PEX / Copper

The price in alabama has hit record high for copper 3/4 L soft is about $4.00 a foot so i am one of the last plumbing company to make the change to pex. I have been doing some checking and the Rehau (Everloc) system looks like the best that i have found. Any help would be great. Bud1300

soooo many pexs ....

their are so many to choose from.....

none of them really look too good after installed.....



I really like the Wirsbo pex , followed by the Vanguard....

master plumber mark said:

none of them really look too good after installed.....

Click to expand...

Amen, Brother!

being ashamed of my pex work

I am considering useing the yellow --cream colored

cpvc on a re-plumb of a house I got to do.........

becasue its cheap and it installs so much more cleanly than PEX

and the PEX looks like dog crap when you are done

with no way to clean it up and make it look "professional"


CPVC is just fine for common plumbing systems and will work for

years and years.....

Someone needs to come up with a system that gently warms the pipe so it can be formed better as it is being installed. This would make the jobs look a whole lot better.

word

LAGNIAPPE

Something given over and above what is purchased or earned, to make good measure or by way of gratuity. A tip.

Time for a new word. The definition implies that you give a lagniappe, when it is actually something given to you by a store in appreciation for your business.

kitec ipex aqua

i'm a DIY.

I bought and installed Aqua (blue) which is just Kitec (orange) with a more pleasing color. The cost of the pipe itself is in the same range as the cost of Pex.

It shapes beautifully. It looks good. It has a huge Inside Diameter.

Fittings cost $3 to $15, whereas copper fittings cost $0.30 to $5. Time saved is significant.

What am I missing? This seems like a solution. Not a problem.

DAvid

kitech

just give the Kitech a few years and see if
those "crimping rings" dont start makeing trouble...


like the old quest pipe did.....

it may bend the way you want it to
but I dont care for the possible future troubles....

it works and has a long history

It has a long history in Germany, and things that work in Germany are likely to continue to work when installed in North America.

My sense of how things operate in English-speaking parts of the world compared to other places where they speak other languages, is that in some "cultures" there are high-level 'social fabric' gaps that allow big mistakes to happen, on one level or on another level. The Germans have made mistakes, but not in terms of implementing technology on a large scale.

i have noticed a huge difference in the way that German society operates compared to any English-speaking society. I don't mean that as a tasteless joke. I mean it as an observation.

Getting technology tested properly is not something that English-speaking societies excel at. There seems to be willful blindness; standard tests are performed without question as to whether a brand new test should be invented for a new thing. German society on the other hand seems to be able to communicate between all the various layers of society and ultimately get improvements out into the marketplace that work properly, as intended, as tested, as promised.

So if a technology has been working in Germany for many years, I trust it will work here too.

geniescience said:

Getting technology tested properly is not something that English-speaking societies excel at.

Click to expand...

As a general rule, this is probably true. Countless examples in our Made in America companies that are untested (Allen Bradley, Microsoft, etc).

What do they use in Japan? High quality products there.

Jason

kitech quality

http://forums.invision.net/Thread.cfm?CFID=1214156&CFTOKEN=a63fdb-d2a1f5e3-f701-47b9-8fa2-6e3abb153d39&CFApp=2&Thread_ID=22688&mc=9


how come this stuff works so good everywhere else...

"The Germans have made mistakes, but not in terms of implementing technology on a large scale. . . .
German society on the other hand seems to be able to communicate between all the various layers of society and ultimately get improvements out into the marketplace that work properly, as intended, as tested, as promised."

Your observations are not consistent with my experience with body cracks, CV joints, and other forgotton problems with a 1975 VW Rabbit, especially when compared to a Toyota of similar vintage.

Bob NH said:

Your observations are not consistent with my experience with body cracks, CV joints, and other forgotton problems with a VW Rabbit, especially when compared to a Toyota of similar vintage.

Click to expand...

My parents had a VW rabbit, a 79 model. Had a internal leak through the windshield that kept destroying the fuse box which was $4oo a whack. It's now in the boneyard where the rest belong.

On the subject matter at hand,

When those of you who are educated on these matters of PEX and other plastic piping materials....do you understand that the general population is not going to know rehau PEXA or Wirsbo or Kitech or just whatever is on the shelves at your local big box stores?

How is everyone going to know what crimp rings/crimper is right for their specific piping systems?

My statements aren't going to sway the millions to not try what is fast and easy. I just hope that you individuals understand that even though you are well versed on your knowledge of the product on hand, there are going to be literally millions of those who are not and knowing what they have isn't going to be like copper fittings that we all know are sized the same as they have been for years. It's a guarantee, they never changed.

I myself am going to have problems making sure that when I service this product that I'm going to have to make sure that I'm using the correct crimper and rings. Otherwise I'm opening up a checkbook to my liability insurance policy with unlimited funds for damage claims.

Someone mentioning "heating" of the piping on this thread to make the connections more pliable and better conforming.

Tell me folks, what am I supposed to do when I have to service this piping when its 29 years old and the plastic is rock hard and will not conform to the brass barbed fittings? Are you expecting me to use outside compression joints to make an illegal connection behind a wall?

You know, the understanding of "well it's worked over in EU for years" is a substantial claim. It warrants good merit but there is more to this technology.

Just in the past year, year and a half,,,,,,the subject of PEX is growing and with that is problems, like any man-made product. I'm forced to learn about this product since I cannot avoid this piping as it will be in tract homes and other homes that require it.

I think the fact that people are making the switch to this piping solely on the grounds of price is unsubstantiated

getting pex Crammed down our throats

well, RUGGED you said it best with being FORCED to use

pex to be competitive.....

especially when copper ia about 3 bucks a a foot



as far as being able to repair the problems, ....on serivce calls

I am finding that the SHARK-BITE fitting have saved my

ass many times now over the past two years......

the sharkbite adapters allow me to get in and get out
very fast without much hasssell at all.....


I keep 3/4 couplings. 1/2 and1 inch couplings in my truck

I keep the same in the TEES too.....


we have all tangloed over this pex on other sites
and its now really just a matter of ecomonics.....


remember these threads I started??
https://terrylove.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2854


https://terrylove.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2742

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On another note.......

if the Europeans are so wise and smarter than

the United States, how come we have had to

go over there twice in the last 90 years and bial

everyone out of their wars and prop up their economies?????

I am of German and Italian decent and dont trust any of them.

Especially the French....

let's not go too deep into this

good points everyone.

i knew someone would mention cars. They have thousands of parts that all get shaken rattled and rolled all the time, so I am not going to change what i said above just because of cars.

i did mention the concept of "social fabric gaps" in all cultures..... That was my way of saying, in other words, that in one culture or another that 'they' manage to get different things done well at one level or at another.

I don't think we are qualified to discuss all this in too much depth since our primary reason for being signed in here is a very different focus at a very different level.

David

wow........

all socio-economic and political factors aside....as somewhat of a novice and merely an apprentice, i was astounded by the ascerbic comments directed at what i percieve to be a phenomenal, industry-changing dynamic...PEX is to plumbing what nylon was to the garment industry....I am constantly amazed at what can be done with a couple of fittings, a few crimp rings, and a couple of feet of Pex plastic pipe!....My boss, the owner of the company, and I use Pex whenever possible, not only for the economics(cost and time), but also for the reliability...How much easier to snip a line, crimp a ball valve in, and you are done, as opposed to cutting copper with a hack saw, or sweating out a fitting, letting it cool, cleaning, fluxing, and sweating back in a gate or ball valve, and then testing under pressure.....while i understand the apprehension, especially of those that got burned by the Qest PB pipe fiasco, Pex is a godsend to plumbing, and i have had nothing but terrific results with Pex and the attendant brass fittings.....while time will tell whether i am in the wrong, i cannot contain my enthusiasm with something that reduces the intense labor involved in plumbing.....crimp on, brothers!!!