Flooded bathroom - Anyone else made a silly DIY mistake?

[Deleted User]

Came home tonight and replaced the flush cone in our bathroom toilet. Noticed a leak under the cistern so removed the pipe. I then thought I would test the leak by flushing the loo……while I had the pipe in my other hand. Must have been a moment of madness.

I felt so bloody stupid. 8 litres of water doesn’t sound much until it’s on the floor. 

Was more worried about the mrs seeing it so grabbed 5 towels and mopped it up. The mrs is now more annoyed at the mess I have made with the towels she washed and dried this week. 

Think I will be sleeping in the cats room tonight. 

Luckily everything is drying out now and it doesn’t seem to have made its way through the bathroom floor thank god. 

flashg67

I've had many a DIY 'doh' moment - you're only daft if you repeat the mistake I guess. I once plumbed a bathroom with all the hot & cold mixed up - which meant the toilet was filling with lovely expensive warm water until I sorted it...

bolwin1

Another bathroom mishap here. Whilst using a combination of brute force & ignorance to remove the skirting boards in a bathroom in a previous home, I managed to puncture a 80 gallon hot water cylinder. The hole was right at the very bottom of the cylinder & there was no way of plugging it or getting anything under it. Flooded the hall below the bathroom in about 10 minutes

FaceHead

This is shaping up into a good thread. 

While rewiring (the bathroom as it happens, adding a shaver socket), having removed all the floorboards in the bathroom, I got sick of balancing on the joists, so used a spare piece of laminate removed from another room across the joists to give myself a board to stand on.

I promptly found myself in the kitchen. 

[Deleted User]

All sorted now, the floor has dried out and the original leak is fixed. Won’t be making that mistake again. For the sake of a £1.45 part, I made 3 hours work. 

flashg67 said:

I've had many a DIY 'doh' moment - you're only daft if you repeat the mistake I guess. I once plumbed a bathroom with all the hot & cold mixed up - which meant the toilet was filling with lovely expensive warm water until I sorted it...

You might have wondered why there was steam coming out the toilet 😁

bolwin1 said:

Another bathroom mishap here. Whilst using a combination of brute force & ignorance to remove the skirting boards in a bathroom in a previous home, I managed to puncture a 80 gallon hot water cylinder. The hole was right at the very bottom of the cylinder & there was no way of plugging it or getting anything under it. Flooded the hall below the bathroom in about 10 minutes

Sounds bad. I thought tonight while cleaning up my mess that I’m pleased it wasn’t the water cylinder leaking. I think if that ever develops a fault, I will call a plumber 👍 

Gavin83

Ohh I have several:

Removed the waste from under the kitchen sink to fix an issue. Without thinking I poured the trap fall of water down the disconnected sink. Thankfully not much water and most of it ended up on me. Felt like a right banana.

Managed to put a screw through a pipe I didn’t know was there. Luckily I only just caught it so it barely leaked.

I needed to move some radiator pipes upstairs. When draining the central heating system I thought I’d judge it and drain enough for upstairs and leave the downstairs system mostly full. I didn’t judge it well enough. Cut through the pipe, water !!!!!! everywhere. Felt like a right knob but managed to stem it quite quickly (had some push fit stop ends on standby) and it didn’t cause any perm damage to the plasterboard.

Almost gone through the ceiling below several times but dodged it so far.

Been quite lucky so far. Let’s see if it lasts!

Phantom151

I managed to remove the entire lockshield valve from the pipework while trying to loosen the nut to the radiator. Water spurted about 6 feet up the wall. Filthy water all over the part of a cream carpet I foolishly thought I'd covered enough of. I wasn't popular...

[Deleted User]

Phantom151 said:

I managed to remove the entire lockshield valve from the pipework while trying to loosen the nut to the radiator. Water spurted about 6 feet up the wall. Filthy water all over the part of a cream carpet I foolishly thought I'd covered enough of. I wasn't popular...

I have done this as well. Bled a radiator but showered the room. It’s amazing how highly pressured the water is in them. 

Also done the drilling through a pipe thing. 

Alanp

In my first house I was installing a new socket for an economy 7 storage heater, taking up the chipboard floor I used a jigsaw, straight through the cold water feed to the bathroom, luckily it was the cold water and managed to turn it off quickly, not too much damage caused, but a mistake never repeated 

pmartin86

Gavin83 said:

Ohh I have several:

Removed the waste from under the kitchen sink to fix an issue. Without thinking I poured the trap fall of water down the disconnected sink. Thankfully not much water and most of it ended up on me. Felt like a right banana.

I've done something very similar - Removed the trap, then proceeded to start "washing it" in the sink...

TELLIT01

Gavin83 said:

Ohh I have several:

Removed the waste from under the kitchen sink to fix an issue. Without thinking I poured the trap fall of water down the disconnected sink. Thankfully not much water and most of it ended up on me. Felt like a right banana.

I suspect that must be one of the most common ones to happen.  It seems such a logical thing to do with the water when there's a sink nice and handy.