Pinholes in copper pipes

Jimmym · Dec 13, 2005

I found pinholes in my copper pipes on Friday night.
I was changing a toilet fill valve and the water supply pipe was "sweating" water. It wasn't condensate. The holes were so small, it was more like pores than pinholes. After further inspection, I found a couple more spots. So I replaced every last inch of copper with PVC/CPVC this weekend. During replacement, I simply wrung off a couple of pipes with my hands. I used 1" Sch-40 PVC from the well to the boiler area. Then transitioned to CPVC where I split to do to the DHW coil. I had to use copper at the DHW coil and tempering valve, but CPVC all the way after that. While I was at it I added a hot water recirc line. I also plumbed in my acid neutralizer. Since I don't have any media yet, I made a spool piece with a couple of unions to use in it's place until I get it filled.
Oh well. My hands hurt like hell. I have a lot of respect for you guys that earn a living with your hands.

Bob NH · Dec 13, 2005

On another site I found the following:

"A few years ago(25?) there was a grade of copper called "Distribution Copper", and had a white stripe on it for identification. This type of piping is no longer manufactured (to my knowledge) because of many early failures due to pin hole leaks."

Sponsor · 2022-01-29T12:20:58-0800

Gary Slusser · Dec 13, 2005

There are many large areas of the US that have severe problems with pin holes leaks in copper tubing after only as few as 2 years. There are many causes of pinholes; bacteria, acid water, electrical grounds and use of water lines as the building's ground electrode, erosion corrosion due to high velocity, high TDS, DO and CO2 content waters, hot water recirc systems, and I'm probably forgetting a few. All these things cause an increased level of copper in the water; too much is a serious health concern.

Gary
Quality Water Associates

Jimmym · Dec 13, 2005

Gary Slusser said:
too much is a serious health concern.

Gary
Quality Water Associates

Not any more. Now I just have to worry about Vinyl Chloride, Tetrahydrofuran, M-E-K, etc, etc, etc.

Gary Slusser · Dec 13, 2005

jimmym said:
Not any more. Now I just have to worry about Vinyl Chloride, Tetrahydrofuran, M-E-K, etc, etc, etc.

I've never seen anything more than someones wild imagination mentioning any problems with any plastic used for potable water lines.

Gary
Quality Water Associates

MadMadScientist · Dec 13, 2005

so lets say I have the pinhole leaks in my copper pipe. I don't want to replace them what can I use to seal the leak? Is there some kind of epoxy or something that I could use that would be permanent?

Jadnashua · Dec 13, 2005

Not likely...patching a leak from the outside is really hard to next to impossible.

Bob NH · Dec 13, 2005

madmadscientist said:
so lets say I have the pinhole leaks in my copper pipe. I don't want to replace them what can I use to seal the leak? Is there some kind of epoxy or something that I could use that would be permanent?

Nothing permanent exists. The problem is that a leak means zero thickness at that point. There are other points where it is almost zero thickness. It would be more trouble draining/cleaning/fixing the pipe than replacing it with new copper. There is nothing short of soldering that would have any possibility of working and I wouldn't try that because you would be doing it again in some other place.

Altenatives: Solve the cause of the problem and replace with copper; or replace with acceptable form of plastic such as CPVC or PEX. Either of the plastic solutions should be a nearly system fix, not a piece of pipe here and there.

Jimmym · Dec 14, 2005

Gary Slusser said:
I've never seen anything more than someones wild imagination mentioning any problems with any plastic used for potable water lines.

Gary
Quality Water Associates

In the morning when I run the water, I can smell a hint of solvent. This will go away soon I'm sure.
I was mostly joking about the greenie, crystal grippin' hippies screaming about vinyl siding and their lung cancer. I'm sure it has nothing to do with smoking a bale of pot every month for the last 15 years. No, can't be that! Must be the synthetic siding on the house nextdoor.

Gary Slusser · Dec 14, 2005

LOL. Note their favorite beverage, water, is packaged in PVC plastic bottles.

Gary
Quality Water Associates

Khayes · Dec 14, 2005

I lived in Orlando for 5 years. Our hot water heater was in a large utility room and I noticed the same pinhole leaks in our supply lines. I cut out the leaky sections and re-soldered new copper. Noticed the same problems in several lines going to outside faucets. Some of the leaky pipe was in fact, paper-thin. Plumbers in my area were making careers out of replacing copper. Most of the explanations ranged from heavy mineral content to frequency of lightning strikes. I managed to keep things patched until we eventually moved but I was always wondering about the pipes I could not see.

Jimmym · Dec 15, 2005

Gary Slusser said:
LOL. Note their favorite beverage, water, is packaged in PVC plastic bottles.

Gary
Quality Water Associates

Don't you love it. Hipocrisy.
Save the otters. Save the poor oppressed lab mice! But love my leather shoes.
Don't burn fossil fuel, don't use nuke, don't dam our rivers! But I want electricity and a warm house. Electric cars are great too! You burn fossil fuel at the power plant that has looser emissions control standards than cars in the 70's, then lose efficiency at generation, conversion, transmission, re-conversion, storage, and at the car's power controller. Now THAT'S progress! I wonder what the actual miles per gallon/emissions figures are for an electric car.
But I digress...

ePIPE · Dec 16, 2005

Pinhole leaks in copper tube

madmadscientist said:
so lets say I have the pinhole leaks in my copper pipe. I don't want to replace them what can I use to seal the leak? Is there some kind of epoxy or something that I could use that would be permanent?

Ace Duraflo relines copper pipes with epoxy (fixmypipes.com)

Master Plumber Mark · Dec 16, 2005

thats pretty pricey

I got a cd info disk about this epoxy system that
peopel are touting right now and its a pretty pricey
affair,

supposedly cheaper than changeing out all the pipes

thats if its even available by a reputable plumber in
your area....

right now they are just trying to sell the franchises to
plumbers

Robertqiu · Dec 16, 2005

please view the beautiful copper sinks

Have you seen the absolute handcraft copper sinks? I earnestly long for get it, achieve my wishes,when i have search for internet. Now, i will introduce them to everyone that like handcraft article. if you interested, you can visit this website: http://www.china-sinks.com you can see multifarious copper sinks.

Cass · Dec 17, 2005

I didn't know this was a sink sales forum.

hj · Dec 17, 2005

cpvc

Unfortunately, if you check any CPVC manufacturer's site, they tell you not to use CPVC when there is a circulating line because the material does not respond well to being under continuous high temperature.

marksman · Dec 25, 2005

I had pin hole leaks in my copper pipe about 15 years ago, and I was told that the cause was 'electrolysis'.

I cut out the bad pipe and replaced it with new copper.

I then went looking for the source of the electrolysis and found out that my electrical service ground was faulty. I put in a new ground rod and connection and have experienced no more problems....33 years in the same house.

Dunbar Plumbing · Dec 25, 2005

Those copper sinks have pinholes in them.

Jimmym · Dec 26, 2005

hj said:
Unfortunately, if you check any CPVC manufacturer's site, they tell you not to use CPVC when there is a circulating line because the material does not respond well to being under continuous high temperature.

This has to be some sort of sick joke. NOWHERE have I ever seen anything about limiting time above a certain temperature. I'll be recirculating 130F water at 65 PSI. I just went through Charlotte Pipes site ( I used FlowGuard). None of their literature/specs suggest not using it for recirculation. At 130F CPVC is rated at ~225 PSI.
Can you provide some links to this information?
See this link (Page 13)
http://www.charlottepipe.com/Documents/FGG_Tech_Manual/FGG_Tech_Manual/html/FGG_Tech_Manual.html

Pinholes in copper pipes

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