More Waste

 

For those of you in construction, this will be no surprise. You are always on a tight time line and any disruption in the schedule is costly. An example of this occurred up in Maine where my daughter and son- in-law have a contractor building a new kitchen in their very old house.

 

The problem started when, as part of the project, they wanted to rough in the plumbing for a new bathroom above the kitchen while everything was torn up. Everything was going along fine until the plumber who was on the job rejected the cheap shower stall pan purchased by my daughter at a national hardware chain store. He said it would crack, leak, and was generally inferior. He convinced them that they needed a fiberglass one and that he could get one by the next morning.

 

So they agreed, and the next morning came and the plumber was there with the shower base. Unfortunately after the hole was cut in the floor and the waste line was run to the shower base, it was discovered that there was a defect in the location of the drain hole in the shower base. It was very slightly misplaced and therefore would not let the pipe flange gasket seat properly. So the project was held up until a replacement shower base could be shipped.

 

Meanwhile, down below on the kitchen side of the project, the dry wallers couldn’t complete the drywall, because the plumbing was not completed overhead. And then of course the dry wall finishers couldn’t do their work so that my daughter and son-in-law could put on the first coat of paint over the weekend. So the whole project was delayed about a week.

 

But there is more to the story. It turns out, upon further investigation, that the poorly manufactured shower base delivered to my daughter’s house had actually been to another construction site where another plumber had undoubtedly run into the same problem and sent it back to the warehouse. The warehouse instead of junking it, sent it to my daughters house where the same routine was repeated.

 

To add insult to injury, a replacement shower stall was hurriedly shipped, and it too was defective. Finally, on the third attempt, a good shower stall base was obtained and installed.

 

I won’t claim to have done an exhaustive study of the cost of this debacle. But a quick examination would certainly lead to the conclusion that it cost several thousand dollars just because a mold at a factory that makes fiberglass shower stall bases was off about  inch. And there is no way to put a dollar amount on the stress and ill will that is generated when things like this happen. It is a real waste! What was lost can never be retrieved.

 

Well the shower stall is installed and the drywall is done and painted. Now the issue is the countertops that arrived warped to the extent that they are not usable. But that is a story for another time.