Pex- brand names, fittings, and volume for upper floors (roof, Lowes, hot water baseboard)

[harborlady]

Searched the threads for pex and surprised it hasn't been mentioned more.

I've decided on pex for the whole house, and the price differences from one store to the next are pretty drastic ($51, $45, $28 for 100ft lengths hot pex). I was told it's due to volume discounts from mfg, but not sure if brand names are an issue here. Anyone know if there are quality differences with brands? How long can I expect pex to last before budgeting for replacement?

Fittings- I was told conflicting advice. One neighbor spits on the ground about the metal fittings that leaked on him, and swears by the plastic. Plumbing supplier swears by the metal fittings, says the DIY neighbor likely did a bad job crimping, used a cheaper tool that didn't work out, or may have done the job with a 'new and improved' fitting that had bugs and has since been discontinued. New construction pex locally is going with metal fittings. I'm guessing that's best. Forget cost differences plastic vs brass, I want it done right, especially since ruined finish work will be the consequence for mistakes down the road. Do brand names matter for fittings?

Volume issues- the pipe coming into the house is 1/2" and that's the only thing consistent in the whole house- everything is 1/2" even if its copper, galvanized, or steel! (No adapters for dissimilar metals, either! hahahaa). Recommendations were to go from that 1/2" pipe coming from the street to 3/4" pex for main line inside, branch off to each use with 1/2". Is this likely to achieve better volume/pressure distribution or am I kidding myself because the street feed pipe sets the tone for everything?

Re: old thread- Cold jensens old house sounds a lot like mine, and warnings duly noted! TY! I'm thinking the vertical chase running through the walls to the basement could be solved feeding it through pvc to protect it from nailer issues or even rough cut surfaces through a sill plate or two. As things stand I'm already using the stack chase for the upper floors, with a lovely french drain in the basement should there be a catastrophe.

[Cosmic]

Lots of folks are trying to decide the same issues. I am thinking about / planning on trying to build a new house in the future.

It looks like the jury is still out on anything that might replace copper tubing. I would still be leaning toward using all copper, no matter the costs. It is a known situation. One downside to copper these days is the fittings are crap in most locations. The better professional grade fittings are getting more difficult to find, those are usually a heavy brass alloy, not copper. That stuff in big box stores is total junk.

If somebody is telling you the street service line size is 1/2" they are whistling Dixie Big Time. It should be at least 3/4", I would like 1", you want that pressure drop from the street / your water source to the meter as low as possible. Also 1/2" is too fragile, most systems probably use 1" valves for their main street shutoff, they reduce down, the smaller stuff is too prone to damage.

Naw, horrible advice, you do not come in small size, increase to a larger main line size, then reduce down again to a branch size. Somebody is on drugs. If it is a huge house, you might do a distribution within the house to widely separate areas at the main line size (like 3/4") to a bulkhead type connection in the local use area just for pressure drop considerations, then reduce to 1/2" . Especially if your point of use has tankless hot water heaters and marginal supply pressure from the street.

What they doing is the equivalent of what is done in "A pressure breakdown" situation where supply pressure is far more than needed. There are devices you put in line to do this, their approach is just an equivalent of that, pure amateur time, stand the chance of having low pressure problems.

The other thing is whatever you decide, never mix materials. Haven't seen what is being done with the poly tubing / piping applications where they want to pentrate the basement wall. Typically that wants to be something like metal transistion, also how do they get the ground clamp for electrical located? Things to think about, these "Experts" don't always get it right.

The idea of a plumbing chase is the only way to go. Both from preventing nailing / screwing into things and for future access / repairs. Can't be ripping apart walls. That chase is best done if it is a wall bay, reserved for the purpose. Many places require each pentration of a floor zone have a fire wall pour, you can plan out future expansion and put in capped off pipes in the pour. The chase should have removable covers. I actually like that idea for the wiring too. In effect you are able to get back to the construction phase opening type situation at any time in future. You can design the covers pretty or hid them in a closet, etc. I've done it in the past for major remodel projects, worked nice.

That issue of what to use with various poly / PEX type tubing seems to be the weak link in most subsitute planning. Not seen anything I think is fool proof, hence another reason for being able to get at it in a chase, if required. There is some compression type fitting methods, could work but not all that cheap. Don't know if I trust that crimped tool method. Murphy's law is always at work.

[Coldjensens]

I do nto know whether I posted this in my prior post. We did a lot of research before deciding to go with PEX.

1. Do not use trunk and branch if you can avoid it. Put in a 1" manifold and then run lines directly from each fixture to the manifold. That way you have no connections except at the fixtures and the manifold. You get better volume and not reduction at connections or corners. Our plumber was supposed to do this, but only did it for one bathroom. That is the best bathroom in the house.

2. There are (or were) two standard types of Pex connections. I spent a lto of time on this about two years ago and I only remember geneal details. One type is the crimp kind. The other type requires that the PEX tubing be slightly expanded and then allowed to contract around the coupling. This type requires a much more expensive tool. The second type was supposedly a lot better. The second type of couplings do not reduce the inside diameter of the pipe so you do not lose volume at the connections. Our plumber was supposed to use this type, but as far as I can tell he lied and used the older cheaper type. Our connections are plastic. After about 18 months we do not have any leaks at connections that we know of. I fell off a ladder and instinctively grabbed some PEX pipe for support. The ladder fell, the PEX held and I ended up hanging from it for a few seconds. No leaks at the connections. It did bend a little in the middle. Eventually, ti rreturned most of hte way to its original postion. It seems to have some ("memory").

3. As far as I could find PEX potentailly lasts forever. The connections may not. thus, fewer connections are better. PEX can even withstand some freezing. However it cannot withstand nail guns.

4. There is a huge difference in price for PEX. As far as I could tell it was all the same brand and same thickness. It is much cheaper from plumbing supply houses when bought in bulk.

5. It is my understanding that copper is pretty much out of use. It is too expensive and too labor intensive to compete with PEX. Plus PEX is inert and does nt put anyhting into the water. With copper, if you leave water sitting int he pipes, it become mildly poisonous and you have to let the water run for a long time to clean out the pipes. SOme water will eat through copper pipe. Not so with PEX.

6. Our electrical grounds to the ground. That was not an issue at all. We drove a metal spike into the ground and connected the electrical ground to that.

If I could go back in time, I would still use PEX, but I would stand there with a large stick while it was being installed to make sure that the plumber did it correctly. I would not use copper, but I might consider CPVC.

[Coldjensens]

One other thing - we did mix materials.

We have a lot of pedastle sinks where the plumbing is exposed. We convereted to copper where the pipes are exposed because exposed Pex looks horrid in a historic house. However our heating pipes are also pex and some are exposed. We foound that by painting them with high temp paint it looks fine. You just have to touch up the paint regularly or the red plastic shows through.

We also did not re-plumb one bathroom that had fairly recent copper. We just connected the PEX to the existing copper via a coupling with a valve in it. No problems there either.

Most of our house was done with 3/4 Pex supply line with 1/2 inch going off to each room and then splitting more from there (Trunk and branch - exactly what we did not want). We have 19 fixtures feeding off that sinlge 3/4 inch line. I was really mad about that, but the volume is not as bad as I expected it to be. We do have some volume issues, especially with hot water fromt eh tankless W/H. It is not terrible, but it really makes me mad becasue I believe that we would not have this problem if they had done what they agreed to do (direct runs to a 1" manifold). the bathroom with direct runs does nto have any volume issues.

[cdelena]

Originally Posted by Cosmic

...
If somebody is telling you the street service line size is 1/2" they are whistling Dixie Big Time. It should be at least 3/4", I would like 1", you want that pressure drop from the street / your water source to the meter as low as possible.
...

I agree... My current house is undersized and it is an issue at times.

In my last house we paid the city extra to put in a large meter and ran 1" to the house. It makes a big difference!

[Cosmic]

This non metal tubing and the lack of having a good grounding source does bother me.

In fact the entire modern thinking about groundng is a giggle. When I changed my service, the power company guideline said, ground at two locations. First to a copper ground rod from the spot in the meter box to a six foot rod driven outside the roof drip area. Second it sezs do the normal grounding on a water pipe from the main service panel.

But hold on, ain't that grounding at two places and doesn't that set up conditions for a ground loop?. Nobody local seemed to know why they said how to do it, no good answers.

Checking on line, found the same instructions and they said, both ground points are now considered to be the same potential, some muttering about not enough distance involved in most cases. Plus they claimed a ground on a water pipe was not as good as we always thought. Think I trust the water pipe ground more than I do the ground rod.

I also am not sure about the claim that PEX can be mixed with metal materials. I am wary about mixing materials of any type. My water supply system has a pretty common problem of calcium / mineral type deposits that come from the supply pipe and maybe some additives plating out in your interior piping if you have any type of galvanic corrosion. I had a mess of materials in the house as bought, steel, copper, GOK, had very serious plugging problems from the deposits plating out. Replacing it all with copper problems went away. I just don't know that PEX is that trouble free. Sounds too good to be true.

[Bydand]

My brother is a plumber and has followed PEX from the time it started to become popular here in the States. After many years of research and trials, he swears by PEX and it is what he has done his own house in when he remodeled. Before he put an inch in a customers house he tried all the different fittings and really put some pull to them to see which ones held the best and which ones didn't leak after being pulled, twisted, frozen, heated, and everything else he could think of. He uses the crimp style fittings and has zero problems with them. I am getting ready to do the house I just bought this Summer, and am going with PEX and crimp fittings throughout.

[BOBBB17037]

I used PEX when I redid my 1971 camper. I used all plastic fittings never had a leak plastic to plastic. Only leak I had was plastic to metal at he hot water heater. But I cleaned up the metal threads on the heater and it took care of it.
I also have PEX in my cabin for hot water baseboard heat run from an outside wood boiler. It has a mix of metal and plastic fitting (installed when I bought it). I have added a few plastic fittings for domestic hot water tap. It runs 180-200 degree water through the PEX never had any problems.

[jimboburnsy]

Originally Posted by Cosmic

This non metal tubing and the lack of having a good grounding source does bother me.

In fact the entire modern thinking about groundng is a giggle. When I changed my service, the power company guideline said, ground at two locations. First to a copper ground rod from the spot in the meter box to a six foot rod driven outside the roof drip area. Second it sezs do the normal grounding on a water pipe from the main service panel.

But hold on, ain't that grounding at two places and doesn't that set up conditions for a ground loop?. Nobody local seemed to know why they said how to do it, no good answers.

You will probably need an electrical engineer to go into any real depth about ground loops, but I think the "dangerous" variety that could be experienced in your home actually comes from two or more appliances sharing a single ground connection (which is how my house and, I assume, most houses are configured). My understanding is that a ground fault in one appliance can be directed "backwards" through the ground wire to another appliance (or at least the casing thereof), but only if there is more resistance going to ground than to the other appliance. In other words, if you have a bad ground you can wind up creating a potential in everything grounded to the same wire instead of tripping the breaker. If you had a ground at the rod and a main water pipe, it would be very unlikely that the path of least resistance would be back into your house.

My house was built in '55 and was "grounded" by connecting individual appliances to the nearest water pipe, when available. The problem is that many connections were simply a wrap or two of 12 guage wire around painted drain pipes (which all go to a PVC changover at the main clean-out anyway) or strapped to galvanized pipe with a fair amount of oxide around the strap. Needless to say, neither I nor my electrician had much faith in the set-up and I wound up spending quite a bit on a total re-wire (reduced quite a bit since I did all the hot attic work). Pipe grounding is fine, but you need to have confidence that the pipes in your home actually go to the ground. In many instances that isn't easily ascertained, hence the recommendation otherwise. Grounding rods aren't perfect, but it is usually much easier to see that you clearly have good contact with the urth that way.

Anyway, I think PEX is probably fine but I completely understand your conservatism.

EDIT: That could very well do a number on your TV and speakers, however...

[Cosmic]

Originally Posted by jimboburnsy

You will probably need an electrical engineer to go into any real depth about ground loops, but I think the "dangerous" variety that could be experienced in your home actually comes from two or more appliances sharing a single ground connection (which is how my house and, I assume, most houses are configured). My understanding is that a ground fault in one appliance can be directed "backwards" through the ground wire to another appliance (or at least the casing thereof), but only if there is more resistance going to ground than to the other appliance. In other words, if you have a bad ground you can wind up creating a potential in everything grounded to the same wire instead of tripping the breaker. If you had a ground at the rod and a main water pipe, it would be very unlikely that the path of least resistance would be back into your house.

My house was built in '55 and was "grounded" by connecting individual appliances to the nearest water pipe, when available. The problem is that many connections were simply a wrap or two of 12 guage wire around painted drain pipes (which all go to a PVC changover at the main clean-out anyway) or strapped to galvanized pipe with a fair amount of oxide around the strap. Needless to say, neither I nor my electrician had much faith in the set-up and I wound up spending quite a bit on a total re-wire (reduced quite a bit since I did all the hot attic work). Pipe grounding is fine, but you need to have confidence that the pipes in your home actually go to the ground. In many instances that isn't easily ascertained, hence the recommendation otherwise. Grounding rods aren't perfect, but it is usually much easier to see that you clearly have good contact with the urth that way.

Anyway, I think PEX is probably fine but I completely understand your conservatism.

EDIT: That could very well do a number on your TV and speakers, however...

And you are right the subject of grounding is poorly understood. I've been around it a lot from many different angles, including major industrial type projects.

As it relates to your normal house. You only want one point in the electrical system truly grounded. In the past that was the main electrical service panel ground bus connected to the water pipe, usually at the main service water pipe on the street side of the meter. That was the way my old house was, just about all of the houses I worked on. It is only recently we have started seeing this new method of also grounding the system at the meter box. Was never done on the older houses.

In my present house those two ground points are separated by something like a few feet of earth, I haven't had any problems. The most important thing at the practical level is have all the ground clamps done with super clean connections. The creme decreme is a fitting designed for the purpose, it goes in line in the water pipe and has a solder cup type socket to attach the ground wire. This ensures the lowest possible resistance connection and it will remain that way. In fact the better installation would do both the power wiring and telephone system grounds into that same connection. A very low resistance connection is what you want. Many old houses the basic problem is corroded clamps. Don't have the telephone and power grounded to different things or widely separated in distance. Today so much of the telephone devices also use 115 VAC, you can create a ground loop and get some weird problems. Make sure that main breaker is off if you lift the ground wire to clean the clamps / connection points.

Bad or improper grounding can give you a lot of failures in electronic / computer or similar equipment. Where you really will see it, if you have an automated house, especially with the technology that communicate using power wiring like X-10 and a lot of the others, things will not work at all with bad grounding / ground loops present. My last house was automated pretty heavy, I will do the same if building a new house. Must be very careful how the electrical side of it gets installed and how the control side it is installed.

If you ground anything other than the service panel in a house can get some very strange effects. The worse I think I saw was seven points were also grounded with that idea of wrapping individual grounds around water pipes. The woman that owned the house claimed it was haunted. TV would flip channels by itself, electronic stuff acted very strange. Claimed her BIL did it. Found hopefully all of them, cleaned the main ground clamp, ghosts went away.

Just for chuckles many electricians don't know that much about grounding beyond the very basics, even less really understand automation or fancy control systems. Calling one of the garden variety folks can be a giggle.

The real problem with grounding rods in my book are they do not typically have enough contact area or the actual soils conditions are assumed for something like your typical house. In industrial settings the grounding systems can be in earth contact for large land areas like to include acres, they are grids of heavy bar or wire buried just so. You can get into some very esoteric discussions about what really is "Ground".

I would love to start to believe in the PEX. The methods of making connections just do not inspire too much confidence in me yet. Ain't sailor proof enough.