I’ve not ever yet used PEX. In fact I know it is primarily used in radiant hot water floor systems but that’s really all I know about it. I keep saying “some day I need to learn more about it” and that some day is here.
Having just bought a log home in the mtns of TN I came to find that down there they build their homes with very little copper for their water supplies. They mostly will copper stub out close to the water supply and then from there use PEX throughout the whole house, including inside walls, joists, etc. , at least that is what I saw in the variety of homes I looked at buying. I’ll be traveling down there now to do renovations of which plumbing will be a part.
I’d love for someone to share with me all they know about PEX as for use in a potable water system. For example, some of the questions I have are…how do you connect it to a copper water line? It’s flexible and may be bent? How do you attach valves (shutoffs)? Is there any gluing involved? How do you make splices? In general how are connections made from PEX to PEX and from PEX to copper, to CPVC, etc, etc. Plus other questions I’m sure to think of later like would it be considered superior to copper or considered the “cheap shot” way to do a job?
If someone knows a lot about PEX please reply and just give me a braindump and educate me on everything you know. Don’t leave out minor details either, just wanna learn alll there is to know about it. Also what applications is PEX NOT a good solution?
Replies
Well, not a subject that lends itself to a post in my opinion. Really involved. To start with try http://www.wirsbo.com and see if they are offering a seminar in your area. Since you are a contractor if you sign up with a local supplier you can go for free which gets yo certified etc.
There are a number of different systems on the market. In our area Wirsbo and Quest are the two used primarily. Wirsbo uses and expansion system where the tubing is expanded over the fitting. Quest uses a crimp ring to attach to the fittings. There are a couple of other systems out there and all require special tools and at least some knowledge in plumbing to get you going.
Cost is about the same + or - 10% of copper but the labor going in is about 1/2. Really nice stuff if you are snaking through a 2 story with plaster walls. Much easier that doing it with soft copper. We really like it and us it some but most houses we work on are coper and since we remodel/repair we use what system they have except in special circumstances. DanT
Are you sure it's PEX? There was another type of plastic pipe used as supplies a while back that caused all kinds of problems. I think there were class-action lawsuits. In my area, PEX is just now starting to catch on for supply piping. Only copper was used. I think the code just changed to allow it.
The system for making joints in PEX that I saw was slick. A brass coupling was inserted into the ends of the PEX and a big crimper was used to squeeze a copper ring around the pipe. Took about 10 seconds.
Al Mollitor, Sharon MA
That other system was polybutylene.Here is an article on it http://www.cbc.ca/consumers/market/files/home/pipes/identify.htmlhttp://www.polybutylene.com/poly.html
The earliest polybutelene systems used plastic (acetel?) fittings and crimp bands. They were the ones with the most problems.The first fix was to change the crimp bands to copper which was an improvement but not the solution. (See Pic)PolyB systems in my area with metal crimp bands and metal fittings rarely give any more problems than all copper systems.And PEX is, of course, a very different system.I don't know about yours, but my church isn't a hotel for the holy, it's a hospital for sinners
Sojourners: Christians for Justice and Peace
"In my area, PEX is just now starting to catch on for supply piping."
In my area, PEX has been popular for probably 7 to 10 years. In fact my own, 5 yr old house is plumbed in it.
To the initial poster: You need to get the PEX crimper tools. I say tools because you need a seperate tool for each size of pipe you need to work with. The tools are around $100 each +-. Maybe they now have universal, but I have never seen one. Matt
Yoiu're talking about the gray polybutylene (sp) plastic, yea that stuff is banned anymore, the fittings failed after heating/cooling over time. This was PEX that I saw, stamped on the side.
10 seconds to do a joint. wow.
it was quest tubbing that had the problems , i think it was taken off the market though , quest tubbing was grey and not see through like pex
not see through like pex
? All the pex we use here is either red or blue...plumbers use red for HW, blue for CW....it's a nice touch.....
PEX tubing comes in white, in translucent, and in different colours. Some manufacturers offer colour coding, which is handy. It's all cross-linked poly-ethylene though.
Some of the radiant floor PEX is designed to be permeable to O2, some not, depending on the liquid used to convey heat.
here' the secret...a 'manablock', along with a few hundred dollars worth of crimpers and fittings - stuff is easy - you can take the copper to the manablock or transition using a fitting from your PEX supplier -
View Image View Image
That's pretty slick and I saw one home with a manifold similar to that one. Only prob I see with the manifold system is...waste? How much more is it, materials and laborwise to "home run" ever water line instead of just tapping off a nearby line?
Only prob I see with the manifold system is...waste?
depends on the situation, I'm sure - the manifold/home run thing eliminates fittings and their propensity to leak, and provides the shutoff capacity for each fixture - you can buy several feet of line for the price of a couple of fittings/valves and the labor to install them - not to mention how clean an install a home run is...
- I don't want to decieve anyone into thinking I'm any kind of expert - I've assisted on two installations -
"there's enough for everyone"
Last house I did had 2-4 piece baths, 1 half bath, laundry, kitchen,ice maker fridge, and hot and cold in the garage, no outside taps. I used 700' of wirsbo doing a homerun system. Whole system roughed in 4 hours. I use copper in the mechanical room to about the 7' height and then go to pex. Looks much better.
that's all modulars use....
ROAR!!!!
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming
WOW!!! What a Ride!
A few things to look for with PEX (e.g., common mistakes in my area:)
Insufficient support: max 32" for horizontal (some manufacturers say 48") 60" for vertical
Too tight a bend - minimum radius: 5-6x times outside diameter
Improperly protected when passing through metal studs (or sheetmetal - some plumbers seem to love to run it through metal duct)
Exterior exposure (not intended for any more than temporary UV exposure during construction)
Holes through wood framing need to be 1/4" larger than the OD
Insufficient planning for expansion with temp changes.
I don't know about yours, but my church isn't a hotel for the holy, it's a hospital for sinners
Sojourners: Christians for Justice and Peace
I'm not a big fan of Pex.
Maybe most of my problems are with crappy installation.
Amoung the Pex installations that I have seen, they can be even worse than the soft copper...loops of piping going all over the place in the crawl (why plan ahead when I can just bend it to meet when I get there...).
One of the benefits is no fittings in the middle of the run, but then the corners cannot be turned tightly and so the corners just look bad which discourages attempts to have everything else be neat.
I know that there is a shutoff for every fitting at the manifold, but I want a shutoff right there at the sink.
Once the Pex comes up through the floor and into the cabinet, it has no stiffness to it and leans this way and that (especially if there is a shutoff valve).
If my house was plumbed with the manifold system, it would drive me nuts. Right now, after I take a shower I can go to the sink to shave and the hot water is right there. With the manifold, I would have to wait all over again.
All that said, clearly Pex is a godsend when your trying to run through existing walls in a multistory home (as someone pointed out above).
Also, supposedly Pex can stand up to freezing without splitting open, so it may be a good choice when you are faced with runs in exterior walls.
And Pex does play well with other children. It is very easy to connect to copper and (I believe) almost any other kind of pipe with compression fittings.
A very recent job I did was replacing a bunch of Pex with copper. The water line from the street coming up in the crawl was 3/4" soft copper, but rather old. It had been continued to the utility room with Pex. I replace that run with soldered copper, but I couldn't get a soldered joint to work at that old soft copper pipe. It is a bit beat up...slightly pitted...it just wouldn't clean up.
So the connection between the old soft copper and the new ridgid copper is a Pex (Quest actually) connector with a compression fitting at both ends. I had to tighten it down a bit more than the instructions called for on that soft copper, but it worked.
Rich Beckman
Another day, another tool.
Slightly off subject, but related Oatey has some need rough in plumbing boxes.Installed like electrical boxes and then have a trim plate that goes over them after the DW. Then come with the stop valves.They are available in copper, CPVC, and PEX connections.They give you a ridgit connection point and local shut off.http://www.oatey.com/apps/catalog/showskus.asp?ctg=5&subctg=0&prodgrpid=507But I can't understand the logic of using these, are similar for refigerator ice maker connections. The shut off is hidden behind the refigerator and you have to move it if you have a leak.
Try using the expansion tool with the PEX rings, 100's of fittings maybe 2 or 3 leaks initially, and I believe that they were my fault for rushing the set time. Never used the copper ring. Wirsbro is the only brand I use. I have used it for both potable water and RH.
PEX pipe can be purchased in coils or in straight lengths. The coil stuff needs a lot of clamps to keep it from going back into a coil. The straight stuff is much easier to make a neat installation with. PEX is available in white, blue and red, which helps keep the hot and cold sorted out. The PEX pipe I use is rated to 100 psi but will withstand more though I advise against it.
As with all plumbing in tight spaces, sometimes it is easier to pre-assemble short complex assemblies, then crimp these in where it is easier to wield the crimping tool. Crimpers have pretty long handles. My crimper works on 1/2" and 3/4", which makes it a bit bulkier in the nose but very versatile.
There are lots of fittings available, in copper or brass or chromed brass, including all types of valves, shut-offs, hose bibs, MIP or FIP to pex, pex to sweat, tees, caps, whatever you need. Some elbow fittings are cut from a brass block and have a sharp corner; other elbow fittings are extruded/stamped from copper and have a smooth radiused corner = less friction loss.
As you crimp up a job, it is advisable to check for proper crimp ring compression with a special go-nogo gauge. My crimper does not get out of adjustment, but I still check the crimps with the gauge now and again. Probably a good idea to check all crimps that end up in a sealed cavity or slab...
The crimps do a great job as long as you pay attention to what you're doing. Best results are when you cut the pipe cleanly at 90 degree, using proper cutting shears. You also must set the crimp ring so that it is not cockeyed to the pipe or fitting. Since a cockeyed ring does not apply even pressure to the pipe over the fitting, the connection will usually leak. The key is to pay attention as you start tightening up on the crimper handles. The crimper is so heavy that unless it is held at 90 degrees to the ring/pipe/fitting it will displace the ring and likely leave you with a cockeyed crimp; it may also spin your fitting out of the alignment you need.
I've never used the expansion system but have seen the results and it too looks like a good sturdy connection.
Though I've seen a lot of very high end homes plumbed in PEX, my personal bias is that we've been drinking water from copper pipes for maybe 60 years now. PEX is a cross-linked polyethylene something or other that may be totally innocuous, but then you may have heard that the plastic used in Nalgene bottles leaches chemicals that are detrimental to male potency. Nalgenes have been in wide civilian use for maybe 35 years now...
One thing to keep in mind is that in some parts of the country plastic water pipe is to be preferred since the water is sufficiently corrosive that it limits the life of copper.
We used miles of PEX in our new construction: 3 full baths, kitchen, utility, 3 outside hose bibs and wet bar.
My understanding is there are two types of PEX: the type that uses compression style fitting and the type that is stretched out using that special tool and then shrinks back to its original size, putting a 'death grip' on the fitting...and there is usually a copper or pex collar that goes over the new joint.
After researching it, I went with the stretch-shrink pex joints. But here in Oregon, only licensed plumbers can buy the stuff, so I made an arrangement with a local plumber to work with me in its install.
So far, everything is working great. Tried to do 'sweeping' turns wherever possible to avoid the noise of a copper 90 degree joints, but this PEX has a fairly long radius that requires using a SS 90 degree bend support bracket. But water noise seems less than copper.
Only drawback so far has been the 'garden hose' taste of water coming out of the faucet when the water has been sitting for a while...so gotta let it run a bit before filling up the drinking glass. However, this taste has dropped off over the months.
BruceM
Every one has been talking about spending your money on the propriatery tools so you can use fittings that only that company has and sells at a premium.
Look into Kitec fittings and use the wrenches that you have in your tool box . The fittings have a male inner fitting that has an O ring to seal the inner side of the pipe. Then the nut tightens a ferrel around the outside of the pipe. No leaks in the fittings.
If you want to do pex think Kitec !!!!!!!!!!!
Hmmmm, well now...that seems like good advice. I mean I'd love to be able to use PEX w/out having to buy a bunch of new tools that I may only use on occasion vs. all the time as I do with Copper.
I did my house with stadler veiga pexcel with a home run system.I took a few classes up in Mass at stadler for $ 75 and $150 each ,they were pretty good.With the $150 class you get a starter crimp set retails for about $480 wholesale $363.Another poster gave great advice about wirsbo classes I would definitely look into that.If I was to use pex again I would probably go with wirsbo.Out of all the websites I've been on I haven't really heard one bad thing about wirsbo except the cost of the tool.Stadler comes in at # 2
I made my own 1"manifold with 1/2" full port ball valves but next time I would probably buy it instaed.I have heard some bad things about the maniblock system on other plumbing websites.
Sioux Chief makes some real nice manifolds already to go.
On my home run system I have about 25 lines in the basement,3 full baths ,1 1/2 bath.
I ran the lines separately (I probably should have bunched them up) and they will sag ,unless you use the aluminum core stuff(fostapex)
ON my low flow fixtures(2.5 gal or less) I ran 3/8" pex.The theory is that you have a shorter wait time for hot water 7 sec vs 22 sec.Im not sure if this works in the real would but I gave it a shot any way.My system hasn't been charged yet so I cant comment.
It might be possible to rent or borrow the tool from the supply house, mine will.
I was under the impression that if you kink a pex line that all you have to do is heat it with a heat gun and it will find its shape again.This is true with wirsbo but not true according to the Stadler brand.
The only casualty I had was with a line that got to close to a 150 watt halogen light bulb( it looked like spaghetti when I found it)haha
Good Luck GregLead,Follow,or Get the Hell Out of the Way!
"The only casualty I had was with a line that got to close to a 150 watt halogen light bulb( it looked like spaghetti when I found it)haha"
Side benefit in case of fire you get a sprinkler system.
Would that be considered a poor mans sprinkler system??lol
GregLead,Follow,or Get the Hell Out of the Way!
Just wanna thank you all for the excellent advice and knowledge....knew I could get good answers here on this.
Looks like I'd benefit well by taking a Wisbo class and investing in getting certified with this stuff. Can only increase marketability of my skills, too.
many thanks to all who replied.