galv pipe under concrete

[heehaw]

it looks like i may be buying a house that was built in 1969: plumbed with galv pipe, and the scary part, is the utility room floor is concrete. how would a person go about changing the pipes if it ever has to be done? i have seen a plumber hook a new copper pipe to an existing copper pipe and pull it, replacing the leaking pipe, but i don't know if that could be done with galv pipe or not?
heehaw

 

[dfkrug]

I once owned a poorly-built tract house built in the late 50s on a
slab. The copper pipes were under the slab. I re-routed the hot
water pipes in the walls and ceiling using rolls of 1/2" soft copper tubing,
which could be unrolled into holes in the tops of partitions from the
attic and extended down into the walls below. This way my hot water
was not cooled by the ground and I was not at risk of under-slab leaks.

 

[heehaw]

thats kinda what i plan to do, once i get the water into the utility room: except will use pex or cpvc. from the crawl space of the house, to the location the line needs to be is about 8ft: once there, the rest will be inside the room/wall or baseboards.
heehaw

 

[kenmac]

it looks like i may be buying a house that was built in 1969: plumbed with galv pipe, and the scary part, is the utility room floor is concrete. how would a person go about changing the pipes if it ever has to be done? i have seen a plumber hook a new copper pipe to an existing copper pipe and pull it, replacing the leaking pipe, but i don't know if that could be done with galv pipe or not?
heehaw

most likely, that pipe is all but closed together on the inside. I doubt you would get anything through it. About replacment. It all depends on how the house is laid out. Sometimes we go outside under geound & come through a wall Sometime we go through the attic & try to come down inside a finished wall. The latter can be difficult. Good luck in your replacment.You will are going to love the xtra water you are going to have after replacment of that old corroded galv. pipe

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Cut the slab and replace the line if you can't access it from outside the house and have no other option for running the line inside the house above ground.

If you cut the slab then you can put some anchors into both sides of the floor that is still there and pour new concrete to tie everything back together. We have to cut concrete floors quite often to put in perimeter drain lines leading to a sump pump.

 

[kenmac]

If the entire house is plumbed with galv. pipe .I would replace all of it

 

[heehaw]

its all galv pipe: the main house is on a pretty high crawl space, so replacing that part isn't any problem: just the utility room area on the west end of the house. i'm not looking forward to that part of remodeling the house. i guess i could put a raised floor in there and put the pipes under that?? sure would be nice is the galv pipe could be pulled out like has been done with leaking copper pipes..
heehaw

 

[AlanB]

I would do whatever I had too to get rid of it all.

I did see a commercial for some professional system here in Florida that they went in, and cleaned and lined the galv pipes somehow. Let me look on the net and see if I can find it. I do not know anything about it, and do not know how clean they could make it, but the idea seems sound too me.

Here it is, several come up on Google, I cannot imagine it working, but, I learn something new every day, it would at least be worth talking with them.

Residential Pipe Replacement Repair Copper Galvanized - Cleanncoat

 

[EddieWalker]

How far under the slab do you have to go? Is there anything like a cabinet that you can remove to cut a hole that wont be noticed in the concrete?

The picture is of a drain line that I put in for a new bathtub in a bathroom that I did. I also moved the toilet and sink, plus added a seperate shower on that job. All the drain lines had to be moved. Water lines were easy and I was able to run them throught the walls.

I figured out where the lines needed to be and cut out the concrete with a masonary blade in my 7 1/4 saw. Then I chip out the concrete with my air chisel and didg down into the dirt about six inches.

Then I measure real good on the outside to where it will line up with the hole in the concrete. I dig a hole on the side of the house and connect a 3/4 inch PVC schedule 40 pipe to a water hose. Then I start pushing the pipe into the dirt until I get to the hole in the concrete. For the drain lines, I had to do this a few times to get the drain lines through, but for a small copper line, that would be all you need to do.

If you can't hide the hole with a cabiner, you can always fill it back in with concrete and finish off the floor with tile, linolium, carpet or ????

If tunneling isn't an option, you can cut a trench through the concrete with a masonary saw blade the full lenght and about 2 inches wide. Then chip it out and dig down into the dirt. Refill with sand and soak with water to get compaction. Finish with cement and hide with flooring.

The saw blades that I like the best have notches in them with diamond, smooth cutting edges. It's loud, dusty work, but it works good and goes fairly quickly.

Sorry to hear about those pipes. I've never seen a galvanized pipe that wasn't at least 80% blocked.

Eddie

 

[heehaw]

from the closest point, which is in the crawl space, the pipe comes up thru the concrete about 6ft over. cutting the floor and the pipe, then hammering it till it moves and "possibly" pulling the pipe out and running in a new one, appears to be the best option. once in the room, i'll run the rest of the pipes for the room around the baseboard and hide it with trim. the folks that are living in the house right now, haven't noticed any problems with the water, but they have lived there for 25 years, and the lines clog slowly, so most people don't realize the problem until it quits or leaks.
re-lining the pipes would be great, but it doesn't appear to be a diy system?
heehaw

 

[Red55]

I saw a system once where they used an epoxy (two -part) and a bladder to repair a sewer line. Kinda like the system they use to reline chimneys. It was not DIY project, and the cost was almost the same as ripout and replace- which didn't make any sense to me. Oh and the sewer line they were repairing was the old clay sewer pipe not gav piping which clogs. -Ed

 

[heehaw]

years ago, i had to replace the natural gas line to my house: luckily, the metal line was big enough, i just cut off both ends and ran the new orange plastic line inside of the old leaky metal line. i doubt i'll be able to do that with the galv water pipes..
a lot of folks like pex, but i figure i'll replumb the house with cpvc: the fittings are cheaper and i've never had a failure with cpvc, after over 20 years ago when i used it for the first timeon my folks house
heehaw

 

[Robert_in_NY]

The advantage of Pex is that it is fast. Even faster then CPVC. You can run it anyway you want without having to measure. You also do not have any fittings other then what you need to tie into whatever appliance the water is going to.

I spent half of a day tunneling a hole big enough for me to work across to the other side of the room. Once I got there it took10 minutes to run both lines and anchor them to the joist (there was only 6" between the joist and the ground). Any other material and I would have been there considerably longer.

 

[heehaw]

i measured pex today: the 1/2 inch will go into 3/4inch galv pipe with room to spare, and the 3/8inch pex will go into 1/2inch galv: so thats probably how i will get the new lines into the area on concrete...that area has the washer, a toilet and a shower: 1/2inch pex and probably the 3/8's would supply plenty of water as long as we don't try to use them all at the same time.
heehaw

 

[CurlyDave]

i measured pex today: the 1/2 inch will go into 3/4inch galv pipe with room to spare, and the 3/8inch pex will go into 1/2inch galv: so thats probably how i will get the new lines into the area on concrete...that area has the washer, a toilet and a shower: 1/2inch pex and probably the 3/8's would supply plenty of water as long as we don't try to use them all at the same time.
heehaw

I would worry a lot about routing pex through old galvanized pipe.

The problem I see is that the pex will move and flex every time the water is turned on or off. The inside of the galvanized pipe is going to have lot of sharp jagged points and edges from corrosion and mineral deposits. In time one of these will wear a hole in the pex.

For the toilet, washer and shower the water supply really comes out of the wall inches to feet above the floor.

Be creative -- re-route the pex around the utility room in the crawl space and penetrate the walls where you need the water supply.

It is frequently far easier and less expensive to abandon an old installation, leaving it in place, and do a totally new install.

 

[heehaw]

i just need to go a fairly short distance under the concrete: then the rest will be done around the baseboards of the utility room: i figure i'll get a drill bit that i can put extensions on and run it thru the galv pipe, before putting the pex in: wouldn't have to do but about 6-10 ft: not sure of the exact distance, but it looks like it should be fairly easy to do.
heehaw

 

[heehaw]

continuing saga of galv pipe: we don't close on this house we are buying for a while: last week they had a water leak right at the foundation: an ended up having to replace all the galv pipe from the house to the meter: it "appears" the plumber used copper, which kinda surprised me, its only 60-70ft but i would have put in 1inch pvc: he also appears to have put in an electric line for some reason?? at least one goes into the hole under the house where the copper pipe comes up.. the copper may switch to pvc after it gets out from under the house, i couldn't tell and haven't been able to find out what plumber they used so far..anyway, that saved me some work.
heehaw

 

[EddieWalker]

In some places, copper is code, and the only thing allowed. It could be that, or it could be that the plumber is old school and only uses copper. Some are like that and refuse to use anything else.

Either way, congrats on your good fortune.

Eddie

 

[heehaw]

i got a price from one backhoe owner of $1.70 per foot for 1 inch sch 40 pvc, installed: which i thought was a pretty good price..whoever ended up doing the job put in a new pressure regulator and ball valve shut off: i would have put the pressure reg under the house, so i could run the lines with full pressure to the outside faucets, but it ain't worth redoing, for now anyway, or later turn the pressure up on that one and install a second one under the house?? a friends daughter had all of the copper plumbing stolen from her house in St. Louis, and they have a copper only ordinance...so its gonna cost them $2k to have it redone.
heehaw

 

[kenmac]

I bid a job today to replace all the copper water lines & the a/c system for a guy that has a vacant house & some thief stold all the copper & the a/c unit & coil. What gets me about this stuff is, people live all around these houses & no one ever sees anyone or anything