Water line question

[plowhog]

Eddie, good info as usual!

You and others advised against blue glue for pressure applications. Christy's rates both blue and clear for pressure in up to 4" PVC pipes. Q- what's wrong with blue?

BTW I use primer/blue glue for all water connections, medium clear for electrical PVC with no primer. Not sure why, but that's what I have always done and I can't ever remember a joint failure?

 

[redipsweb]

Eddie, good info as usual!

You and others advised against blue glue for pressure applications. Christy's rates both blue and clear for pressure in up to 4" PVC pipes. Q- what's wrong with blue?

BTW I use primer/blue glue for all water connections, medium clear for electrical PVC with no primer. Not sure why, but that's what I have always done and I can't ever remember a joint failure?

Medium glue is fine for electrical, it's not under any internal pressure. All your wanting to do for electrical is make a water tight seal from ground water. The heavy duty glue us plumbers use is in a green can & is also clear. Plus, the heavy duty sets up quicker than blue. I never use blue glue if there are no wet pipes involved, that's the only real reason to it. Inspectors require primmer over cleaner because they can see you actually used a cleaner/primmer product when doing the install.

 

[KJSBX]

I ran 400' of 1" PE-3408 black ploy to my barn 18 years ago-no problems yet.
I sleeved it in 6" sch80 PVC where it crossed under my driveway.
I direct buried it below the frost line (42").

 

[Elviscaretaker]

Some good advice on this topic.
My 2 cents worth is (for the areas I've worked and lived in) I'd go with a sleeved Uponor Wursbo pipe. For reasons stated above that some ground tunnelers like to bite them. This type of pex can freeze to about 4-6x it's normal size and survive, you can heat up a bend in the pipe to get a kink out, the compression fittings (need the tool to expand the pipe, but you can rent them in some areas) and I've been able to get 500' rolls of it from Fergusons. The bad of it is the UV, do not leave it exposed to the sun anywhere in the system. The pex you get at the boxes is pretty much crap (IMO). I got tired of fixing leaks for friends and family with pvc/cpvc and firmly believe that it shouldn't be used in any home or sprinkler system due to past experience (I call it a 10 year pipe). I've never had any issues with 200 psi poly. The big thing is to bury whatever you choose deep enough for your frost line AND bed the thing in sand. MINIMUM 6" all around it. I understand costs and availability can be a issue but it's always better to not have to go back and fix it. Sleeving the pipe also gives you the option of running the final later. One last thing, check your code before burying electrical with the water, in a lot of cases there needs to be 1' elevation difference between the pipes and some don't allow them to be in the same trench. It also never hurts to lay some buried caution tape a few inches under the soil along the trench line. IMHO.
If you have water to the site now, do a pressure test on it, it'll give you a better idea of what size to go with. You can do a cheat if you want and run a extra long hose and test at the end of it. Not the best but it'll give you a better idea of what the pressure will be at the end of the line.

 

[DGeorge747]

I have to run a water line to a home I'm building and would like to get some of your opinions on what you guys would do. Now remember its hard to find most materials. I'm needing to get the water line in so they can pour the concrete pad for shop. The shop pad is about 350 feet from the meter and I'm running 1" line. My two options are 1" pex and schedule 40. This is somewhat rocky ground with a lot of clay, sand and small stone in the mix. I'm reading that it wouldn't be a bad idea if I go with Pex to sleeve it which is going to raise the cost.

Pex line 1" x 400' is going run around 400.00 and I will roughly have two fitting in the total run. If I sleeve the pex with 4'x100' black corrugated sewer and drain pipe its going add another 240.00 for a total of 640.00. The pex isn't a full one inch inside diameter and more like .830. I can get a 300' roll and 100' roll so really one connection to get to shop.

Schedule 40 will be in 20' sticks at around 300.00 and I wouldn't think I would need to sleeve this. With the schedule 40 I will have about 20 glue joints and of course would use the blue glue in a quart. The PVC is a full one inch ID which means more water up to home and shop.

I am somewhat familiar with both setups. Meaning I have experience gluing PVC and I also have a pex tool and have ran pex before. My pocket book is telling me to go with PVC. Probably no clear cut answers but what would you guys do in this situation?

In the water supply lines I have installed, and have seen installed, only use a continuous piece (if possible) of black poly water line or better yet. PEX.

I would highly recommend to stay away from PVC as a pressurized water supply line for many reasons. Too many joints to possibly fail, especially due to shifting and settling of the soil, and the possible damage from backfilling. Also, the hardness and brittleness of PVC in the ground is risky.

There is no need for sleeving or putting your water line in "conduit", in fact it could make things worse.

If you have concerns about rocky soil damaging your water line, you should put about 6 to 8 inches of sand in the trench before you put the water linein the trench, preferably PEX, then backfill over the water line with another 6 to 8 inches of sand. Finish backfilling over the sand with your existing soil and your water line is now protected.

I don't know your climate, but another advantage to PEX is that it can even freeze and swell up or expand without bursting or cracking, and when it thaws out it will return to it's original shape.

Good luck! NO PVC. NO underground joints.

 

[lman]

I also ran 1" black poly about 300 ft. to my horse barn about 22 years ago. Trenched to 42" direct burial. Soil was already sandy, so no rocks. Haven't had any problems with it.

 

[redipsweb]

rickyb01, you need to know the different types of pex, most of the crap bought at box stores is type B & does not expand, pex A does expand. PEX-A is the most flexible, allowing for it to be fastened by cold expansion, which allows the end to be fluted prior to inserting the fitting. PEX B is not expandable and you should never expand the end of a PEX-B pipe. So everyone saying go w/ pex because it expands, be diligent on the pex you purchase. Pex-a can be installed w/ expanded or crimp fittings, Pex-b is crimp fittings only. If you go w/ pex, buy Wirsbo/Uponor brand pipe, you can get this at a plumbing supply house. If black poly was great that everyone keeps mentioning, it would be still available. Many places quit selling this crap because of the failures. Yes, there is the lucky few that have it w/ no problems, but as I said "lucky few". With the ground conditions you have, that would be my absolute last choice.

 

[DieselBound]

I'm curious as to why people believe PEX is better than poly in this application. I'm a fan of PEX-A (Upunor), so it's not that I don't like PEX.

I'm contemplating a new house build and have thoughts about what I'd use for a short supply line run (max 30'): PEX or poly. My pretzel-logic PVC piping in my pump house has always had me contemplating swapping to PEX, but have had concerns over UV stability (no windows and the door tends to stay closed unless I'm doing maintenance work)- I also have had concerns about my use of H2O2 (treatment), whether PEX-A can take it (tried reaching out to the manudacture several years ago and got no reply): might be an over-blown concern.

 

[redipsweb]

I'm curious as to why people believe PEX is better than poly in this application. I'm a fan of PEX-A (Upunor), so it's not that I don't like PEX.

I'm contemplating a new house build and have thoughts about what I'd use for a short supply line run (max 30'): PEX or poly. My pretzel-logic PVC piping in my pump house has always had me contemplating swapping to PEX, but have had concerns over UV stability (no windows and the door tends to stay closed unless I'm doing maintenance work)- I also have had concerns about my use of H2O2 (treatment), whether PEX-A can take it (tried reaching out to the manudacture several years ago and got no reply): might be an over-blown concern.

I used Pex-a for a commercial job, that they used it to clean screens the manufacture told me I could use it, but I had to use S/S fittings because of the chemicals.

 

[Menagerie-Manor]

I'm curious as to why people believe PEX is better than poly in this application. I'm a fan of PEX-A (Upunor), so it's not that I don't like PEX.

I'm contemplating a new house build and have thoughts about what I'd use for a short supply line run (max 30'): PEX or poly. My pretzel-logic PVC piping in my pump house has always had me contemplating swapping to PEX, but have had concerns over UV stability (no windows and the door tends to stay closed unless I'm doing maintenance work)- I also have had concerns about my use of H2O2 (treatment), whether PEX-A can take it (tried reaching out to the manudacture several years ago and got no reply): might be an over-blown concern.

Pex or poly for direct burial is great either way, at this point there is probably more poly service connections underground then everything else combined in this country. I gutted the kitchen in my cottage 2 years ago (was seasonal use originally) and ripped every inch of PVC water out. There were more repairs sections then I had fingers or toes to count and if you took a piece and bent it by hand it would literally explode. I re-piped the house with 3/4 pex.