PEX or copper for a half bath?

[Innovate1]

Doing a small half bath and shop sink on the opposite side of the wet wall and an outside faucet. Have done copper and only a little familiar with PEX (did my own in slab heating for the house basement and garage). Seems there are several fitting systems - compression crimp rings, screw on compression, expander (tube then shrinks back to tighten connection). PEX is nice to work with but the fittings are expensive. Wondering which way to go for this small job and where to go to read up on the various fitting systems and such.

 

[cdestuck]

I too have limited use with pex and I’m not one to change up quickly. Guess I’m old school and vote for copper as long as you can sweat well. It’s not as fast but your labor is free and not a huge job.

 

[mike93lx]

Cpvc is easy and cheap. No expensive fittings or tools, no fire risk, easy to test fit easy to glue, cheap to redo if you need to change or mess up. I use sharkbite to adapt from copper when adding plumbing

 

[Ohmthis]

With smart routing pex will eliminate the number of fittings needed over copper. I have used PEX quite a bit and if I were doing a project similar to yours I’d use PEX. The tubing is quite inexpensive and since it is so flexible it can be put into 90*, 45*, offsets, and other configurations that you’d have to fit and sweat with copper. By keeping the fitting counts down it will be economical and faster. Just my 2cents.

 

[theoldwizard1]

PEX for sure, especially if you have the tools !

Copper is great, but it does take a little bit of skill to get good joints (difficult when you only do it once in a blue moon). If the wall is open, you definitely want to use those 90° copper stubs. They have one end closed for pressure testing the system.

When you are doing the finish plumbing, cut the closed end off with a tubing cutter, debur inside and outside, shine up the end with emery cloth and use a 1/4 turn stop valve with a compression fitting.

If you have any corners to make with PEX, I strong recommend those corner reinforcements. They will prevent kinks. (Hot water helps with the bends.)

 

[Ohmthis]

PEX for sure, especially if you have the tools !

Copper is great, but it does take a little bit of skill to get good joints (difficult when you only do it once in a blue moon). If the wall is open, you definitely want to use those 90° copper stubs. They have one end closed for pressure testing the system.

When you are doing the finish plumbing, cut the closed end off with a tubing cutter, debur inside and outside, shine up the end with emery cloth and use a 1/4 turn stop valve with a compression fitting.

If you have any corners to make with PEX, I strong recommend those corner reinforcements. They will prevent kinks. (Hot water helps with the bends.)

They are called PEX stub outs, and yes are very handy and much more rigid too.

 

[Bretny]

Pex tools are prob about the same money as tools for copper. Pex can be made in home runs with next to no fittings behind walls. And then there's the price.

My whole house is pax. I removed all copper when renovating.

 

[westy33]

Whenever I can I use PEX over copper. It's a lot faster and cheaper if you use the crimp ring fittings. I bought a crimp kit on amazon for about $20 (cutter, crimper and some clamps) I have a new house and the whole thing is piped with PEX. I added a water softner a few weeks ago and with the pex I installed it in less than an hour. If you use the shark bite fittings the cost will climb fast. However, they are easy to install and I have not had any leak.

 

[hogdaddy]

I like using copper and it's super easy to sweat joints.

 

[finn]

PEX is much easier, and won’t burst like cpvc or copper if for some reason you get a freeze.

I have done copper and have torn out burst cpvc and copper. Would never use copper again, and see absolutely no value in cpvc.

 

[mike93lx]

PEX is much easier, and won’t burst like cpvc or copper if for some reason you get a freeze.

I have done copper and have torn out burst cpvc and copper. Would never use copper again, and see absolutely no value in cpvc.

PEX can definitely leak when frozen, especially at fittings.

I don't plumb my house planning for pipes to freeze, so cpvc and copper have worked great for me. The only spot I have PEX is a piece of a heating circuit, which pops and creaks like crazy when warming it. It will get torn out and replaced with copper at some point in the summer

 

[derek_m]

Copper or Pex-A (expansion type fittings and tool required).

 

[Robinson1]

As a remodeling contractor I tend to use whatever is already in place. So if you already have copper by all means continue to use copper. Most leaks I find are results of "transition" fitting like shark bite couplers or compression fittings installed to switch over from one type pipe to another. Last year a uncovered a leaking shark bite during a bathroom remodel that caused 10 thousand in structural damage.

To me shark bites are a temporary repair that shouldnt be covered up as a finished solution.

I'm also not a big fan of PEX. I've seen alot of crimp rings leak. Most plumbers try to pull it like wire and it always ends up kinked in the corners and stubbed out at awkward angles because everything is in a bind. It's nice for straight long home runs without fittings but plumbers who try to do a whole project with 3 fittings total should go straight to hell.

CPVC is incredibly common in this area and to be honest a good install with properly supported pipe and proper fittings is almost as good as copper. Dont ever even think about using plastic threaded adapters on valves or fixtures. They always leak eventually and are way to easy to cross thread. They make special threaded adapters with metal threads that solve this problem.

Back to copper. 90% of problems associated with copper can be traced back to 1 of 3 things. Dirty joints, poor joint fit up, and using too much heat. If you take your time and clean every joint properly, use plenty of flux, made sure all fittings are fully seated, and only heat the pipe enough to make the solder flow you'll never have a problem besides the occasional pipe that's full of water. Which can be a nightmare. I've literally killed hours boiling water out of pipes only to have someone open a faucet upstairs and refill the pipe with backflow. But that's an extreme example and shouldnt be a problem in most applications.

 

[Lassen Forge]

Call me old school, but I'd put it in copper. I've had 2 Pex failures recently (and locally I'm not alone) and while there's a skill to soldering copper together that some people never get the hang of, it just seems to last longer and survive our freeze/thaw cycles up here.

 

[Jazz1]

I had a 22 year old plastic fitting break under my sink. Wife was right there so only a few gallons shot across the floor.
My friend is a journeyman plumber had no explanation other than he installs lots of Pex but NONE in his home. Discussion led on to how many heat cycles before plastic fails. 20 years down the road all this plastic plumbing may be a liability for home owner when it all starts disintegrating.

 

[frankd]

We recently and the plumbing redone in an existing bath. Plumber used pex with crimp fittings. He say's it's basically all he uses now unless a customer specifically asks (and pay extra) for copper. I've done a little work with Pex and copper. IMO pex is much easier to work with. He did recommend against using the sharkbite fittings as he's seem them fail.

 

[Showkey]

I had a 22 year old plastic fitting break under my sink. Wife was right there so only a few gallons shot across the floor.
My friend is a journeyman plumber had no explanation other than he installs lots of Pex but NONE in his home. Discussion led on to how many heat cycles before plastic fails. 20 years down the road all this plastic plumbing may be a liability for home owner when it all starts disintegrating.

Then it should have started by now:

PEX Tubing was developed and first used in Europe in the 1960's. This product entered US market 30 years ago and has been growing in popularity ever since. Others state 40 years of use with no issues.

Then there are three types of PEX. Fitting and install methods are different.

https://www.pexuniverse.com/types-of-pex-tubing


If you think copper will last for ever. Talk to folks in Florida where copper “dissolves” ( pin hole leaks) from the outside and inside.

Erosion corrosion, also known as impingement damage, is the combined effect of corrosion and erosion caused by rapid flowing turbulent water. It is probably the second most common cause of copper tube failures behind Type 1 pitting which is also known as Cold Water Pitting of Copper Tube.

More on copper problems:

https://www.cleanwaterstore.com/blog/top-9-causes-of-copper-corrosion-in-home-piping-systems/

 

[tdkkart]

We just did a bathroom remodel, I'm replacing all the CPVC in the bathroom with pex, and will soon be changing out the entire house. Our house is 45 years old and we've had 2 pvc fittings start leaking in the last 2 years. The fittings are splitting at the mold lines. Apparently 45 years is about the limit.

 

[iamrfixit]

In the past I've always used copper, it makes a nice looking and durable job. It does get quite expensive these days. Pex is also a great product, but harder to make "pretty" due to the sweeping bends. I used crimp rings for a few years but have switched over to Pex-A expansion. Expansion fittings are larger internally and don't restrict flow as much. Either system works, I find expansion easier to make connections in tight places.

Sharkbite or other similar fittings create a seal using an O-ring and those O-rings will always fail at some point. Pipe movement or other environmental conditions can speed that process along. You don't want a bunch of those buried inside your walls when they start failing. They've only been around maybe 10-15 years, a plumbing system can last decades. Fifty years is hardly out of the question, I know of numerous plumbing systems that are original to the house and much older than that.

CPVC is an awful product, the pipe gets brittle over the years, especially the hot lines. I've seen several catastrophic failures of this product and remove it every time I see it. There was cpvc in my house when I bought it. As I was removing it the pipes were obviously brittle and shattered with the slightest flex. It's literally a disaster waiting to happen. My nephew had over $20k in damages when a cpvc elbow snapped under his sink.

 

[Bert_]

My house is mostly galvanized pipe. Some pex when I remodeled the bathroom. Little bit of copper off the water heater.

Pex is easy to run and takes only a couple tools. Still need to use your brain and plan routing, ect.

Wired a car wash last summer that got plumbed with a bunch of 2" copper. Looked nice but I wouldn't want to pay the bill.

 

[mmb617]

When I originally replaced the galvanized plumbing in our house almost 40 years ago I went with all copper. That was the way to go then. More recently I plumbed a bathroom remodel with pex. After that I threw away all the copper cutoffs I'd saved for future use because I'm never going back to copper.

 

[b-boy]

I learned to do Cu from my Dad. He's a metalurgical engineer. He worked for a company that specializes in copper and brass alloys for construction purposes. He's a legitimate expert in plumbing and wiring. Even he's come around to Pex. At first he was really against it, but after reading a lot of the research, he's concluded that it is a solid replacement for Cu.

If I have a choice, I'd prefer Cu. However, I've been using Pex for any new plumbing. It's just so much easier to work with than Cu - AND I probably won't set my house on fire.

 

[mobiledynamics]

Any PROS on this thread.....I've got a mix of copper/pex on my properties. Even brass.....

Anyhow, I can torch but due to density/clearance, I've been thinking about the ProPress system. The O RING is a concern, but I don't think the system has been out long enough to know if it will last or not ? These will all be in exterior (unenclosed) applications

 

[iamrfixit]

Any PROS on this thread.....I've got a mix of copper/pex on my properties. Even brass.....

Anyhow, I can torch but due to density/clearance, I've been thinking about the ProPress system. The O RING is a concern, but I don't think the system has been out long enough to know if it will last or not ? These will all be in exterior (unenclosed) applications

I'm not a plumber, I work industrial maintenance. Also I've built or remodeled numerous houses. Over the years I've installed miles of plumbing.

I have fewer concerns about the propress system than sharkbites, even though both seal with an O-ring. The propress system crimps the pipe in place so there's no movement. The O-ring stands a much better chance of maintaining a seal if the piping can't be moved within the joint. Most types of O-ring joints can usually maintain a seal, until a few years go by, the O-ring begins to harden and the joint gets disturbed.

The propress system is a pretty significant investment to purchase the press tool, the powered versions I've seen are a couple grand. You can get a hand operated tool for a couple hundred, but it is huge! Just getting the hand operated tool into some places will be difficult, actually using it will often be impossible. Working with the handles extended for leverage it can only be worse.

I used crimp rings on many jobs and often had to plan way ahead making joints because the tool simply would not fit where needed. Even the more compact ratcheting versions can be impossible to use up within the floor joists or in close proximity to other piping. Using a system with rigid piping it could only be worse.

 

[mobiledynamics]

IMF - Ridgid has a very sweet set of compact dies that are like $1100-$1200. However, it's much more compact and allows maneuverability versus the -fixed-dies that come in the set.

For myself, due to the tight tolerances, I would prefer not to be torching...
The PP came to mind, however, I have HUGE reservations on the O Ring for the long haul - even though I know many pros have switched to said systems, even when buried in-wall.
Then again, plumbers don't see the ~job~ once they are done with the job....

 

[59 wagon man]

I love my pro press have the Milwaukee setup up to 4" and an old ridgid setup. it is such a time saving tool you can't imagine. even if you cant get a good shutoff you can still crimp. you just have to plan it out as sometimes fitting the crimper can be a problem but I still carry my b-tank as sometimes you still need to solder
my house was built in the 60's with copper and never had a slab leak so water quality is the issue not copper being a bad product

 

[tdkkart]

Sharkbite or other similar fittings create a seal using an O-ring and those O-rings will always fail at some point. Pipe movement or other environmental conditions can speed that process along. You don't want a bunch of those buried inside your walls when they start failing.

The problem I've seen with the push-connect SharkBite style fittings in industrial is not with the O-rings, but with the teeth of the retaining ring cutting the tubing. In applications such as air or water, especially if there is a lot of pressure cycles the end of the line eventually gets cut off inside the fitting. Basically the only failure I've seen in those style fittings.

 

[mobiledynamics]

Personally. I don't believe SB should be used in any run of a final plumbing run.....but that's a whole nother debate. I do have a boatload of SB caps are great for stub ups before the final product get's put on.

 

[mobiledynamics]

59 Wagon Man. Pro of Weekend Warrior since you mentioned the B tank. I get that a good handful of *pros* are using PP exclusively and will torch if the job/situation requires it.

Just a weekend warrior here. Still hemming and hawing on the dang O ring in the PP setup. I sorta sum it up that I would be okay with it in exposed locations but ever stuff -in wall-

 

[59 wagon man]

we use it on risers , branch piping etc, with water pressure of 80 psi. fittings are more expensive by about 5 x the price of solder but 1/2 the price of SharkBite. a good b tank setup with a turbo torch setup costs about $100 here at most pawn shops.for the avg homeowner the tool investment is significant ,I have about $6000 for my Milwaukee setup but if you ever soldered a 2" and up copper joint it takes several minutes per joint and a little bit of dripping water usually will make for a special trip to the grocery to grab a loaf of white bread to stop the drip. with the propress even with dripping water a 2" joint is less than 30 seconds. one trick with the propress is before you crimp make sure the fitting is fully engaged on the pipe and mark where it sits on the pipe with a magic marker .as you crimp make sure it hasn't slid apart as there isn't much cheating room. if it moved out and you crimped it ,plan on cutting it out and recrimping a new one. you can also get a turbotorch for the little bottle gas tanks but there is no tip adjustment as with the b-tank setup. I have tips for 1/4" copper up to 4" copper

 

[johnnyradiant]

we use it on risers , branch piping etc, with water pressure of 80 psi. fittings are more expensive by about 5 x the price of solder but 1/2 the price of SharkBite. a good b tank setup with a turbo torch setup costs about $100 here at most pawn shops.for the avg homeowner the tool investment is significant ,I have about $6000 for my Milwaukee setup but if you ever soldered a 2" and up copper joint it takes several minutes per joint and a little bit of dripping water usually will make for a special trip to the grocery to grab a loaf of white bread to stop the drip. with the propress even with dripping water a 2" joint is less than 30 seconds. one trick with the propress is before you crimp make sure the fitting is fully engaged on the pipe and mark where it sits on the pipe with a magic marker .as you crimp make sure it hasn't slid apart as there isn't much cheating room. if it moved out and you crimped it ,plan on cutting it out and recrimping a new one. you can also get a turbotorch for the little bottle gas tanks but there is no tip adjustment as with the b-tank setup. I have tips for 1/4" copper up to 4" copper

After your first dripping 2" pipe you know why they call it Wonder Bread.

 

[mobiledynamics]

Thanks 59. Great seeing/hearing the POV from a Pro and not this JOE.

This JOE is still holding reservations..on O Ring rot. Sure, the fitting/connection will outlast either my ownership or life span, EPDM is rated for like 50 years ?

 

[mobiledynamics]

Just circling back to this thread....have hvac tech out. was talking it up with me. The installers are a different crew....and all installs are done with the crimp. He was telling me how they pressure test for a full day, etc, etc. Ended up chasing issue in a closed up wall (not fun of course to the HomeOwner and or whatever patching/painting/etc) that needs to be involved post that. Or the DUST, which is always the big stickler for me...as much as you control/contain it, there is always dust. Anyhow, said service tech had to find a leak in the run (o ring nicked) and he ended up fixing/brazing that particular connection.

Not saying there's a right or wrong, but yeah, for me, I would use said tool in the application I need it for (dense pipe, wood, preferably no torch due to the proximity of structure). But this is all exposed and easily -refixed- down the road. pffft...hvac gas ain't cheap like water ;-)