Q. When I stayed recently in an old cottage during Shabbos, a pipe of hot water split and started leaking heavily. There was no option to close the water intake (It was very rusty), or to summon a non – Jew.
Could one fix that pipe by covering the split with heavy self-adhesive plastic tape, without tearing it?
A. Horav Shlomo Miller’s Shlit’a opinion is that one cannot use self-adhesive plastic tape even when not tearing it, as it constitutes ‘Tikun Mana’ or fixing an utensil. However, one may wrap a plastic bag around the pipe and hold it in place by using rubber bands.
Rabbi A. Bartfeld as revised by Horav Dovid Pam, Horav Aharon Miller and Horav Chanoch Ehrentreu Shlit’a.