Well, I've got two plumbers coming tomorrow for estimates and a third calling me to set up an appt. I had to fight through a half dozen of them that won't even come out to my house without paying $50 or $60 for a service call to get an estimate. Just as well, I'll probably get a better bid from someone who actually wants the work.

I'm going to definitely ask for PEX. I know the jury's out on it, but I'm glad people here have good experience with it, and with copper being so expensive now, I'm willing to take the risk that resale dips slightly. The NSF International study puts my mind at ease a bit on the health aspects of PEX.

Re: freezing vs. corrosion, I can't say for certain which it is, but the pictures look a *lot* like the pictures in that PDF report from the Maryland state gov't. I can't rule out freezing, of course, but the lady across the street told me they had to replace all the copper in their kitchen, and she said they didn't let the pipes freeze, so I'm starting to think maybe it might be cheap/impure copper combined with something bad in our water supply. But I doubt I'll ever know the gospel truth on it. (This is municipal water, BTW.)

Re: legal options, I emailed a friend of mine who's a lawyer and he's going to go over the agreement I signed and see if the home inspector has any kind of obligation to do his job correctly. If not, I'll probably contact him and explain the situation and ask him to do the right thing and give me at least a partial refund. At the very least, I'd like him to know that he should actually check the pipes next time around, so maybe others don't have to deal with this.

No homeowner's warranty, unfortunately. My buyer's agent told me that they mostly exist as a sales gimmick, and that most of them have significant restrictions on which contractors you can use, what qualifies as a defect, etc. I'm sure there are exceptions but at the time no warranty was offered so I didn't get one.

That Maryland report is fascinating. If it is something in the water, PEX is probably cheaper than trying to get some kind of water treatment system to deal with the problem.

Matt, thanks for asking your dad about my problem. I still have the piece of ceiling that was painted over, and there are signs of the water damage on the other side. I can't say for certain when the painting happened (I know I didn't do it) versus when the water damage happened, but it certainly raises questions.

I really appreciate all of the advice and discussion here, folks. I have a lot more info to tackle this problem with now. I'll keep you posted how the estimate/repair process goes, and on any interactions with the inspector/agents/sellers that may come from this.

Correction, three plumbers came out today to give me estimates. The one guy said he'll get back to me with numbers, but the two numbers I got today are $3,350 and $4,300. This doesn't include patching the walls and ceilings that need to be ripped apart.

Assuming my homeowner's insurance covers a portion or all of this, do I even want to go that route? They'll probably just jack up my rates the way auto insurers do, right?

I recently had a similar plumbing issue. Homeowners insurance said they probably wouldn't pay and if they did they'd raise my rates (insurance is basically a scam IMO). The contractor wanted $4500. To make a long story short I did the work and it only cost me $250

Learn to sweat pipes and do it yourself. Get the major problems first and then over time replace al the pipes when time allows
.

Yeah, that's basically what I thought.



Yeah, my girlfriend's dad can help me with the copper. Looking at PEX a bit closer, it looks like there are a lot of folks out there that have gone the DIY route. For some brands of PEX it requires special crimping or expanding tools that I'd have to rent, but it does look doable. I'd probably have to give up several weekends and potentially go without running water at my place for some time, but to save $3000 in labor costs, it might be worth it.

Obviously depending on how your plumbing system is currently installed, you might be able to segregate your existing piping so that you would have water running to some parts of your house while you refit piping to the others. My guess would be that there is a branch fairly close to the supply line. Turn off the main shutoff (hopefully there is one and you don't have to call the water company) and cut off one branch to redo that side and cap off the stub you left. Then turn the main shutoff back on. Obviously, it would be helpful to know which is which to begin with so that you don't leave yourself with nothing but one functional sink, but, worst case, you can still take a, um, "sailor's bath".

I would assume that you could run a lot of the PEX before disconnecting any of the fixtures, resulting in less time with out water.

Reading a do-it-yourself guide to PEX (link), it looks like running PEX isn't all that much worse than running Ethernet wires. You have to leave enough slack for expansion, and you have to make sure the weight is properly supported, but none of that sounds too rough. You'd definitely want somebody to show you how to do the crimps properly. I'm guessing you'll have a much harder time opening the walls to get at the old pipes than you'd have installing the PEX to replace them.

Somehow, I imagine you end up leaving the old copper alone rather than trying to hack it out of the walls. Still, the scrap value is somewhere in the neighborhood of $3/pound, if I'm reading this web site correctly.

"hack it out" makes it sound like reciprocating saws and other noisy and/or gauche tools would be used. I'd suggest using a miniature tubing cutter. It's far more genteel.

A short demo...

Just cutting a pipe, inserting the ends and joining at 90deg

Obviously a huge amount of skill involved...

Instead of renting specialized tools what I do is purchase them and then resell them when I'm done. I try to get them used (sometimes off eBay) so then I don't loose a lot of resell value.

Also you’re not rushed to complete a job that usually you’re new at so you can return the tools in time.

If the tool is more general purpose I usually keep it. Since I save so much doing the job myself I can justify keeping the tool (by that I mean wifey lets me keep it).

With my last specialized tool purchase I made $30 when I resold the tool That’s better than losing money on a rental and I had all the time I needed to do the job right.

(Hmm.. My first attempt at this post seems to have gone to the great bit bucket in the sky.)

OK, I'll be the doom-and-gloom guy. If you miss a connection and it blows during the night or while you're away, will your home owner's insurance cover the damages for DIY work? If not, a bonded pro might be worth it.

I ask from experience: At work, the coffee machine's water line blew a few days after installation, spewing water all night long. It was a pencil-sized tube. The water saturated carpet over 100 feet in both directions, hitting several offices and a bunch of cubes. We lost several computers that were on the floor, had to retile the kitchen and server room (everything in the server room was up at least 6 inches, so no real problem there), and do some sheetrock work. Not to mention the roar of 20 fans and the dehumidifiers for the better part of a week.

-jk

The pipes in my office building are bad. In my old room (gorgeous, had windows overlooking the flightline and the airport across the street, mountains in the distance - now I live in a cave), water mains in the ceiling burst twice overnight, about two years apart. They estimated 20,000 gallons of water flooded it the first time, and 15,000 gallons the second time. First indication there was an 'issue' was the elevator being inoperative and the bottom of the shaft completely full of water. Good times!

Anti-leak : http://www.wayscale.com/index.shtml

True DIY work can sometimes not be up to par with the pro's. On the other hand I've had "pro's" majorly screw up stuff. I then had to fix it myself or fight them to fix it right.

You could, for a few days, turn the watermain off in the house before you leave. Then at least you wouldn't come home to a pool in your living room.

My latest issue was with the pipes leading to the house. I still have a big hole in my yard to make sure it doesn't leak. Everything looks good for me so far. I did do a similar repair years ago with no problem.

It sure is a lot easier to just "pay the man." But even that doesn't always turn out good.

No offense intended to jmwking, but the cure for FUD like that is rather simple: get a plumbing permit, and have the work inspected as required

Cheers

Hope the plumbing inspector is better than the home inspector

Big difference there.

The city Plumbing Inspector is a pro who signs off on the work, and that should be more than sufficient for any insurance FUD.

Home Inspectors are just a racket, like lot surveyors -- those both fall into the category of unnecessary things that many buyers often shell out for (not knowing any better).

Sure, once or twice one of them might find something significant enough to make their fees not a total loss, but..

Cheers

After getting those two estimates and doing more research on PEX installation, I am strongly considering the DIY route, or at least trying it first before I drop several grand.

The two estimates I have so far both have about $700-$800/day for labor for 4-5 days. The difference is the one estimate has an absurd $1500 for materials. Already ruled that one out.

I think the problem is that most of the time that they're quoting me is them trying to get at the existing pipes by cutting through my walls, ceilings, etc. and then removing them. I don't think this will take them that long, but they're probably padding the estimate a bit to ensure they don't go over due to unforeseen problems in getting at the copper. Once there is a reasonably clear path from the supply in the basement to all of the fixtures, I have trouble believing it's going to take them longer than a day to do the actual "plumbing" part of the plumbing job.

So, with the material costs for PEX being around what some plumbers were asking me to pay just to come out and give me an estimate, I can't see the problem with trying to do it myself. I can do a few of the easy runs first and go from there. If I get stuck for whatever reason, I can always call someone in and I've only lost a small amount in trying to save a bundle.

At the very least, I'm going to do *all* of the prep work of cutting open walls and getting to the pipes myself. Why pay plumber's rates for cutting through drywall? Also, I'm guaranteed to be more careful about doing the least amount of damage than they are.

Yes, there's the "nobody to blame but myself if I flood my house" factor, but I don't know that it will be any harder to get money from my homeowner's policy for repairs than it will to get money from the contractor's liability insurance. Also, the PEX installs really do seem easy once there's a clear path from the supply to the fixtures.

At this time, I'm seeing a very small risk for potentially a very big reward. I think I'll talk things over with someone at the local plumber's supply place to get some more info, though.

In my experience with city inspectors they seemed more concerned about how many inches off the floor something was or if it met some stupid city code.

Luckily I live way in the sticks and we barely have building codes.

Perhaps Canada has laws that make sense and inspectors that are competent and not "on the take."

In the O’l days my mom worked as a secretary for two building inspectors. Until they went to prison for accepting bribes.

Go and visit by all means but once you've worked out the materials you need, get on the telephone and start calling around for prices. They will price competitively to get your business. If you just turn up at the shop they will probably quote you full retail prices. I've saved as much as 40% by doing this with builders merchants.

I tend to pose as an office worker of a property management/maintenance company when doing this because it a) makes me appear to be in the trade, and b) gives me a get-out if they ask me something I don't readily understand. Works like a charm!

Is it both hot and cold pipes that have leaks? Or just one or the other?

I wouldn't consider hiring either the home inspector, or the surveyor, as a racket -- I consider it doing due diligence, particularly when I'm considering an investment of tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. Same way as, if I was planning on investing the same amount of money in a single company, I'd hire an external CPA to come in and audit the books. Me? I shelled out for the home inspector (well worth the money in our case -- we backed out of an offer based on the home inspector's report), but didn't bother with surveys, because the property lines were well defined, and the house was clearly within any local setback requirements.

Also, for what it's worth, land surveyors are licensed professionals who sign off on work -- if they put their name to something, they are legally liable if it's found to be wrong.

Of course, you'll find crooks in any line of business.

They may or may not be, but most mortgage lenders require those services before they will agree to the loan.

I'm with you that the inspections don't mean much but I would think if you got the permit and inspections the insurance couldn't deny paying because you did it yourself.

When I built my house the guy "let me by" on stuff because he didn't want to come back. The dumbest thing ever was they told me I couldn't get the certificate of occupancy without having appliances.

Both. Most of them have been on the cold, but down in the basement there is at least one leak on the hot side.

Okay, I'm trying to put together an approximate materials list for the DIY option. Can you folks who've installed PEX yourself or had it installed provide some guidance as to what I'll need?

I can measure out how much tubing and so forth I need, but I want to make sure I buy all the odds and ends I'll need for the installation. Here's a diagram I made to try to calculate the amount of tubing and number of fittings and so forth. The computer geek in me is loving how much this stuff resembles doing network cable, though I'm sure that resemblance is limited to the planning phase

Anyway, here's my shopping list so far:

A manifold
If I do this, I'm going to do it with home runs to most of the fixtures. Counting up the number of cold and hot endpoints, I think a manifold like this one should do the trick.

PEX tubing
There seem to be many brands. Some brands are only compatible with some of the fittings. I'll probably decide which way to go with the fittings and choose the tubing based on that.

There appear to be many different ways to join tubing to the various manifolds and fittings. There are copper crimp rings, stainless steel clamps, and expansion fittings, all of which require a specialized tool, and then there are sharkbite fittings that you just push the tubing on to. I'm ruling out the sharkbite ones based on what I've read, along with the fact that it just doesn't seem as sturdy to me on paper. But does anyone have opinions on which of the clamp/crimp/expansion options is better?

Fittings
I'll go through all my fixtures and figure out what I need to connect them. There's a special water heater connector available that I'll probably get. I'll also need some Ts to do splits where home runs are inconvenient/unnecessary. What else? I see they make 90 degree elbows, why would I need those when PEX is so flexible?

Installation stuff
I'll buy or rent whatever tool is necessary to do the crimping/clamping/whatever. I'll also buy various J hooks, fasteners, etc. for keeping the tubing in place and as neat as possible

What else am I likely to need?

Given that you're not experienced with it, you're bound to make the occasional mistake. As such, I'd go with the fittings that are most easily redoable while also ameliorating your feeling that they might leak.

PEX has a minimum bend radius before it kinks. It's possible that you might get into a situation where you'd have to bend it more tightly than its rated for. In that situation, you'd use an elbow fitting.

Keep in mind that with a manifold system, infrequently used faucets will create a column of stagnant water, which can lead to certain bacteria being able to grow more readily (think Legionnaire's Disease). For those outlets, I'd try to avoid a home run.

If you're going to run a whole new system and not just copy what the copper is already doing, you'll likely have to cut new holes in joists and such. Make sure you look up what the code is on cutting holes in load-bearing members. There's a reason that carpenters refer to plumbers as being worse than termites.

They make a tool for cutting flexible plastic tubing. It kind of looks like pruning shears. I'd definitely get one of those rather than trying to cut the PEX with a utility knife like LBT showed in his video.

Assuming you want to remove the old copper piping, I'd still suggest a tubing cutter. It's remarkable how well they work, and it's very tidy.

Oh, and make sure you have a good number of towels and buckets to catch water that will leak out of the existing system as you disconnect it.

My brother had an interesting experience with a building inspector. He put up a driveway awning and the inspector said that was fine but he had to plant some indigenous trees and plants in his yard to comply with code. My brother was like, what, OK I'll do that. So he spent a few hundred dollars on tree and plants, called the inspector back and the inspector then said “Oh that was just a suggestion, I don’t need to come back.”

Just IMHO - you're insane if you don't use push-fit
(I think push-fit == shark-bite)

Push fit is (almost) impossible to connect wrongly.

Anything involving a spanner/thread is almost impossible to connect correctly in tight spaces, like, say, in a retro-fit...


FWIW I do know where you're coming from - it's called old-age and conservatism - I was sceptical too. It also kills 'the trade' so they hate it and diss it whenever possible. (They're also a pretty conservative/dumb lot too).

Nowadays, would you use coaxial cable to wire up an ethernet network? Of course not. Materials have moved on - don't fall prey to the FUD!


What else?
4 elements to plumbing:
* waste (not relevant here)
* hot water supply
* cold water supply
* heating flow/return

Plan each separately.

You'll be partially constrained by existing layouts but you will have some opportunities.

Don't forget that you can easily join plastic to copper so you can replace sections in phases without needing to replace an entire system at once. This can drag out so make sure the brand you select has longevity.

Cold water:
Do you need to soften? Filter? Do you use a header tank - do you need to? If you soften then you need a potable feed to the kitchen (and bathroom sink if possible) - showers, appliances should be soft.Toilet feeds should be untreated to avoid wasting salt. Do you want to use reclaimed water for the toilets?

Hot water:
Less need to insulate with PEX but...
Do you want/need a pumped circuit so the hot water is instantly available anywhere in the house (very nice!)
Do you want mains pressure hot water?
Any desire for heat reclamation?
What about thermal stores?
What hot-water heating system do you use - is it worth changing it?

Heating
I assume radiators.You'll need to check the risers and probably want to use copper/chrome there for appearance.
Check the routing for heating - you may want to zone it and use switchable manifolds - they're not that expensive and it's really nice to have each zone heated independently. No point in heating the bedrooms whilst you're in the lounge/study all day.

If you want you can even automate the zone switching...(later!)

Lots to consider - I suggest you dismiss most of it

If you're getting your water from the city, then it's been treated with chlorine and heaven only knows what else. It should be comfortably clean, even if you leave it sitting around in the pipe for a while. I figure you'd be more likely to get an off-taste from the plastic than a some kind of nasty disease. Now, if you've got well water, that's another game entirely.

For what it's worth, my house, which was built from the ground up with PEX, has everything from the entire house converging on a central manifold, just like you would do with network cabling. This has the benefit that you can centrally turn off the water to absolutely anything in the house. Very convenient.

I would consider doing the hot water runs with pipe insulation. It's cheap, and it will conserve at least some of the heat energy. If you're planning to do a hot water circulator for instant-on hot, then this sort of insulation becomes even more important. (And it also guarantees that you're not just doing a simple star-shaped topology any more.)