It’s been a long, hard day. As you enter the room you let the last bit of your clothing drop to the floor. You’re already feeling good and you know that the hot and steamy water flowing over you will only further your ecstasy. You lift in one leg and then the other. As you turn the knob water begins to flow from the tub faucet. It’s getting hotter and hotter. Just when you’ve reached the perfect temperature you grab the knob and turn. You can hear the water running up the pipe to the shower head. You’re ready, you’re excited, and you’re disappointed. It’s a low flow shower head.
Yep, it’s an incredibly simple thing that the government screwed up. Now, if you live in California or some other arid climate, maybe there’s an argument to make for low flow showers (I have a free market base approach that might work here, but that’s a side debate). I don’t live in an arid climate. I live in Indiana with some of the most abundant water aquifers in the world. Not to mention one of the largest fresh water bodies on the planet that might just be a little bit north of my current location. With the exception of a minor, occasional mid summer drought. We don’t have a shortage of water here. Also, it’s incredibly cheap, so I’m not worried about price.
Now this has been an increasing problem throughout my life. But there is a solution. It involves a couple pairs of pliers. One to take the shower head off and a pair of needle nose to pull out the flow restrictor. It’s really simple. Just keep working at it until all the plastic and bits aren’t in the way anymore. In fact, I carry pliers with me on every road trip that I take. There are hotels as far east as Virginia, as far north as Montana, as far west as California, and as far south as Texas that have higher flow rate shower thanks to me.
Imagine water as a hot dog and this as the hallway. In this scenario it’s actually good for the hallway to be large.
Unfortunately, this solution is working less and less. They’ve figured out people like myself are doing anything and everything I can the thwart their efforts. Manufacturers are now incorporating low flow into the faucet valve. I have a solution to this to, but it’s not quite as simple. It involves a drill and being willing to buy the parts two or three times for when you screw up. It’s still usually well worth it. Or, if you don’t about aesthetics you can make your own flow heavy setup using ball valves. Now your wife may not like it at first, but when it no longer takes her 20 minutes to wash the soap out of her hair, she’ll hopefully come around.
In the meantime make sure you turn on a faucet and let it run for 15 minutes a day to counteract their measures.
Low. Water. Terlets.
/nuff said
Oh, and you may as well go ahead…..hit that THEME MUSIC !!
Because of 1.6 gallon toilet tanks, I use exactly 3.2 gallons of water to get the job done.
Fckn’ right. Useless pieces of shit (pun intended).
We have these “Earth-friendly” toilets at work with two buttons on them; one to flush liquid and another to flush solid. Great concept, right? I’d even consider getting one for my home to save water.
The problem is that for some reason, it also has an automatic sensor that is waaaaay too sensitive. Here’s how it typically goes: I open the stall door, and it flushes. I start pissing, and it flushes in the middle of that. If it doesn’t flush while I’m zipping up, I’ll have to hit the button again since there is now some urine in the water. While I’m washing my hands, it will usually flush one more time just for good measure.
Oh, and many people have walked into the bathroom and observed the sinks – also equipped with automatic sensors – running all by themselves. Lord knows how long that had been going on.
I’m a little jealous. Our automatic sinks at work don’t run by themselves. In fact, they don;t run when you put your hands under them. I’ve literally spend 2-3 minutes trying to get them to turn on the rinse the soap off, only to walk out with soap on my hands, go to the break room and use the real faucet.
“Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.”
On the place I grew up, we were on a well and a septic system, and since Dad didn’t want to have to have the septic tank pumped out too often, the rule there was “if it’s yellow, let it mellow. If it’s brown, flush it down.”
But in town? Fuck that. I hear you can get good toilets in Canada.
This is as good a place as any.
How To Have a Libertarian Christmas
Would. And would let her sit on my face. ///SubtleHotnessPost
Too wholesome. She’d never sit on your face.
Wrong. I bet she’s a freak.
I’m willing to take one for the team to find out for sure.
Correct. Lauren Southern can sit on my face while Julie B. provides oral.
Is there an evolutionary explanation for why so many right leaning females have cleft chins?
I was into her right up until the very end; when she wished me a “Murry Christmas”. Learn how to talk, please.
I believe she was literally wishing that Bill Murray will visit us during the holidays.
That was a failure for Netflix
And a Rothbard New Year to you!
beat me to it; tried to rhyme Rothbard for a pithy answer
I got nothing
a clothyard of Rothbard
Huh. I just took a look at mine, and to my surprise, the thing unscrews from the pipe the feeds the water into it. No idea if it’s low flow, but it’s sure gunky and now I have an easier way to clean it.
PS. Through the grime I can read “2.5 GPM”. So yeah it’s probably supposed to be low-flow. Sounds like a Friday project to take care of that.
It’s very likely that if you look into the side you unscrewed, you will see a small disk with a small hole through the middle. Remove and destroy that.
*note to self* Actually read the entire thread before imparting my “wisdom” upon everyone.
If there’s anything other than a screen on the pipe it has a flow restrictor. I’d removed the screen too if you have one. I was going to take a picture of one with a flow restictor in it, but I removed them years ago.
Well, it comes apart into 3 or 4 pieces of plastic that screw back together in some way I’ve already lost (I am mechanically retarded) and which allows for adjusting the stream from “spray” to “massage”. Not sure where the actual “flow restriction” is occurring. Enh, I’ll play with it and figure it out.
Oh shit, I just unscrewed a heavy piece of metal from the pipe that appears to be part of the showerhead and it’s got a bunch of plastic-looking blockages inside it. Maybe that’s the flow restriction?
Generally yes.
I’m starting to wish I put in a disclaimer absolving me from liability like Suthenboy has on his reloading articles. But yes, remove any and all plastic pieces.
Wait until it starts leaking at the joint because of a lack of dope or Teflon tape.
Everyone will know who to blame…
Ha, I’ll try not to shoot my eye out.
Teflon tape is your friend.
So are SharkBites, but that is outside the scope of this essay.
I’ll pick some up.
I love Sharkbites. Especially in spaces where a torch would create massive problems.
Amazing how slowly plumbing tech makes it’s way into the real world. Of course, by ‘amazing’ I mean not remotely surprising. The fact that plumbers still use copper and sweated joints is laughable. A buddy had his furnace fail at the cabin in winter. Ordinarily you would be chasing leaks forever. He had redone everything with PEX and had to replace a couple fittings.
+1 Christmas Story
I can’t say I’m a huge fan of sharkbites. Not because I’ve had problems, but because it takes away one more reason I get to play with the blow torch. Oh well, I get to use it a couple of times a year to burn weeds in the yard
+1 PEX.
I helped my uncle replace his plumbing with pex because he was getting pinhole leaks in the copper. Easiest plumbing I’ve ever done.
…because it takes away one more reason I get to play with the blow torch.
Buy an old car, especially one from the norther climes. You will get plenty of torch time.
You mean the Minnesoda blue wrench?
You all just woke me up to a possible fix for a plumbing issue that’s been hanging over my head for a while. Now I just have to check to see if I still have some of that PEX tubing stashed away or if I tossed it like my wife told me to.
A bizarre twist of plumbing history: plumbing in Japan – iron, copper/brass, PVC, etc. – fits US standard plumbing exactly. I found this out when I renovated my place here (Japan). I could bring fittings and hardware from the US and it all worked perfectly with locally sourced materials and fittings. My guess is that after the war, when Japan was re-building from the rubble, the best source for fittings and pipe came from anybody working on a US base with access to fittings on base. I expect it became standard just because it was the most accessible source.
嘘だよ！
When I was tearing out the old stuff I noticed it was exactly the same sizes as I had always used in the US. Even some of the cast iron fittings I pulled out during the tear-down had “1/2” and similar inch-standard numbers in the castings.
I had to do this for the first time about 20 years ago.
My shower head limes up (well water) and acts as a low flow. I occasionally have to take the head off and try to clean the pores with limeaway or something. Doesn’t seem to work, easier to change to a new cheap head once a year or so.
Not cheap, but Speakman do really well with our hard water. Design allows the scale to crack off as you adjust this spray pattern. The restictor also come out easily. Drywall screw into the plug and pull out with a pair of pliers.
I’ve also taken a drill to one shower head that refused to have the restrictor come out.
Can we add anti-scald valves that are adjusted to tepid temperatures to the compliant list? At least the anti-scald valve has a valid purpose.
No. Fuck all anti scald devices. They are mandated by assholes that never take baths. My wife cannot get a bathtub of more than lukewarm water(*) thanks to those assholes. At least in Japan and Europe, the controls have override buttons to move the controls into hot water. If I had my druthers, every congressman who passed that POS, and everyone who had failed to repeal it, would be chained inside the Super Jockey tank.
(*) the only way to get a decent bath is to turn the water heater up to actual scalding and pay for it at every faucet
Low flow head after a long hard day is the worst.
Any head after a long hard day is damn good.
Hmm.
https://youtu.be/rgc_LRjlbTU
First thing I do with any new faucet is to remove the low flow bullshit.
It’s why I’m so clean and happy.
I’ve heard about the new tamper proof silliness but haven’t come across it yet. I bought a couple Hansgrohe faucets from Costco and both were easily restored to proper flow glory.
I’m sure someone will put a list together for people who love their water hot and plentiful. A smart supplier would go out of their way to highlight the threaded restrictor with plenty of pics.
Related: Wine Bricks
Ha ha ha ha. “Don’t do this or your grape juice will turn to booze, and that’s against the law.”
Awesome!
That’s awesome!
I hope that America still exists.
There were actually laws against home vinting as well as home brewing until the late 70’s. I remember my Dad took advantage by making his own wine in the late 70’s. Best thing Carter ever did was calling for the legality of “home” brewing & vinting.
There were (and are) tons of laws against home distilling, but my groovy Italian great-grandfather made plenty of wine and grappa.
Fuck the ATF.
Ha ha ha. Awesome. And agreed.
Low-water showerhead relevant
First thing I thought too.
Unfortunately I have a double whammy. We have a sediment/iron problem with our well, causing the 1 micron whole house filter to clog in about 3 days on average. Granted, in a normal setup they should last roughly 6 months.
Low flow shower head plus a clogged filter makes for a very unpleasant shower. Thankfully I replaced the low flow head, so now it’s just the filter causing issues. Hopefully that part can be fixed once I get my water test back from the lab next week.
A few years ago, we had the master bath remodeled. The shower fixtures were delayed because the Obama EPA had changed the plating method requirements for imports. Most of the fixtures we had purchased were already in the country, some were not and were on backorder while the manufacturer adjusted their plating system.
When everything was finally installed, the wall shower head put out water like OMWC trying to take a leak in the middle of the night during a prostate flare up. I asked the plumber to pull the restrictor and everything was fine.
The only problem I have now is that our hard water reacts with the metal in the plated fixtures and everything leaches copper sulfate. Everything has blue stains on it.
Gotta love the government. They’re here to help.
You should see our orange water.
Im on a well, but I dont have a ton of minerals. Just a whole lot of iron.
See what you get for wanting nice things!
I made the “shower” in my basement from some galvanized pipe, two ball valves, and an old showerhead from my parents house. That thing has more pressure than any shower I’ve ever been in. Oh, and it just uses the floor drain
Most the women who’ve visited don’t care for the aesthetics though.
Most women don’t appreciate what I do in my basement, either. It’s like they don’t even see the value in the pole. Small minds.
When I was around 12 we outfitted the basement to add 2 bedrooms for me and an older brother. By “outfit” I mean throw in the beds and a curtain to separate us. The surface of the giant octopus furnace provided some warmth in the winter. Then my mom’s boyfriend moved in and I got to share the room with my future step-brother. Fun times.
…and then you wrote up the experience for the Nifty stories archive?
“Most women don’t appreciate what I do in my basement, either. ”
I saw some movie about a guy, part-time seamstress IIRC, with a similar complaint.
Needs moar lotion on it’s skin
To bring this back to the topic at hand and not rampant speculation on my private matters, I do not use a low flow hose.
Why do you hate gaia ?
The only Gaia I ever met reminded me of my mother.
There is something to be said for not wasting, not wanting. If only there were a non coercive way of distributing resources without falling into the tragedy of the commons.
Maybe if the cost was related to the supply? Or is that just crazy talk?
OT: in a long dead thread you mentioned the long story why you learned Japanese. I’d definitely be curious. At some point when work settles down I’m going to try to put together a post about what has worked and not worked for me learning a second language. Probably in two sections things that non language specific followed by what’s worked and not worked for me specific to Japanese.
Here is some incentive, but as you’ve said before not for you… From my randomized generic J Pop list literally 2 minutes ago.
https://youtu.be/MBuJ5R2KBKo
It’s hard to go back 20+ years and figure out why, how you did something. Fog of time and all. I was going to write it up today and submit it. Haven’t submitted anything in a while. Given I have a hangover, I’m not clicking on that link.
I learned Kanji by just making time every evening to sit down and write them over and over. I did it with Fudepen – like a magic marker with an actual brush for a tip – but any pen will do. The main thing was setting and keeping a pace. 50 new Kanji every week. When you get to writing 1,000 characters every day drop the first 50 off the list (you’ve learned them by now anyway.) Do this and you will have the necessary character set in less than a year.
Same here. There are systems where you can learn how to read them, but not be proficient at writing them. It was fun being able to write them, so I never considered doing otherwise. I think age has a lot to do with it. I started at 28 or so and still had some folds in my brain where I could learn new stuff. At 49, my brain is smooth as a cue ball.
The other aspect of this age theory – 25+ years ago when I learned Kanji the only other method was flashcards. There were no electronic learning devices like the stuff they have today. IN the early-to-mid 90’s the WordTank came out with a flashcard feature but I never found it as good as just sitting down and writing them out. Something about nailing the stroke order that mentally broke them into radicals.
There is also the Helsig method. It didn’t work for me, but others swear by it. You memorize kanji, but not meaning. You fill in meaning as your vocabulary increases.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembering_the_Kanji_and_Remembering_the_Hanzi#Heisig's_method
I used a spaced repetition application on my iPad for about an hour a day. Took me about 19 months to get around 1,000.
I can’t write them for shit, but know enough radicals that if I see one I can get the stroke order correct.
I started from zero, but was in my early 40s when I started. Your brain doesn’t work the same as it did in your 20s. I’ve got lots of tricks to learning, but the lack of plasticity is noticeable. Motivated younger students kick my ass…
I’m 49 and still learning new programming shit all the time – I kind of have to. Hopefully it will help keep me sharp longer.
Same thing for me professionally. You never stop learning.
My mom was still sharp as a tack and learning the ‘puter into her seventies. Big inspiration.
I used to do the Sunday NYT crossword with my grandmother right up until she passed away. I’m hoping I’ve got her genes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_You_Are_Engulfed_in_Flames
If you think a bunch of comic essays about Japanese culture and trying to quite smoking, David Sedaris has the answer.
I take baths.
Bubbles and candles?
Or ice baths like a man?
Or like, you wake up in one with an organ removed kinda bath ?
Just to chop it up with something totes not gay .
There’s never a wrong time to get that not gay.
Halford is still awesome
I’ve listened to the first half of their new album and it’s great so far.
Halford is a beast. Would love to see him do something more with Bruce Dickinson while they both still have it.
Hit MY theme music.
http://archive.is/X5EPA
19’s shirt is not real functional, but something about it speaks to me.
Hey, can anyone tell me if Killing Eve is worth watching?
It has its moment. I wouldn’t have watched it without NewWife. Maybe have it on while you’re balancing your checkbook ?
I ate some Romaine hearts last week after the ban.
Not only did I not die, but I gained the Romaine’s courage.
I have some wilting in the refrigerator right now. I’m not sure if they;re still good, but if they are I’ll probably have a salad for lunch tomorrow.
You’re going to die.
Why eat salad?
I like bacon and ranch dressing, I add a couple of lettuce leaves for the crispness. Don’t worry, my diet is plenty full of meat and potatoes.
Take a wild guess whose fault E. Coli is.
It was either Trump, Nazis or some other shit.
My paralegal got sick from the romaine at some restaurant. Needless to say, she hasn’t felt great all week.
You shouldn’t be feeling your paralegal!
While we are talking about plumbing – does anybody know if there is a good product like a PVC T-fitting that clamps/glues to existing PVC pipe to make an additional line? I would like to add a T-fitting to my existing line without cutting/splicing in the T.
Like a saddle?
https://www.pvcfittingsonline.com/fittings/schedule-40-pvc/saddles.html
Used in irrigation. Would not use inside a home or for a waste line.
That’s what I was thinking. Only I need 1″ diameter. This would be an outdoor application so a very slow, slight drip wouldn’t bother me too much.
Man. My kid is six. He went through a youtube phase where he would watch vids of pull starting gas engines. It started with those soft porn vids of asian chicks kick starting scooters in mini skirts, then he saw the motorcycle kickstart vids in the sidebar and one day he found pull starting vids. He got obsessed and would ogle any garden equipment dept. at whatever store we’d be at.
So this year he says he wants a pull start mini bike. He got an all electric version last year and he rides it pretty competently. So, I start hunting for a cheap modern version of a Taco mini bike. There’s a slew of them available. Every time I click on one it says “not available for sale in California” Fuggin pisses me off to no end. Now, I gotta buy one off of craigslist and restore it, which isn’t likely to happen before xmas. Goddamn this state.
I mean, wouldn’t it be easier to just drive out of state, buy one, and bring it across commie lines?
Well, yeah, but it is around 400 miles to Px from here. Also, the newer one would be cheapanese. I’ll probably get him something else for xmas and then restore him one of the OG Tacos. I’m a mechanic so it’ll be easy enough.
This. I’m tempted to bring you one, man. I remember riding mini bikes on my great grandparents’ ranch in fucking Antioch. Cali is making me so sad.
Speaking of the environment… who doesn’t want to duovigintuple their electric bill?!
https://mobile.twitter.com/justinamash/status/1068274895962992641
Twitter comments: More ‘woosh’ sounds and missed points than a blind man’s drunken morning outing on opening day for deer season.
Is there a way to fix a shower massage? I don’t think the restrictor is plastic. I had an old, pre-regulation one that was great. Then I got a new one after I moved, and it sucks compared to the old one, so much that I don’t use it.
At lot of the fancier massage ones are also restricted by the hose. Replace the hose portion with an unrestricted hose like this: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00QNJV6QE/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Many years ago I worked doing water and energy conservation job where we would go in and (among other things) install low flow shower heads, toilet dams and sink aerators. I was doing this job with my Irish friend named Mick on a horrible ghetto apartment building. It was one collection of dreary horrors after another. One woman hadn’t seen her sink in years (it was buried under massive amount of dishes, trash and assorted detritus). One had two hookers and a ten year old kid in it, a crack pipe on the table, a vodka bottle in hand, and the OJ trial on the small tv. It was 10 AM. No, we do not want to party. The kid tried to leave with us and they grabbed him from the hallway.
We go back to one apartment that we had visited earlier but couldn’t go into because two guys were banging each other in. When we returned they were finished and one answered the door in tight whities. We entered the dingy ass apartment and went to change the showerhead. The fellow asked us if he could keep his showerhead. I opened the filthy shower door and their was a long coiled butt washer attachment on the outflow pipe before the showerhead. Mick says, “no we have to change it.” Ok Mick, you change it then. He gets in there with his channel locks and carefully removes the old showerhead without disturbing the butt washer. He turns on the water to test it and the water shoots through the butt washer like an electric snake and hits him square in the face with a stream. Mick was a tough man, but he looked like he was going to cry. I’m laughing my ass off as we run out the apartment. Mick runs to the nearest corner store and buys a bottle of Listerine and alcohol and proceeds to wash off in the street. I gave him shit for years about that.
One time I had a toilet clog really badly. I had a 102 degree fever and wasn’t thinking clearly. So after attempting to plunge, in one hasty moment, I decided to remove the toilet. I got the toilet off easy enough. After a long battle, I was finally fed up. I went to town with the plunger straight on the pipe. Finally, the clog broke free. I fell over. The pipe backsplashed shit water all over me and, to top it off I fell into the cpvc water supply line and broke it.
It was a shitty day.
I love that you bring tools to do this at hotels. Friggin awesome.
That’s fringing vulgaris.
Yrs muy phone shop peaks for me.
My shower is all kinds of fucked up…So moving on those big government folks, am I right?
Whatever, this place is boring, I have better things to do. *refreshes site for the next hour becomes I’m sad and alone*
Speaking of things the government fucks up, anyone bought a gas can lately?
Did you buy a red gas can or a yellow gas can? Either way you’re a rule breaker if you fill it while it’s in your trunk!
Yes, the new new ones are even worse than the old new ones. Spilled lots of gas thanks to the downright dangerous spring loaded nozzle. I hope the CPSC and whoever else pushed that crap get covered in gas and ignited over and over again.
I take off those spring loaded nozzles and am free to pout/huff as I choose.
How the fuck am I supposed to write this? I’ve spent the last two hours trying to put down on paper why I came to Japan in the first place. The story has to start with my childhood. It’s the core of why I’m here today, but the story suddenly becomes wildly elaborate and I’m not even sure that I’m not simply making stuff up. What was I thinking 20, 30, 40 years ago? I doubt I knew then what really motivated me and it feels dishonest (revisionist) to even try. The facts themselves are murky and I’m sure that I’m getting the order of events wrong. Regardless, it’s been eye opening to realize that I don’t know even my own life experiences very well.
Ask a Climate scientist, they are all knowing.
Actually thought of you Wisconsin glibs as I wrote. I’m not being very kind to rural Wisconsin in the piece. Think I’m coming across as an arrogant ass. (Nothing new there, though).
It is a culture of rural folks confounded by new fangled things interspersed by The Packers and getting drunk. It’s not high faloutin, but an enjoyable existence. If you want to be just left alone. Not for everybody.
That’s what I’m beginning to see; it’s not about Wisconsin, but more about how I viewed it.
And I know, western Wisconsin isn’t the same as it is here in central Wisconsin even now. We’re all the descendants of happy go lucky Germans and Pollack’s who just want to get drunk and have fun.
I did the whole leaving thing. I hated this place. Then I missed picking apples off a tree in my own yard, not having to worry about who my neighbor is because I only see them a few times a year. And most importantly, beer being sold all the fucking time everywhere, between 9pm and 6am.
My problem was more cultural. The number of broken families, domestic violence, alcoholism etc.
I’m about 10 years younger than you if I remember right, and from central Wisconsin not western Wisconsin, so my experience is a bit different, we had all the drinking, but no broken families. I only knew what divorce was because of movies. I mean, my uncle married my aunt after he was divorced, but that was a decade before I was born. And domestic violence didn’t rear it’s head in my life until around 1997 when my neighbor, the nicest guy you could ever meet until he was drunk started harming the neighbor kids I babysat, then we hid them in my bedroom in the attic one night when he was on a bender. First and only incident I’ve had to deal with on that.
Anyway, I should sleep now, but these very differences in out similar life experiences are why I don’t think many laws should be enacted even on a scale so large as a state. I sleep now.
I moved to Las Vegas because no one believed I would. That was the extent of my motivation for my one time gallivant around the
worldcountry.I first came to Japan because the military sent me – but I had long been interested in Asia and Japan in specific so it was something I looked forward to.
I chose to come back after getting out of the military, getting an education, and some work experience. Why? I wanted to know what it was like to live a) someplace other than the US, and b) in Japan in specific. I figured I would stay for 5 to 10 years… it’s been a lot longer than that.
I never really felt all that homesick about the US – until my most recent trip back there. I recently figured what it is: I am feeling like I am not only growing old here but I might never live in the US again. I’m not really comfortable with that. I can’t see leaving Japan forever but I want to be able to enjoy being in the US for more than a week or two at a time.
#believeallgaijin