Plumbing

After several long months of shopping around to try to find the best deal on shower and tub fixtures, we have come up with what we feel are the best products for our style of home. Many of the fixtures are either very traditional, with a victorian flare. The oiled bronze, with flares and decorative frilly shit wouldn't quite look very good in a modern bathroom. The flip side is that when you search Ebay for "modern shower faucet" you retrieve hundreds of pages of silly dollar store contraptions (chromed plastic) with led lights that shine blue, green or red while you shower. Why anyone would ever want to do that I am not sure. Between these dollar store faucets and the several-thousand dollar fetish pieces that make my pocketbook squeeze a bit tighter is a vast wasteland of nothingness. I found several products on AliBaba.com after literally viewing page after page of poorly translated Chinese manufacturer's offerings. I almost pulled the trigger on several items but was daunted by the poor translation of their technical data and the high shipping rates. I did, however, find this terribly amusing item, which came complete with the disclaimer that you shouldn't use your mouth, because soap will enter into your mouth.

Here's what I've ordered, I've listed the prices because that was the best part of the whole deal. When the items arrived, I was surprised at the great quality. The first clue to the quality was the fact that the boxes were so heavy that I could barely drag them into the apartment.

TEC Pura with four body sprayers $245

Tec Pura shower valve $79

In other plumbing news, we are still shopping for a roof-mounted solar water heater - likely going to choose the evacuated glass tubes which can be purchased online for approximately $800. The 3/4" pex feeds for the potable water are going in slowly, and after several false-starts with the sewage lines, I spent the day underneath the house yesterday fitting together 4" pipe. I likely fried some brain cells from the ABS cement, but the solvent-related high offset the dismal nature of being stuck under the house with 23" of headroom.

The 1/2" pex for the radiant floors has arrived, but I won't be installing that until after the rough plumbing and electrical. I'm dreading the inspection, and have been reading my code book every night before going to sleep just in case I've missed anything.