Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

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aelectricalman

aelectricalman

Senior Member
Location
KY
Nightmare Installations - excerpt from EC&M's
Blame the Plumber
After 25 years in the service business, I've realized you never see it all. A customer once called me and explained when she turned the water on in the kitchen sink her door chime would ring. Of course I said I'd be right over because I had to see this one first hand. Sure enough she turned on the water and the chime went off. My first thought was a possible grounding problem with the cold water bonding. I tested the grounding system and the chime system with no luck. Never one to give up, I explained I needed to sleep on it. The next day I returned and asked the customer if it would ring when she turned on the cold water, the hot, or both. She didn't know so we tested it, and it only rang with the hot water on. Then I asked if she'd recently had any plumbing work done, and it turned out she'd had the whole house repiped. I went into the attic and found the problem. The new hot water line was laying across the front door button wiring. When the hot water was turned on and the pipe heated up, the connection was made. The plumber had slightly nicked the insulation on the bell wire during the pipe installation, but it only made contact between the two conductors when the hot water was turned on.
Greg Charrier
Huntington Beach, Calif.


Funny stuff
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

My question is how does heating the pipe make the doorbell ring? The pipe is stationary and theres always water in the pipe. It seems like this is a tall tale.
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

Isnt the pipe "copper" For the bell wire to make connection it would have to be heated causing the copper in the wire to expand. This would take a lot of heat and over time.

Now, if the pipe rattled or "banged" when the water was turned on, I could see this happening but I find it hard to believe. But then again, there is a first time for everything.

I think you should write a fairy tale book for this one.
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

My guess would be that it had nothing at all to do with temperature. As if heating the pipe 10 or 20 or how ever many degrees expanded the pipe enough to make contact or something.

I think it would be that the pipe shifts when the water is turned on or off.
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

I have seen this story over at www.powerlineman.com .

There was another story over there about somebody's dog barking instead of the telephone ringing. Turns out that their telephone line had the ringers connected tip to ground and because of a broken ground wire the overhead wire in the dog run and the dog were serving as the ground!

Poor dog!
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

I have one better happened about 5 years ago when a service crew was sent to add a phone in a den adjacent to the garage,no problem right yeah right.Bone head tied the dgo system in with the phone system and every time the phone rang the garage door would open or close depending upon the position :D Sad but true ;)
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

Dude, I know this guy who had some chick in a hotel room, when he woke up the next morning there was a note telling him to go to the hospital cause his liver was gone. :cool:
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

George, don't let the missing liver bother you, there are those who wake up with out a code book. :eek: :eek: :eek:

Roger
 
Re: Turn on the hot water, and the doorbell rings. :D

Hey, where's my "how to get away with stuff" book? :(
 
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