Todays Friday teaser. Thinking outside the box. manhole.
Problem
Blocked main foul sewer. Wont go into the detail of how and why, but the cure is to lift a manhole and rod it.
Issue
The manhole. Its in a block paving drive, The cover is of old design that takes a full brick into its recess, about 20 of them. Weighs about 100kilos. Because it takes a full brick in its recess top its a deep manhole cover, about 6inches deep, tight fitting, so it needs to come straight up, pull one side then the other jams it in place.
It is a two man job, one on each side with a steady and even straight up pull.
I am on my own
Solution
How was it done using just the contents of an everyday suburban garage
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Set up an axle stand one side of the manhole. Trolley jack the other side. Piece of something strong to span the gap while taking the weight of the cover, attach manhole cover to the spanning rod/plank etc with a tow rope or similar. Pump the jack up and, when the manhole cover is clear of the ground, wheel the trolley jack round taking manhole cover with it.
Am I close? It's certainly something I could do with my garage contents.
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>> Am I close? It's certainly something I could do with my garage contents.
Close - Good shout, but its not an even "straight up" pull.
Last edited by: Zero on Fri 11 Dec 15 at 10:23
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Preventative flush when the Police called this morning ?
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>> Preventative flush when the Police called this morning ?
Believe me, they would never have found it in the toxic soup contained in my manhole. Nor would you have wanted to use it afterwards.
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How about drilling a pilot hole in the metal man hole cover ( or two maybe ) screw something into the holes to make handles ( cup hooks or something similar but stronger maybe ) lift cover, do deed, fill in holes with black sealant or something afterwards to prevent smell but leaving holes available for future use.
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I'm pretty sure I can lift 100kg six inches off the ground and then drop it again a second later, so I'd have done it that way and then spent the next two days lying inside with icepacks on my back.
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Or get a friend to help...
Oh wait...
;-)
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>>I'm pretty sure I can lift 100kg six inches off the ground and then drop it again a second later
15+ stone [sucks teeth) that would be going some Fursty, it's not as if it tis a deadlift ya know.
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>> I'm pretty sure I can lift 100kg six inches off the ground and then drop
>> it again a second later,
Indeed when you first approach the job that is what you think. However its nearly a meter square and needs to come up square. In practise its not possible by one man
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Park the car with a towbar directly over the the centre of the manhole,connect rope1 to manhole cover loops, to ensure centre lift, loop towrope thro rope1 over tow hitch, attach to a suitably positioned 2nd car and drive carefully away for 9". Then move first car to give suitable clearance.
I assume that the blocks are not sand bedded and removable? to reduce the cover weight.
Last edited by: sherlock47 on Fri 11 Dec 15 at 12:15
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>> I assume that the blocks are not sand bedded and removable? to reduce the cover
>> weight.
A valid solution, one I have employed in the past. However its a real brother to get the blocks back in the cover in the right herringbone pattern.
It was my fallback position.
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if not answered by 17:00 I shall reveal my method statement.
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Not sure I fancy Fursty's idea of lying in a foetid hole for a couple of hours...ice packs or no !
Reverse car until towbar is above centre of cover...lash cover to bar then jack car up under the diff..............no diff ?....tough t**** !
Dig a hole next to the stinking pit then tunnel sideways. See ' The Great Escape ' for further details.
Phone....men....debit card. Seemples !
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>>if not answered by 17:00 I shall reveal my method statement.
The rhythm method??
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Assuming my previous solution was not correct, in that you did not have a car with towbar available......
Position a a 'Workmate' directly above the cover with the legs akimbo the cover, Run 2 verical ropes up from the lifting eyes thro the jaws and then loop each of the ropea full 360 around bo the jaws and tie off. Slowly wind the work mate handles to widen the gap - ensuring that any skew of the cover is corrected by 'differential screwing'.
Just hope that d i ff e rential s c r e w i n g makes it thro the **** filter :)
I think that a genuine workmate would take the load, not sure my £10 chinese lookalikes would!
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>> I think that a genuine workmate would take the load, not sure my £10 chinese
>> lookalikes would!
you know, in a moment of madness, after about the 4th glass of port, i did actually consider that as a viable plan of action.
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Three wooden poles lashed together as a tripod over the cover, and two pulleys and a rope.
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Holes as per Runfer, then the engine crane and load leveller. That way, could raise up to a ton!
You might think owning an engine crane is a bit daft for an individual, but have you seen the hire costs? I've done two engine in/outs with the 4/4, and used it several times while getting the engine plates sorted on the three wheeler. So I'm quids in. Plus, it makes a handy general purpose crane, I used it to get a washing machine out of the Landrover. And I lent it to a pal to do engine surgery on his Cobra replica.
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Contained mixture of home made explosive (red lights and siren flashing at GCHQ), delay fuse, flush down toilet, BANG! Cover now sat somewhere on drive :)
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That has just reminded me of something from long long ago. Back in the dark ages when we were young, one of our crowd went to train as and indeed became a fireman.
He got hold of the something or apparently the two somethings which when added to water turn it into vast quantities of foam.
At a party, he put some of the first something in the water in a toilet cistern and some of the second something into the water in the toilet bowl.
The next customer for the loo was a young lady who when she pulled the flush...
Well, let's just say I was glad it wasn't my house.
;-)
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Much less impressive, but amusing nonetheless;
Remember those little packets of sweet bits which then used to crackle and pop in the mouth? "Space Dust" or similar it was called, I think.
They're quite good fun in the cat litter tray.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Fri 11 Dec 15 at 14:25
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>> At a party, he put some of the first something in the water in a
>> toilet cistern and some of the second something into the water in the toilet bowl.
The Hebridean writer Finlay J McDonald's childhood anecdotes relate to similar jape being played in houses in thirties - pre indoor loos etc where a 'gazunda' was commonly provided - at least for older females.
A tin of Andrew's Liver Salts emptied into the potty at lights out had the obvuios effect when his Gran used it - much chaos!!
Finlay's father however found the empty tin and did 2+2 =. The boy's backside smarted for a week!!
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I suppose everyone has heard of the effects of clingfilm stretched tightly over the porcelain of a toilet bowl at parties?
Really really funny if you are not the victim or the host...
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Nitrogen triiodide painted on the blackboard.
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What does that do? Not heard of that.
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Dissolve some iodine in ammonia. (Household will do, more concentrated is much better.)
Paint the resultant solution onto a blackboard. And wait for the teacher to come along with a piece of chalk. Cue cracking. NI3 is a contact explosive. Three large iodine atoms crammed around a tiny nitrogen atom leave a highly unstable molecule. So give it a gentle rub and BANG it goes.
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Nitrogen tri-iodide is easy to make, but ridiculously unstable. It's the sort of thing that some teenagers 'discover' that if one suspects yours might, best demonstrated by an adult to put them off.
My mate at school wreaked his bedroom carpet. He left a saucer of the liquid drying on his windowsill and as it dried, something set a little bit off. Probably a very minor explosion, but enough to deposit little portions of the nearly dry stuff on the carpet. By the time he got home, they were dry and on walking into his room, several of them went off and blew holes in the carpet. He tried to pick up the rest with a stick and a little shovel, but the moment anything got near, another explosion took place...
My brother 'borrowed' my ingredients (880 ammonia and iodine crystals) and made some in the utility room. A little bit went off, and he was deaf for several hours!
I was given the job of disposing of the rest of his nitrogen tri-iodide by my parents. But I'm probably the most hair-raising safety rep the BBC has ever had (I'm not really dangerous, it just looks that way...).
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Get that last bit put on a T-shirt, Slidey!
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>>How was it done using just the contents of an everyday suburban garage<<
Took the rods from the garage, looked at manhole, thought "Sod it" and rodded it from the next manhole that was smaller and easier to lift??
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>> Contained mixture of home made explosive
I think they call that the ultimate solution.
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....ask a woman for a solution??
Pat
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I'd just ask a bloke to show me how strong he was....
Pat
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Right
Solution
Two wheeled hydraulic car jacks., 1 metre of 4x2 to span the gap, two lidl ratchet roof rack straps with built in hooks that fitted into the manhole "keys", loped over the 4x2 and ratcheted up tight, then pumps on each jack in turn to lift it cleanly out the hole. The wheel jacks allowed to be wheeled out the way, and back.
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I don't suppose you found Fursty in there ?
Last edited by: Ted on Fri 11 Dec 15 at 16:52
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...contents of an everyday suburban garage...
...two hydraulic car jacks.
FOUL!
(And I don't mean the sewer.)
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Doesn't everyone (from here) have at least 2 hydraulic trolley jacks in the garage? And 2 bottle hydraulics, and about 4 scissor screw jacks. I tell my wife it is quite normal.
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>> You went off early Zero.
Premature explanation.
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>> Doesn't everyone (from here) have at least 2 hydraulic trolley jacks in the garage? And
>> 2 bottle hydraulics, and about 4 scissor screw jacks. I tell my wife it is
>> quite normal.
At the last count, three hydraulic trolly jacks, one of which is broken. Two bottle jacks, both of which are broken, two scissor jacks both of which you wouldn't trust.
Fairly typical i would have thought.
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I broke a scissor jack lifting my shed. It's a very big shed. I could go on to explain why I needed to lift it but you'd all just get bored. Anyway, if ever you need to lift a shed, don't use a scissor jack.
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>> I broke a scissor jack lifting my shed. It's a very big shed. I could
>> go on to explain why I needed to lift it but you'd all just get
>> bored. Anyway, if ever you need to lift a shed, don't use a scissor jack.
We all knew that. You have the broken jack in your garage still tho?
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>> We all knew that. You have the broken jack in your garage still tho?
Worse than that, it's still in the boot of the car...
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>> ...contents of an everyday suburban garage...
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>> ...two hydraulic car jacks.
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>> FOUL!
>> (And I don't mean the sewer.)
How are you supposed to swap tyres front and rear if you dont have two jacks?
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If I want the wider wheels to get there first for a change, I drive backwards.
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Ah yes of course, the LEC is deformed. Bit like a club foot.
Last edited by: Zero on Fri 11 Dec 15 at 17:42
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I think using 2 hydraulic car jacks is cheating. Zero may well happen to have two, but I don't think the average domestic garage has.
Attach the ends of two scaffolding planks to the cover, then lift each and pile bricks under their centres so that the planks point up in the air at the other end. Splay them out so that the ends are your car track apart, Rest two more planks against the raised ends, and then drive your car up the ramps until the boards pivot and lift the cover. Push two more planks under the raised cover, lower, and slide it clear.
Snag - you may be no more likely to have 6 scaffold planks than 2 trolley jacks.
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And don't forget to film it.
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I'm very taken with the cartoon on the top right of p.34 in the current Private Eye. They're all good but that one is ace, best football-manager joke I've ever seen.
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>> I'm very taken with the cartoon on the top right of p.34 in the current
>> Private Eye.
Can't seem to find it unless I subscribe!
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How would you..... - Mike H
