# Bad wirsbo



## canuck92 (Apr 1, 2016)

Are we gunna be ripping out splitting wirsbo eventually .....


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## ShtRnsdownhill (Jan 13, 2016)

do you have more details on what, where it was installed?
looks more like a puncture than split


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## Master Mark (Aug 14, 2009)

Someone will probably be ripping out all the pexes eventually if the chlorine levels keep rising in the public water systems... They warned everyone about the possibility of chlorine hurting the pexes probably 20 years ago.

but its not gonna be me.....




.


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## The Dane (Feb 19, 2015)

Could it have been a tiny stress fracture from expanding the PEX while it might have been too cold in the winter time and the water finally wore through the fracture? Cold temps are why we don't use expanding PEX here up north.

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## The Dane (Feb 19, 2015)

Could it have been a tiny stress fracture from expanding the PEX while it might have been too cold in the winter time and the water finally wore through the fracture? Cold temps are why we don't use expanding PEX here up north.

I know a lot of people down south likes the expanding style because you don't restrict the flow and all but my thinking is this.

Think about it as skin. The skin on a pregnant lady gets expanded and because of the stress it creates on the skin stretch marks appear. If you pull or push something away from its original form you stretch it thinner therefore making it weaker. 

Expanding might create a strong pressure down on the fitting from the pipe wanting to pull back to its original form but that strong leak free connection does not change the fact that the material now is stretched out and flowing water might more easily wear through that's thinned out part of the pipe that is under a constant stress. Think of the difference in a rubber band. If you try to cut a rubber band with a knife you will find that it takes more force or movement of the knife if the rubber is just laying flat not stretched out. If you stretch out that rubber band you barely have to touch it with a knife and as soon as the first tiny cut is made the band snaps right apart because of the power of the stress held in the material under stress. 

This might be an extreme comparison but the physics of it is the same meaning the water can more easily wear through that part of the pipe that is stretched out.

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## canuck92 (Apr 1, 2016)

ShtRnsdownhill said:


> do you have more details on what, where it was installed?
> looks more like a puncture than split


1-1/4 hot water domestic line, arrived to repair a pin hole leak in the wirsbo, after cutting out an making my repair i turned the water back on and noticed a split. 
The split was right where i expanded and put my coupling. I do know how it happend, but wirsbo has been talked about as a high quality product as far as plastic water piping goes so thats why it caught me by suprise.


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## Tango (Jan 13, 2018)

canuck92 said:


> 1-1/4 hot water domestic line, arrived to repair a pin hole leak in the wirsbo, after cutting out an making my repair i turned the water back on and noticed a split.
> The split was right where i expanded and put my coupling. I do know how it happend, but wirsbo has been talked about as a high quality product as far as plastic water piping goes so thats why it caught me by suprise.


There's your answer, anything touching hot water fails a lot quicker than the rest.


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## ShtRnsdownhill (Jan 13, 2016)

canuck92 said:


> 1-1/4 hot water domestic line, arrived to repair a pin hole leak in the wirsbo, after cutting out an making my repair i turned the water back on and noticed a split.
> The split was right where i expanded and put my coupling. I do know how it happend, but wirsbo has been talked about as a high quality product as far as plastic water piping goes so thats why it caught me by suprise.



did you check and make sure no dirt got on the expander before you used it or any sharp edges that may have caused it, did you cut it out and expand it again? how did that come out, did the pex feel like it was brittle?


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## Master Mark (Aug 14, 2009)

canuck92 said:


> 1-1/4 hot water domestic line, arrived to repair a pin hole leak in the wirsbo, after cutting out an making my repair i turned the water back on and noticed a split.
> The split was right where i expanded and put my coupling. I do know how it happend, but wirsbo has been talked about as a high quality product as far as plastic water piping goes so thats why it caught me by suprise.



if that was the case then you should have used a sharkbite coupling to make the transition to the new stuff.... 
I dont care to expand old wirsbo pipe for this reason..... and that is what they make sharkbites for.....anyway..... 

The expanding ability of the wirsbo pipe is probably its best feature in my opinion.... we have seen many, many homes under forclosure with wirsbo pipe that had totally frozen up and to my suprise their were no breaks in the system at all.... The Delta cartriges froze and broke but the pipe stayed intact..... 

with the first case I ran into, I thought it was a miracle 


...


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## canuck92 (Apr 1, 2016)

The Dane said:


> Could it have been a tiny stress fracture from expanding the PEX while it might have been too cold in the winter time and the water finally wore through the fracture? Cold temps are why we don't use expanding PEX here up north.
> 
> Sent from my BLN-L24 using Tapatalk


No cold temps its in an isulated storage room.
Brittle wirsbo with lots of calcite build up.


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## ShtRnsdownhill (Jan 13, 2016)

canuck92 said:


> No cold temps its in an isulated storage room.
> Brittle wirsbo with lots of calcite build up.


Im thinking water quality has alot to do with it...other than that it will be a crap shoot in the future what happens to pex...regardless of brands..


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## The Dane (Feb 19, 2015)

canuck92 said:


> No cold temps its in an isulated storage room.
> Brittle wirsbo with lots of calcite build up.


I did not mean if the pipe froze and split. What i meant was, maybe the pipe was originally installed during winter time and just from sitting in the van the pipe was cold and frozen so when expanding the pipe over the fitting maybe the pipe got a few tiny hairline cracks, not enough to be a problem right away but maybe enough that the water with time wire through a lot faster in that spot.

Sent from my BLN-L24 using Tapatalk


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## Master Mark (Aug 14, 2009)

ShtRnsdownhill said:


> Im thinking water quality has alot to do with it...other than that it will be a crap shoot in the future what happens to pex...regardless of brands..


The copper industry was saying this back in 2003 or so when they legalized pex to be used in california.. They were jumping up and down about this.... 

Wirsbo pex has worked great in France for a long time but they have no florides or chlorines in their water systems to attack the stuff like the USA has.....'

they figured it was good for maybe 40 years if we are lucky......give or take

again, it wont be my problem:laugh:


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## canuck92 (Apr 1, 2016)

Master Mark said:


> ShtRnsdownhill said:
> 
> 
> > Im thinking water quality has alot to do with it...other than that it will be a crap shoot in the future what happens to pex...regardless of brands..
> ...


Appartly this building has started using "somthing" in there water to prevent pin hole leaks in the copper, we took floride out of the city water system in 2013 and now there putting it back in 2020. So im sure it has sonthing to do with the quality of the water...


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## Tommy plumber (Feb 19, 2010)

*Just gear up for more work boys!*


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## Master Mark (Aug 14, 2009)

canuck92 said:


> Appartly this building has started using "somthing" in there water to prevent pin hole leaks in the copper, we took floride out of the city water system in 2013 and now there putting it back in 2020. So im sure it has sonthing to do with the quality of the water...



Water softeners in our area are falling apart in less than 6 years these days....depending on how close you are to where the water company injects the chlorine into the system. 

The resin filter beds used to last 15 years all the time when I was a kid but now if you dont buy the most chlorine and chlorimines resistant resin you can expect them to break down fast......

Chlormines, it is the name for the new contaminant that they are using in our area during different seasons of the year.....they switch back and forth...

I have no idea what they will eventually do to the pexes..... Of course , 
much of the grey poly pipe they threw into the homes back in 1978 is still holding up ok........

I try to sell people a charcoal filter that takes out all this crap before it gets into the softeners and into the water lines....and eventually gets into your liver..... its reallybest for your health......

If you knew the stuff they threw into the water systems to keep it drinkable you probably would just drink beer and wine......


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## Will (Jun 6, 2010)

I see Wirsbo/Uponor leaks here all the time. If it has a recirculating pump with no timer, its a ticking time bomb. Chlorine eats Wirsbo up. It is the worst PEX for chlorine. I've seen it turn black, looks like bacteria is feeding on it. Its the PEX of choice in my area so leaks are common. Got a ton of huge houses here with big recirculating loops. Leaks a lot


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## Alan (Jun 18, 2008)

canuck92 said:


> 1-1/4 hot water domestic line


Recirculating pump on it?


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## canuck92 (Apr 1, 2016)

Alan said:


> canuck92 said:
> 
> 
> > 1-1/4 hot water domestic line
> ...


Yea, its a 10 story building


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## Venomthirst (Jun 20, 2018)

We've had same problems in our buildings... it's an issue that will continue to happen... more work for us no pipe is for life dont care what anyone says


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## Alan (Jun 18, 2008)

canuck92 said:


> Yea, its a 10 story building


That sounds like the failures i've seen. Only on the sections of pipe that were constantly hot. Hot branch lines were ok and so was the cold side.

I don't think i'll do any recirculating systems with pex.


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## czplumbing (Nov 24, 2014)

Looks like it swelled up from freezing and split?


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## canuck92 (Apr 1, 2016)

czplumbing said:


> Looks like it swelled up from freezing and split?


No it split when i expanded it, wasnt new pipe i adapted to it when i replaced a small section that had a pin hole.


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