Adventures in plumbing

We had a drain in one of the sinks that would not work. Three different plumbers looked at it, and no one could figure out why it is so. It drained fine when the flow of water was low, but then, as I increased the flow and the water overwhelmed the drain hole, it would start making bubbles, and stop draining.

Clearly, the problem was in ventilation. For the water to drain, air needs to be provided to take its place as the water goes down the pipe. Not enough air was the problem. But how to fix it? One of the plumber cut in a vent with a one-way valve to let the air in - no dice.

Finally, one day the faucet broke. The little plastic nuts that held it to the sink cracked in two. I procrastinated for a while, but recently I finally got around to replacing it.

Now, here in the US, it seems that when you buy the faucet, you also get the drain pipe that goes from the drain in the sink to the elbow under it. Seems like a waste to me, but I guess it allows for matching the faucet and the ring around the hole. Since my old faucet was chrome, and the new was chrome too, I debated with myself whether I should just leave the old drain assembly alone. I was glad I did not.

Turns out, the plumber who installed the drain first was an incompetent SOB. In every sink I ever seen (even the ones in Russia) I noticed a presence of a hole in porcelain, high up on the edge of the sink. I always thought that the hole was for "emergency drain", in the case we plug the normal drain and forget to turn off the water. Well, I was wrong. Turns out, the hole goes through the body of the sink, all the way to the big drain hole, and joins it. The drain hole assembly is not a solid pipe - it's got 4 huge cutouts on each side. Through these cutouts the hole on the side of the sink delivers - air! - for the water to go down. In my case, the left-handed baboon who installed the sink filled the entire drain hole with the plumber putty, plugging the little hole on the side that provided the ventilation. And the 3 or 4 plumbers who saw it since could not diagnose the problem.

Of course, after I replaced the drain assembly and cleaned up the vent hole, I now have a perfect flow in that sink. But I still deplore the level of skill in our local handymen. One of those who saw this sink was a plumber with 20 years of experience! And no one could figure out what's wrong. I really expected better from US workers. Do they not care about customers? Do they not care about their own craft? Pretty disgusting...