Rural Hygiene Part 12

If the tank is to be placed inside a building, it may be built of steel or of wood, although a lining of lead, copper, or galvanized iron is of advantage in the latter case. If the tank is out of doors, protection against frost must be carefully attended to, both to prevent an ice cap forming in the tank--the cause of many failures of tanks--and to prevent standing water in the connecting pipes being frozen. If the tank is to be placed inside the building, care must be taken to have it water-tight and to have the supports of the tank ample for the excessive weight which will be thereby imposed. Wooden tanks are likely to rot, and if left standing empty, become leaky. They are, therefore, less worth while than iron tanks.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 53.--Hand pump applied to air-tank.]

_Pressure tanks._

A simple and very satisfactory method of storing water, and at the same time making provision for pumping water, is to place in the cellar or in a special excavation outside the cellar a pressure tank similar in shape to an ordinary horizontal boiler. The water in this tank is forced up into the house through the agency of compressed air, pumped in above the water, either by hand or by machinery, and in some cases automatically regulated so that the air pressure in the tank remains constant, no matter whether the tank contains much or little water. The village supply of Babylon, Long Island, is on this principle, the tanks there being eight feet in diameter and one hundred feet long,--much larger, of course, than is needed for a single house.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 54.--Engine applied to air-tank.]

The accompanying diagram and figures show the method of installing this system, which is known generally as the Kewanee system, although a number of other firms than the Kewanee Water Supply Co. are prepared to furnish the outfit necessary.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 55.--Windmill connection with tank.]

How the air-tank may be used in connection with a hand force pump is shown in Fig. 53. The water is pumped from a well into the tank, usually in the cellar, whence it flows by the pressure in the tank to all parts of the house. Figure 54 shows the tank with a gas engine and a power pump subst.i.tuted for the hand pump. Figure 55 shows the using of a windmill in connection with the tank and also shows the relation of the tank to the fixtures in the rest of the house.

CHAPTER IX

_PLUMBING_

A generous supply of water for a house brings with it desires for the conveniences necessary to its enjoyment. As soon as running water is established in a house, the kitchen sink fails conspicuously to fulfill all requirements, and a wash-tub seems a sorry subst.i.tute for a modern bath-room. A single pipe supplying cold water only, no matter how pure the water or how satisfactory in the summer, does not afford the constant convenience which an unlimited supply of both cold and hot water offers, and the introduction of running water is usually followed by an addition to the kitchen stove whereby running hot water may be obtained as well as running cold water. The next step is the equipment of a bath-room, affording suitable bathing facilities and doing away with the out-of-door privy.

_Installation of the plumbing._

These things are reckoned as luxuries, not among the necessities of life, and it must be understood at the outset that such conveniences cost money, both for original installation and for maintenance; the water-back in the stove will become filled up with lime if the water is hard, the boiler will become corroded and have to be replaced, the plumbing fixtures will certainly get out of repair and need attention, and there will be, year by year, a small but continuous outlay.

Again, it is idle to propose installing plumbing fixtures unless the house is properly heated in winter time, and this calls for a furnace for at least a portion of the house. Usually the kitchen is kept warm enough through the winter nights, so that running water may be put in the kitchen without danger from frost; although the writer knows of a house where it is the task of the housewife each winter night to shut off all water in the cellar and to clean out the trap in the sink drain in order to prevent freezing in both the supply pipe and drainpipe.

Usually a water-pipe may be carried through the cellar without danger of freezing, but in most farmhouses heated by stoves, except in the kitchen and sitting room, water-pipes would, the first cold night, probably freeze and burst.

Various makeshifts have been employed to secure the convenience of a bath-room without adding to the expense by installing a furnace. In one house the bath-room was placed in an alcove off from the kitchen, with open s.p.a.ce above the dividing part.i.tion, so that the kitchen heat kept the bath-room warm. This is not an ideal location for a bath-room, but, in this case, it avoided the necessity for an additional stove or furnace. In another house the bath-room was placed above the kitchen, with a large register in the floor of the former, so that the kitchen heat kept the room warm; and in still another case the bath-room was over the sitting room, and a large pipe carried the heat from the stove below into the room above. The stovepipe also went through the bath-room and helped to provide warmth. It is better, all things considered, to defer the installation of a bath-room until a furnace can be provided, since then there is no danger of frozen water-pipes at intermediate points where the cold reaches the pipes. A full list of fixtures and piping required is as follows:--

1st. A tank in the attic to store water in case the main pipe-flow or pump-capacity is small. This tank, of course, is not needed if the direct supply from the source is at all times adequate for the full demand.

2d. A main supply pipe from the outside source or from the attic tank connecting with and supplying the kitchen sink, the hot-water boiler through the kitchen stove, the laundry tubs, the bath-tub, the wash-basin, and the water-closet tank. It is wise, in order to save expense, to have all these fixtures as close together as possible; as, for instance, the laundry tub in the bas.e.m.e.nt directly under the kitchen sink and the bath-room fixtures directly over the kitchen sink.

3d. A hot-water pipe leading out of the hot-water boiler to the kitchen sink, to the laundry tubs, and to the bath-tub. Although not essential, it is desirable to carry the hot-water pipe back to the bottom of the hot-water boiler, so that the circulation of hot water is maintained.

This will avoid the necessity of wasting water and waiting until the water runs hot from the hot-water faucet whenever hot water is desired.

4th. The necessary fixtures, such as faucets, sinks, tubs, wash-basins, kitchen boiler, water-back for the stove, water-closet, tank, and fixtures. These may be now taken up in order and described more in detail.

_Supply tank._

The attic tank may be of wood or iron, and its capacity should be equal to the daily consumption of water. Its purpose, as already indicated, is to equalize the varying rates of consumption from hour to hour and between day and night. The minimum size of this tank would be such that the flow during the night would just fill the tank with an amount of water just sufficient for the day's needs. Of course, the additional supply entering the tank during the day would reduce the size somewhat, but the basis for computation given is not unreasonable.

Several accessories must be provided for such a tank. An overflow is essential, and this is best accomplished by carrying a _pipe out through a hole in the roof_. This must be ample in size, provided with a screen at the inside end, and be examined frequently to make sure that the overflow remains open. A light flap valve to keep out the cold in winter is also a desirable feature for the overflow pipe. The tank must be water-tight, and while it is possible to make a wooden tank water-tight, it is wiser to line a wooden tank with lead or sheet iron. The latter can be painted at intervals, so that it will not rust, and is safer than wood alone to prevent leakage.

Care must be taken to give sufficient strength to the wooden tank; it should never be made of less than two-inch stuff, and should not depend upon nails or screws alone for holding the sides together. Figure 56 shows a suitable way to put together such a tank. Certain firms that make windmills and agricultural implements generally can furnish wrought-iron tanks, warranted to be water-tight, of suitable size to go in an attic. Such a tank, as we have already said, should hold about five hundred gallons and should therefore be a cube four feet on a side or its equivalent. It needs to be very carefully placed in the house, or else its weight will cause the attic floor to sag. A tank of the size named will weigh a little more than two tons, and such a weight, unless special precautions are taken, cannot be placed in the middle of an attic floor without causing serious settlement, if not actual breaking through, of the floor.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 56.--Construction of a wooden tank.]

A good way of placing such a tank is to nail the floor joists onto the bottom of the rafters, so that a truss is formed, and the box or tank is properly supported on the floor and also hung from the rafters by iron straps bolted both to tank and rafters. If possible, this tank should be placed directly over a part.i.tion carried through to the cellar, in which case no settlement is possible.

_Main supply pipe._

The main supply pipe, except when pressure is very great, is most satisfactory when made of three-quarter-inch galvanized iron pipe. Even with a high pressure, half-inch pipe is unsatisfactory because of the great velocity with which the water comes from the faucets and because the high pressure causes the packing in the faucets to wear out rapidly.

This three-quarter-inch pipe should have a stop-and-waste, as it is called, just inside the cellar wall, so that if the house is not occupied at any time, the valve may be shut and the water in the pipes drawn off, to prevent possible freezing. The pipe should never be carried directly in front of a window or along the sill of the building unless protected by some kind of wrapping. The laterals and the different fixtures are taken off from this main supply pipe as it rises through the house, and the pipe is capped at the top.

_Hot-water circulation._

To provide hot water, a branch must be taken off at the level of the kitchen stove and run into the hot-water boiler at or near the bottom.

The circulation in the tank and through the house is then provided for by a separate circuit running from the bottom of the hot-water tank to the water-back and back into the tank at a point about halfway up. The house circuit is then run from the top of the boiler around through the house, and if a return pipe is provided, it comes back and enters at the bottom. This hot-water pipe is also of galvanized iron and should be of the same size as the main supply pipe (see Fig. 57).

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 57.--Hot-water attachment to the kitchen stove.]

The fixtures may be as elaborate as the purse and taste will allow, but some general instruction may not be out of place. There are many types of faucets, all good, and differing from each other only in some minor detail of construction. Experience with the so-called self-closing faucets or bibbs has not been entirely satisfactory, since, with high pressure, the packing very quickly wears out. Similarly, experience with those faucets that open and shut by a single turn of a handle shows that frequent renewals of packing are necessary. The simplest, most reliable, and the easiest faucets to repair are those in which the valve is screwed down onto the valve seat, which is a plane, and where the water-tightness is made by the insertion of a rubber or leather washer that can always be cut out with a knife from a piece of old belting or harness. The faucets may be nickeled or left plain bra.s.s, and the advantage of the added expense of nickel is in the appearance alone. If the faucets themselves are nickel, then the piping also should be nickel; that is, bra.s.s nickel-plated. Galvanized iron piping and bra.s.s faucets do not, to be sure, have the same satisfactory appearance as highly finished nickeled faucets, but the one is quite as serviceable as the other.

_Kitchen sinks._

In providing a sink for the kitchen, choice lies between plain iron and enameled iron. For special work, sinks have been made of galvanized iron, of copper, slate, soapstone, and of real porcelain. There is hardly any limit to the cost of a porcelain sink, and while an enameled iron sink with fittings costs from $30 to $60, a cast-iron sink of the same size will cost only $3 or $4. A good quality of white enameled iron sink, of size suitable for a kitchen, with white enameled back and a drainboard on the side, costing $30, is very attractive as an ornament, but it serves no more useful purpose than a $3 sink and a fifty-cent drainboard. Figure 58 shows an enameled iron sink, containing sink, drainboard, and back all in one piece. This is pure white, and when fitted with nickel faucets makes a very attractive fitting.

_Laundry tubs._

If running water is to be put in a house, stationary tubs for the laundry, into which water runs by a faucet and which can be emptied by pulling a plug, are certainly worth their cost over movable wooden tubs in the labor saved. Stationary tubs may be made of wood, of enameled iron, or of slate.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 58.--Enameled iron sink.]

Wooden tubs are not as desirable as the others because in the course of time they absorb a certain amount of organic matter and have a persistent odor. They are, however, very inexpensive, a man of ordinary ability being able to build them himself at the cost of the wood only.

Enameled iron tubs of ordinary size cost, with the fixtures, from $20 to $40 apiece, and a set of three slate tubs costs $25. To these figures must be added the expense of the piping to bring both hot and cold water to the tubs, together with the two faucets and the drainpipe connections necessary. Figure 59 shows three white enameled iron laundry tubs costing about $75 installed.

_Hot-water boiler._

The kitchen boiler is to-day almost always made of galvanized iron and is placed on its own stand, usually back of the kitchen stove, although it may stand in an adjoining room,--the bath-room, for instance,--and aid in keeping that room warm. Such a tank costs about $12, to which must be added the necessary piping, and it is always desirable to put a stop-c.o.c.k on the cold-water supply entering the tank. Then if the tank bursts, the cold water may be shut off without doing harm.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 59.--Enameled laundry tubs.]

A drainpipe from the bottom of the tank is also desirable to draw off the acc.u.mulations of sediment.

_Water-back, wash-basin, bath-tub._

The water-back is merely a hollow box made to fit the front of the fire box in the stove, usually shaped so as to replace the front fire brick.

The cold water comes in at the bottom of the box, is heated by contact with the fire, and the hot water goes out through the other pipe into the boiler.

The wash-basin in the bath-room is either marble, enameled iron, or porcelain. The marble basins with a slab can be had for about $7.50, while the enameled iron basins cost from $6 to $40. To this must be added the cost of faucets and piping, together with the drain and the trap that belongs with the drain. The enameled iron basins which are being used to-day more than ever before have proved very satisfactory, have but little weight, can be fastened to the wall without difficulty, and take up less room than the old marble basin. A fancy porcelain basin costs about $75, and is no better for practical use than either of the others.

Much the same kind of material may be used for bath-tubs, although warning ought to be given to avoid the use of the old-fashioned tin-lined bath-tub. This lining will easily rust or corrode, is very difficult to keep clean, and while the first cost is less than the enameled iron tub, it has no other advantage. An enameled iron tub five and a half feet long will cost from $20 to $100 without fixtures.