Joe the Plumber made famous during the recent Presidential election was as near as we can tell was a real honest goodness licensed plumber. But what happens when Joes wanna be plumber cousin, Rufus, decides to get into business for himself. After all he's helped Joe on a few jobs and he knows the ropes or should I say pipes.

I believe Rufus was the plumber who worked on this two family home I inspected the other day.

The first photo is of a vent pipe rusted off the main vent stack. The pipe was made of black iron which is usually used for gas. This piping was laid through out the attic to vent the two kitchen sink drains. Just below this main vertical pipe Rufus had replaced the old cast iron with plastic PVC pipe. Why not finish the job with plastic, it's better, easier and cheaper. This pipe wouldn't be broken if he had thus creating a health hazard.

The second photo is below the first. You can see the plastic vent pipe on the left. By the way this is the attic. As a rule there is no heat in an attic. So why would you run water supply pipes through the attic? Don't know, but I bet someone is going to have a shower in their kitchen below soon.

The third photo is of the water meter and main water supply pipe for this home. It's the small white plastic pipe running up the center of the picture. Problem is it's too small. Looks like half inch pipe where there should be at least three quarter inch. Must've been all that was on the truck that day.

As you can see some things are better done by a licensed professional instead of some Rufus off the street.

James Quarello
JRV Home Inspection Services, LLC