Long story short....

My lazy-ass brother-in-law was in charge bring up the compressor when the two of us went up to turn the water off at his mom's cabin last year. (his dad had just passed).

"Meh, we don't really need blow the lines out, we've never had a problem before" he said. So we didn't.

Hint hint...the reason you never had a problem in the past is because ... wait for it.... YOUR FREEKING DAD ALWAYS BLEW THE LINES OUT!!!
But I digress...

Yesterday I go to turn the pump on and get everything set up for MIL to come up over Memorial Day weekend...no water pressure....but I can hear water flowing like a fountain under the cabin.

I turn the water off, get into my coveralls (damn it's icky, wet and dark under there) and look what I find...



There was little-to-know working room for me under there, I barely had enough room to cut the pipe off much less f-around with a torch and solder.

Sharkbite to the rescue....I may never sweat a copper pipe again!!!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Ronin1069,

Well done.

You need to talk to Phil Swift and get some Flex Seal Tape.

Those thing are amazing and probably took a lot of $$$ out of plumbers pockets.

I got to use one just a couple days ago.

I don't care if they cost a couple dollars more. I Love 'em.

No shit, 7 or 8 plumbers failed to return my call when my water heater blew up and it needed replaced.

Shark bite to the rescue. Did it myself. Not up to code probably, but I needed hot water and professional plumbers wouldn't bother to call me back for the job.

Damn your a big dude to be stuffing yourself in a crawl space. Was it like 3 or 4 feet down there.

Can you use SharkBite fittings on red and blue flex (not sure of brand) pipe?

quote:

Originally posted by GA Gator:
Damn your a big dude to be stuffing yourself in a crawl space. Was it like 3 or 4 feet down there.

It sucked so hard!

I had a little room to get in from the side, but then I had to crawl back about 6 feet to get to the leak. Good thing I've been trying to lose some weight...6 weeks ago my fat ass would not have cleared the 4x4 beam going across.

I've never considered myself claustrophobic, but that was a tighter fit than I liked. Just no way I would have been able to get a torch going and properly seal with regular copper fitting.

I don't think I would crawl under any crawl space. Ever. Heeby jeebies.

quote:

Originally posted by bubbatime:
I don't think I would crawl under any crawl space. Ever. Heeby jeebies.

Heeby jeebies?? I don't worry about those.
I'm more concerned about the spiders, centipedes, cobwebs, rats, did I mention spiders??

quote:

Originally posted by heathtx:
Can you use SharkBite fittings on red and blue flex (not sure of brand) pipe?

Yes, use the plastic insert the comes with the Sharkbite in the end of the PEX.

We had ours burst once.
Redid the bathroom last summer so I switched everything over to PEX. Granted it was PVC. I still plan to blow them out each year.
We have a tiny crawl space too so figured should swap it all out while the floor was up.
I also used shark bites for the PEX they are great little buggers.

Like you, I recently used shark-bite fittings and boy are they super easy to work with.

congrats on your fix!

I have some on my HWH. I don't trust them, I check for leaks every time I go in the basement. They are super easy though.

I have them on my water heater, water softener, & both outside hose bibbs. No problems anywhere. I too was doubtful at first, but they've been solid for years.

Got em in my house. theyre awesome. They also work for slightly running water too.

My hot water heater valve would not close all the way, rather then risk over turning it I just sharkbite the the end while it was slightly running. Now I can turn the hot water off if I need too, except all the plumbings done...

I once witnessed a plumber use a sharkbite when the end of a hot water pipe burst in an large, very old apartment building I was doing work in.

I was removing a cabinet in the kitchen on the 40th floor when I must have jostled the pipe enough to burst, sending scorching water at full pressure all over the kitchen.

This was a shitty situation to be in, because we were rehabbing the building and there were crews scattered all around the massive complex. There was also no way to shut the water off...valves did not work and there was no access to the main.

So I'm up in the building, alone, with hot water spraying all over the place. All I could do was call for help and think how much damage I was causing while the water flowed uncontrollable into the kitchen and into the units below me.

Luckily, I reached the plumber who somehow located me in the building. Without blinking, the rockstar plumber whips out a sharkbite and goes under the sink. It took a few minutes of him fighting the scorching water and high pressure, but once he got that baby on, the water stopped.

Since the water flowed for about 30 minutes, there was some serious damage to the unit below, but it could have been much worse if he didn't have that sharkbite with him, especially since we couldn't turn the water off.

quote:

Originally posted by downtownv:
Those thing are amazing and probably took a lot of $$$ out of plumbers pockets.

Actually most likely just the opposite about taking money out of their pockets. My plumber uses only compression crimp fittings and doesn't actually solder anything anymore, and it's much faster for him to get work done.

quote:

Originally posted by heathtx:
Can you use SharkBite fittings on red and blue flex (not sure of brand) pipe?

The PEX needs to be clean with no scratches on the outside. If you are going to pull the PEX through a wall similar to pulling wire, first wrap a section of the pipe in electrical tape to keep it pristine for the fitting.

These things have O-rings in them, no? What does this say about their longevity? I watched some videos, and see how they can be hella quick to go on. but how are they going to hold up 5, 10, 20 years down the road? Or does no one care any more?