP:

Wow so I finally have a minute here. Man what a crappy situation but could have been way worse. Basically our upstairs toilet supply line exploded 5 minutes after I got home from work, which I left early. We also just got back from vacation a few days ago.

After a minute or two of the water spraying everywhere we finally realized what was happening and shut the water off and soaked stuff up with towels. About 15 minutes later the water broke through the ceiling of the first floor on to our stairs and living room floor, all hardwood. I had a big old bucket and tons of towels running all over the place.

Servpro mitigation is on their way now at the recommendation of Nationwide. They want to make sure no mold sprouts up.

The damage isn't huge, but we will need a substantial amount of the ceiling replaced. We just painted the hallway portion too.

What a bummer but wow only 2 minutes or so of water flow....I am thankful it didn't happen on vacation or when we were at work. House would have been toast!

 

[boomerang]

I had a friend that was out of town for a week on vacation. He turns onto his street on his return and notices that there is water flowing in the gutter. He wonders what that is all about. As he gets closer to his house there is more and more water flowing. He pulls into his driveway to realize that it is coming from his house. A pipe had burst which flooded the house and it was running out across the lawn into the street. The house was built on a slab so no basement to fill up but he said the drywall was soaked three feet high where it wicked up.

My wife walked into our half bath many years ago and cried out that there was water all over the floor. The nut on the supply line at the toilet had spontaneously split. It was some type of plastic. Fortunately we found it early enough that there was no real damage but the water was about to crest the low threshold at the entrance to the bathroom.

 

[RearAdmiral]

I had a friend that was out of town for a week on vacation. He turns onto his street on his return and notices that there is water flowing in the gutter. He wonders what that is all about. As he gets closer to his house there is more and more water flowing. He pulls into his driveway to realize that it is coming from his house. A pipe had burst which flooded the house and it was running out across the lawn into the street. The house was built on a slab so no basement to fill up but he said the drywall was soaked three feet high where it wicked up.

My wife walked into our half bath many years ago and cried out that there was water all over the floor. The nut on the supply line at the toilet had spontaneously split. It was some type of plastic. Fortunately we found it early enough that there was no real damage but the water was about to crest the low threshold at the entrance to the bathroom.

Sheesh that is nuts. The water mitigation folks were around our house until 1am or so, then I got to wake up at 530 to head to work today. I'll probably take a half day though. I'm mostly irritated I didn't react sooner, but I guess I wasn't expecting to see water spraying all over my bathroom. The living room is where I have my little theater setup with all my equipment so that could have gone very wrong.

It looked like the hardwood had absorbed a bit of water at one of the joints, hopefully no damage is caused. They have a huge dehumidifier upstairs and one downstairs, as well as 2 blowers on each floor. They didn't seem super worried about anything in particular, will just be a pain to wait for everything to get fixed I suppose.

Could have been SO much worse though.

 

[boomerang]

Yeah, they say that timing is everything and in your case that really applies. Home from work early right before it happens.

Another story. Stepson buys a townhouse that he finds out after the fact is one of hundreds in his neighborhood affected by bad plumbing. Some new type of fittings were used in the construction of all these homes and they all failed or were doomed to fail. Anyway, they come home one day and as they walk in they notice that the ceiling in the dining room is bulged down about three feet. When they close the door, that's all it takes and the drywall lets go and there is water everywhere. Lots and lots of water and he doesn't even know where to shut off the water.

Insurance covered it and the company that did the reworking had done so many of these town homes that they knew where to cut the holes they needed to in order to replace all the plumbing in this place. It was a two story to complicate matters. We were there for a visit right after the work was completed and before the drywall had been patched back in. The openings they cut were almost surgical. IIRC, they were waiting for an inspection or something before patching over the openings that were cut. I was pretty impressed.

 

[RearAdmiral]

Yeah, they say that timing is everything and in your case that really applies. Home from work early right before it happens.

Another story. Stepson buys a townhouse that he finds out after the fact is one of hundreds in his neighborhood affected by bad plumbing. Some new type of fittings were used in the construction of all these homes and they all failed or were doomed to fail. Anyway, they come home one day and as they walk in they notice that the ceiling in the dining room is bulged down about three feet. When they close the door, that's all it takes and the drywall lets go and there is water everywhere. Lots and lots of water and he doesn't even know where to shut off the water.

Insurance covered it and the company that did the reworking had done so many of these town homes that they knew where to cut the holes they needed to in order to replace all the plumbing in this place. It was a two story to complicate matters. We were there for a visit right after the work was completed and before the drywall had been patched back in. The openings they cut were almost surgical. IIRC, they were waiting for an inspection or something before patching over the openings that were cut. I was pretty impressed.

Wow, I can't imagine how he felt when all that water came down, that is insane. It is kinda funny how the cuts were surgical though, with all that practice. Right now I have about a 4'x3' chunk of drywall out of my ceiling. I was so happy with that area too, I put a ton of effort into renovating the living room. At least my deductible is $500 so that's not bad, but $500 to work my way back to a proverbial zero is annoying hah. Hopefully they pay someone to paint too. I did 2 coats of primer and 2 of paint in there.

 

[RearAdmiral]

I had a conversation with the adjuster yesterday evening. His next appt is August 25th! 2 weeks away and I am supposed to just wait around with a huge hole in my ceiling before I can even start repairs. I have only been dealing with Nationwide at the national call center so I am going to call my agent today and see what we can do about that. 2 weeks seems nuts to have to wait for an adjuster.

 

[NutBucket]

You definitely got lucky. A coworker had a similar failure but the water ran for hours before his wife got home. They were in a hotel for nearly 6 months while their entire first floor was gutted and rebuilt. The only bright spot was he paid the difference and got upgraded materials throughout. Small consolation.

 

[RearAdmiral]

You definitely got lucky. A coworker had a similar failure but the water ran for hours before his wife got home. They were in a hotel for nearly 6 months while their entire first floor was gutted and rebuilt. The only bright spot was he paid the difference and got upgraded materials throughout. Small consolation.

Ouch but yes I did get super lucky.

 

[PowerEngineer]

One of the water hoses to their washing machine split while my neighbors were at work, and the damage was extensive even though it flooded just their daylight basement. That's why my wash machine hoses are always metal braided, and I still close the water valves when I go away for a few days.

I also made a point of replacing all the plastic fittings and water lines for the toilets and sinks in our house (fortunately all the main plumbing lines were copper). Again, all metal fittings and metal mesh water lines.

 

[NutBucket]

Instead of braided lines you can also use soft copper.

 

[luv2liv]

oh man, this is scary!
we are high tech people. how can any of us prevent this in the future or be notified via text for water leaking/flooding the house?

 

[master_shake_]

oh man, this is scary!
we are high tech people. how can any of us prevent this in the future or be notified via text for water leaking/flooding the house?

i am actually shocked there are no Bluetooth humidity sensors that can pick up and send an email about it to you.

even cars have humidity sensors on the windshield.

https://www.electronichouse.com/sma...ome-water-leak-detector-because-leaks-happen/

there are.

 

[RearAdmiral]

Adjuster coming tomorrow(Tuesday) at 8am. Managed to change adjuster so that they can come a week earlier.

 

[luv2liv]

thanks master shake!
im getting 4 Aeon Labs Aeotec Z-Wave Water Sensor. along with the Wink hub. total is $213. if anyone knows anything better for cheaper, please let me know. i think $213 is very reasonable considering the headaches it will save me coming home from work or vacation with a flooded house.
sorry about your place op.

 

[shabby]

thanks master shake!
im getting 4 Aeon Labs Aeotec Z-Wave Water Sensor. along with the Wink hub. total is $213. if anyone knows anything better for cheaper, please let me know. i think $213 is very reasonable considering the headaches it will save me coming home from work or vacation with a flooded house.
sorry about your place op.

Not sure how that'll save you from a flooded house, i'd look into a remote shutoff valve rather than some sensors that tell you there's water around them.

 

[NetWareHead]

To get around this issue, I typically replace my soft hoses every few years which I hope can prevent catastrophic hose failures. Cheap and the cost is a write-off.

They do make excess flow valves for washing machines, dishwashers, even ones for gas. I dont think work as well as advertised; mainly because the issue they are designed to prevent is not always the cause of problems. True they will stop a hose at full blast but does nothing for a slow leaks. Plus they have the annoying habit of tripping and sealing the hose shut when the appliance calls for water which requires you to reset it. And they are expensive; $30 for a set of washing machine hoses.

 

[luv2liv]

i'd look into a remote shutoff valve

im looking at this z-wave valve. https://www.amazon.com/Wireless-Z-Wave-Water-Valve-inch/dp/B006KU10ZI
dont i still need sensors to know when house is flooded to turn water off?

 

[Red Squirrel]

That is one of my worse fears. Water scares me more than electricity. With electricity if there is a lose connection, either it will burn up, or absolutely nothing will happen if nothing is on that circuit. With plumbing? Anywhere along the system if it breaks you have over 100psi of water flowing with nothing to stop it.

It's crossed my mind to look into some kind of flow meter or pressure monitoring setup and solonoid valve system, if it detects flow for too long it would shut water off. There would be a bypass function for if I'm actually using water for a long time, like watering lawn.

I had actually bought a bunch of 5v sensors that I was going to connect to my home automation system, but during testing, I noticed that they catch on fire if they get wet. So that's just replacing one problem with another. So I halted that project and never ended up looking again at it. Should definitely get on that. Same with the float valve in the sump pit.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

That happened to my Uncle's house on (more or less) the first day of a week's vacation. They had to rebuild most of the house.

Apparently a plastic in common use for plumbing fixtures and toilet valves back in the '70s degraded over time when wet.

 

[RearAdmiral]

Adjuster decided to replace our bathroom floor(tile), which had been covered with water. I was worried they would cheap out on that and I could get mold later on. The guy was pretty comprehensive. They are covering the drywall and several coats of primer / paint. Came out to a few thousand in damage. The adjuster mentioned that practically all of their water claims are toilet supply lines.

I wonder if they have considered inspecting those regularly at their customers homes or asking for pictures or something. The thing cost like 6 bucks and I replaced it in a few minutes. I figure by Fight Club logic that they may have considered it and it somehow costs more than houses getting flooded.

Now for the best part!

When the Serv Pro people removed the ceiling drywall, they cut out the affected piece which happened to be directly below our jacuzzi tub drain. They found what looked like a small bread / loaf pan just sitting there. I assume it was for some sort of leak. Later on I take a bath and lo and behold the drain from the jacuzzi drips onto the living room floor. Gotta get that fixed too, but seriously their idea of a fix was putting a bread pan below the leak and installing drywall under it!? What were they thinking?? Hopefully that is an easy fix.

And as for the jacuzzi...the 240v heater setup never really worked right. I can't seem to nail down the cause.

 

[RearAdmiral]

Final update in OP. Everything is back together and looks great!