Tonight’s Unplanned Project – Dealing with a Broken Shower Head Pipe
 The shower head broke off in my hand, so I had to take the pipe for it out of the wall to fix it
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 A piece of the shower head pipe was left behind in the wall pipe, so I had to get it out without damaging the threads. I cut about halfway into it in several spots with a hacksaw blade
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 After gingerly weakening the metal in a few spots with the hacksaw, I pried it out with needlenose pliers and screwdriver
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 I got out all of the old pipe without damaging the threads, then I scrubbed it clean
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I had a rare evening planned tonight – doing nothing. My plan was foiled when the shower head suddenly broke off in my hand when I tried to adjust it slightly. I couldn’t put off fixing it, because it’s our only shower. A piece of shower head pipe was left behind inside the pipe where it connected in the wall. I was actually lucky that whoever did the original plumbing didn’t do it correctly, because the pipe in the wall wasn’t attached to the framing. I was able to turn it freely where it connected to the tub’s pipes, and pull it out of the wall. So at least I didn’t have to cut a hole in the wall.
The trick was getting the piece of broken shower head pipe out of the wall pipe without damaging the threads. I was able to do it – see the pictures. My neighbor is a plumber – I gave him a call and he happened to have an extra shower head pipe in the back of his truck to replace my broken one, which was especially nice because Home Depot was already closed. So it’s all fixed now – not exactly the relaxing evening I had in mind, but it could have been worse.
