Maintenance Happenings 2021

Updated 17 November 2021

Maintenance Happenings Archives 2021

posted 21 August 2021
August 2021 Maintenance Happenings Slab Leak Impacts 40 Residents for 13 Hours A slab leak in the laundry of a bottom floor unit in the 4831 Lago Building, required that water was turned off from around 10:30 am to 11:30 pm for both the 4831 Building and the 4791 Building which affected 40 units. Immediate Response Powerstone dispatch a plumber when a leak was reported early in the morning. When the plumber arrived, water was turn off along with the boiler to the 4831 and 4791 buildings around 10:30AM. The plumber cut into the dry wall in the unit's laundry room to track down the leak. It was also discovers that an outside patio shutoff valve did not work and replaced. Looking inside the drywall, it was concluded that the leaks was coming from underneath the slab and that cement had to be removed to locate the broken pipe. Another Plumber Unfortunately, this plumber did not have the tools to perform concrete removal. Powerstone then contacted James Le Court Plumbing to remove the concrete and finish the job. This became an after hours job when two Le Court plumbers arrived at 7:00pm. They removed portions of the cement to reveal the broken pipe. They then rebuilt the piping in the concrete and behind the drywall to repair the leak. The water was turned backed on along with the boiler at 11:30 pm for both buildings. Neighbors Helped Several neighbors assisted in this emergency. Seems the combination lock to the boiler was jammed. So the plumber had jumped the fence at 10:30am to turn of the boiler when he turned off the water. Later, resident Mike Peduzzi was able to spray silicon on the lock to get it unlocked. This allowed Le Court to to quickly turn the boiler back on when the piping was fixed. Arriving home from work, our resident plumber Henry Godina who lives above the slab leak unit, provided the Le Court plumbers a sharper pipe cutter from his own tools to speed the repairs. Grunion Jacuzzi Shutdown In the middle of August, the Grunion Jacuzzi was shutdown because the filters had holes in them and the Pool maintenance crew consider it to be safety. This was not fixed for about a week until with a work order was generated. The vendor replaced not only the Jacuzzi filters but also the Pool filters at the same time, though the Poolwas never shutdown. ■

posted 16 August 2021
2021 Maintenance Happenings Luke Warm Water by Michael Barto The biggest problem that faced Harbour Vista this year, was the lack of hot water for the three Grunion buildings. Over the last six months, things deteriorated to where more and more residents could get nothing but luke warm water. On August 3rd, a meeting was held with two vendors and Treasurer Mariette van den Bersselaar. The results of that meeting and the immediate follow-on with physical inspection and adjustment of boilers and plumbing systems seems to have finally fixed this issue. The following describes the mistakes that were made and what led to a solution. Grunion Hot Water System The hot water system at Grunion consist of two boilers each serving three building. Each side of the middle building is served by a different Boiler. The *16521 Boiler* serves the 16521 Building and the North half of 16551 Building and the 16581 Boiler serves the South side of the 16551 Building and the 16581 Building. These boilers were installed in 2018. Sediment in the Lines More than eight months ago, a resident in the 16521 Grunion Building reported yellow colored water and clogging of her plumbing fixtures. Boiler maintenance was performed. But the problem did not go away. Missing Strainers It came to the attention of the HOA, that strainer, which collect sand and sediment, were never installed in the boilers. Strainers were installed in February of this year. That seemed to solve the sediment issue in some cases. Draining the Building It was decided to drain the 16521 Boiler reservoir system and to drain all the hot water pipes in 16521 Grunion building. This draining did reduce the sediment issue. What It Entailed Draining of the 16521 Building was accomplished by installing new taps at each stack shutoff valve (both input and return). These stacks consist of input and return shutoff valves on he outside of the building. It was assumed at the time that there were only four stacks in the Building. The taps were installed that supported the two bedrooms unit. The plumbers completely missed the three bedroom stacks (another 4 stacks). Evidently, Powerstone did not know this and neither did many residents. Luke Warm Water Even though the sediment issue was gone, a new problem started to appear, with residents experiencing luke warm water. This problem began with the units facing west of the 16521 Building and slowly progressed through the rest of the building. It also eventually started to occur on the South half of the 16551 Building. At the same time, even though served by the another boiler system (16581 Boiler), the South half of 16551 Grunion and the 16581 Grunion Building started to also experience luke warm water. Cross Over The next proposal was to replace any old “Mixet” valves still existed in units that were installed when the complex was build in 1980. As Mixet valves age, both their cartridge and the valve themselves deteriorate allowing hot and cold lines to cross even when they are off. Though not specifically affecting the unit with the defective valve, because this is a shared system, these faulty Mixet valves may affect the other units on the lines. Haphazard Replacement To rreplaced the Mixet valves, at least three different plumbers were contracted by Powerstone. The plumbers in many cases were confused as to what they were expected to do. Despite the effort of HOA Treasurer Mariette van den Bersselaar to coordinate the effort, plumbers show up at a resident doors unannounced with no instructions and no one coordinating the effort. Nobody Cares The May, June and July HOA meetings had many member strongly expressing that no one seem to care about this issue. HOA President Mary Williams did have a meeting with the Property Manager Matt Bosma and his management about this issue. Mary has never provided any summary or resolution coming out of this meeting. Boiler Maker Boiler company vendor Laars sent a technician to evaluate if the boilers were installed properly. During that inspection, one circulating pump was replaced because of corrosion. But it had no discernible impact. July HOA Meeting At the July HOA Meeting, the property Manager Matt Bosma, announced that Mariette van den Bersselaar was now the point person for this problem. Matt also announced that there would be a meeting held onsite with the plumbing vendors which Mariette was asked to lead. Meeting with Two Vendors The meeting was held on August 3rd with ProStar and Dry Master. ProStar had been assigned by Powerstone to be exclusively responsible for the Boiler and Dry Master was assigned exclusive responsibility for the plumbing of the buildings. The goal of the meeting was to solve a simple problem to hot to eveyone one of the fixtures that the fixtures that the boiler services. The 16521 Boiler After the meeting, the vendor representatives adjourned to inspect the boilers and the plumbling system with Mariette and her assistant Michael Barto. They first looked at the 16521 Boiler. ProStar cleaned the strainer and removed a half of cup of sediment sand. ProStar turned off all the boiler valves and then turned them back on. ProStar then individually drain the three return lines that ran from the buildings to the boiler. Draining Each return line drained first as luke warm water with spurts of air pockets in the line. A significant amount of air was bled from the line before it finally heated up to hot water. Each draining took almost twenty minutes before the return water became hot. This same process was repeated for the *16581 Boiler* and once again, a significant amount of air was bled and it took a long time. Checking with the Residents After this process, many residents confirmed that they had hot water. What was the Cause? No one can say for sure what caused this. Plumbing systems are complex. But bleeding the air may have been the secret. With so many plumbers, the boilers had been turned on and off over many months which allowed air in the pipes to accumulate and not be properly drained. Hopefully, a new Board will provide better direction to Powerstone to improve communication and coordination with residents. ■ Editor Notes: The plumbing companies are only as good as the people that work for them. Right now the person from ProStar explained more to me than the previous Boiler vendor. But then I never asked these questions from the other vendor. It has become obviously to me that poor maintenance practices and lack of understanding allowed this system to deteriorate. The previous vendor was directed to drain all of the 16521 building and install taps in each stack, but missed half the stacks. The ProStar person says we need a lot of draining to remove air every time the water is turned off. But the next boiler person may not know this. The issues with these vendors may be caused by not having an on-site contact to provide coordination. This problem was all being handled at arms length by Powerstone and the Board President. Mariette provided the following action items from the results of August 3rd for Powerstone and the new Board: Plumbers to continue to ferret out crossover in all of the buildings. Follow recommended practice for the monthly water shutdown: each valve on the boiler system must be bled for 10 to 20 mins or until air and cold water are bled, and the Wye strainer cleaned. a. Residents to call regular Powerstone number with each new occurrence of lack of hot water in kitchen or bathrooms.

posted 3 June 2021

May 2021 Maintenance Happenings

My Sidewalk is Gone

Residents awoke up on May 25th, to find the sideway to their condo was a dirt gully with caution tape blocking the path. This was very inconvenient timing for this was the start of the Memorial Day weekend. Residents and visitors had to navigate the new obstacle course or go around using another path to come and go from their condo.

Broken Concrete, Roots and Wiring

The 16551 Grunion Walkway became particularly hazardous as the broken concrete remained until the next day. The exposed path showed large root exposed. These will need to be cleared prior to laying new

concrete. During the removal, large tree roots were chopped back leaving a tree on this walkway in a precariously position. This tree was finally removed eight days later on Saturday June 5, 2021.

Electrical Conduit and Sprinkler Mud Pits

On the walkway between 4831 and 4791 Lago, a broken conduit line and wiring were exposed in the new gully.

Waiting for the concrete to be pored for the new walkways, sprinkler are going off creating a mud in these exposed gullies. Residents asked if some wooden boards could be put down during the construction. Unfortunately the size of the boards was not specified and only 1X2 boards were put down in some places. You got to be kidding me?

Roof Repair

The entire roof for Grunion garages #41 to #50 was replaced in late May. The vendor posted notices at each garage to make sure that no one had their car parked in the garage. This was a good idea as part of the plywood under roofing was replaced. But this was not without incident, as nails were left in the some garage floor and one resident had their bike dropped to the floor from the hooks it was attached.■

posted 25 May 2021

More April 2021 Maintenance Happenings

The Great Flush

On April 19th an entourage of Benrick plumbing trucks showed up at Harbour Vista to flush both hot and cold water lines at of the 16521 Grunion Building. This was a request from the Board to resolve an issue with sediment in the water. Though similar issues are affect all Buildings at Harbour Vista, it was decided to initially flush one building and if results seem promising then to flush the other buildings.

Common Boiler

Both 16521 and half of 16551 Grunion Buildings share the same hot water boiler and the cold water systems. Even though this flushing was only for the 16521 Grunion Building, both the hot and cold water system needed to be shutoff for 16521 and half of 16551 Grunion Buildings

The Stacks

The Grunion side of Harbour Vista uses a plumbing system where both hot and cold water systems are split to individually controlled stacks of five unit each with four

stacks per building. Benrick Service decided to enlarge the draining spigots at each stack control valve located at each of the four gas meter set of the 16521 Grunion Building. Hot water goes into the building and is returned to the Building through two shutoff valves. Cold water has only one shutoff valve into the building. This required some new piping and soldering.

Each Stack was Flushed

Each hot water Stack was flushed and the cold water system drained via a hose to the roadway. The drain water was checked for excess sediment. The boiler system was also flushed. Some sediment was notice. The cold water pressure is also higher than the hot water, but not in any great significants.

Jury Still Out

Hopefully this will reduce this sediment issue. But the jury is still out on that conclusion. Meanwhile another issue has risen where members are not getting hot water. But that is for another story.■

posted 24 May 2021

April 2021 Maintenance Happenings

I Have Been Stumped

In late April, several trees were removed on the Blackbeard side leaving some stumps. Residents now noticed their walkway are brighter or naked depending how you look at it.

Tree Trimming in Late April

Following the stumping, several trees were trimmed at the Lago Gate to Heil. These guys like to climb trees.

Strainers Clean

Also in April, The HOA had all the boilers strainer cleaned. The strains are to prevent build up a sentiment in the water from the City.. As shown below, this stainer


*strainer*

is contained in a 45 degree shutoff where sand is drop to the bottom and then drained.

For this maintenance, the water did not need to be shut off. But the plumbing service Benrick provide a crew of four truck to do it.

Good Neighbor

During this effort, a resident could not start his car because of a dead battery. One of the Benrick worker was nice enough to provide him a jump when he was leaving the property. ■

posted 31 March 2021

March 2021 Maintenance Happenings

Gas Leak forces Cabana Jacuzzi Close

The Cabana Jacuzzi has been closed going on two weeks. Gas smell was noticed by a resident who was walking in the afternoon by the area on a Sunday, March

21st. This was verified by a Board members who called the Gas Co. The Gas Company came out immediately and red tagged the meter and shutoff the gas. Le Court plumbing investigated the situation on March 25th and has reported what needs to be done to repair this system. Powerstone will report to the Board. In the meantime and as of this writing, the Jacuzzi will remain closed.

Barbecue Maintenance

The HOA had all the Barbecues at Harbour Vista clean this month. This was extensive cleaning as shown in the pictures. This cleaning required a crew of two and a couple of hours for each barbecue. The HOA has cleaning of the Barbecues scheduled as on-deman bases. ■

posted 18 January 2020 (updated)
Maintenance Happenings Grunion Walkway Slab Leak On January 11th, a resident noticed a puddle of water between garages #6 and #7 on the Grunion Side. Concerned residents contacted Parking Committee Chairman Brenda Richardson, and posted a message to the Harbour Vista HOA Discussion List. Brenda Richardson, contacted Powerstone and the Board. An emergency crew arrived a little after 2PM. They concluded that the sidewalk near garage #10 had a cracked pipe coming from the main water line. The water was shut off for 16581 Grunion and half of 16551 Grunion. The Board authorized the repairs. The crew used jack hammers to break the cement walkway. They discovered that a main irrigation line had broken and new fittings were installed. The water was turned back on to the buildings around 6:40PM. Cement work to restore the walkway still needs to be undertaked. A plywood board currently covers the repairs with road work cones placed around to warn residents. Residence Took the Initiative Several residents took the initiative to notify people about this water leak, contacting neighbors, the Board and Powerstone. The HOA Parking Committee Chairman Brenda Richardson coordinated with Powerstone and the maintenance crew for the prompt repair. For future issues, Brenda Richardson has her cell phone number posted at the Newsletter (714) 501-7018 [text message OK] and you can also email her at ldybug1997@gmail.com. Editor Note: A couple of months ago on the Cabana side, there was a leak, which no one reported for two days. See Water Leak. In Febuary, the walkway was fixed.

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