1" Rolled copper tubing leak underground patching?

Support your community
Shop deals on ebay
shop deals on amazon
Advertise with us
Plumbing Forums

Help Support Plumbing Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
R

Rapidrob

Member
Joined
Jun 17, 2019
Messages
19
Reaction score
1
Location
Albuquerque
My water main is 1" Rolled Copper Tubing that is 125 yards long. I noticed my water bill was higher than normal and knew I had a leak somewhere in the run of tubing. I live in the desert so normally any water leaks will be shown by green plants growing very happily. This is not the case.
After two months of leaking I noticed the basement wall was wet through a small crack in the foundation. This has never happened in 31 years.
I assumed the leak was on the outside wall of the basement foundation and did an educated guess as to where it may be. As it turned out I was only a few feet off from the leak as a trickle of water was slowly flowing to the right of my hole in the ground.. The main shut off is 125 yards away and I have the tools to do so. Not a fun job when in you 70's.
My question is that the 1" rolled copper tubing is not the same size (OD and ID) as "normal" copper pipe is. When I uncover the leak, I'm not sure what will be needed to repair the leak? Once the leak is uncovered I'm sure it will be impressive and I will have to shut off the main. If the repair parts are not common, I'll be out of water until I can order them which will take several days to show up. I have soldering skills and have done repairs in the past on normal copper tubing pipe. I just installed two Ball Valves in the water main inside of the house. I can now isolate the outside water line for draining as the line is lower than my basement sink. I'm not sure if I can drain the line before the leak running the 125 yards to the water meter/shut-off. There is a slight uphill to my home.
Thank you for any helpful info.
 
Rolled copper soft tube tends to not be round enough to allow fittings to work properly...so, we have in our arsenal "shaping" tools for copper. Though, the tools are for standard sized copper tubing, 1" or 1-1/4" etc. The O.D. of tubing is uniform whether L or K type copper tube.
Most good plumbers these days have ProPress or "press" fittings and without fully draining whatsoever.
Note: soft copper tube is not suitable for press fittings over 1-1/4"
 
The water line is 3 feet down
I'll look into press fittings.
I plan on uncovering the leaking tubing today and see what I'm up against.
Thank you for the info.
 
Have you looked into a "Dresser" repair clamp? Get the real Dresser, not the fake China look-alike. That is nice; they will let you use the copper clamp tool.
 
I spent 8 hours digging the hole to the leak. The pipe is 4 feet underground and not copper. Somewhere a transition took place and the water line is 2.1" Black ABS plastic pipe. There was a large rock on the pipe and a 3/4" crack on its top surface.
The "trench" is only 1 foot wide and I cannot get to the pipe to clear and cut out the bad section and replace it.
I tried a Garlock rubber wrap and two radiator hose clamps but it did not work.
My neighbor has a small excavator and perhaps I can have him dig out the earth next to the pipe where I can get to it and do the repair.
My water pressure seems excessive. I'm going to contact my water company and have them check the pressure.
leak.jpg
 
Thank you! I'm not a plumber.
How do you repair poly pipe? I'm not seeing too many 2" fittings anywhere.
 
Last edited:
My neighbor showed up today with his mini excavator. We were able to widen the trench by three feet giving me more room to work on the leaking Polly pipe. He removed a 10" section and we found the pipe is very thick, 1/4". A professional plumber showed up as a courtesy to my neighbor and he told me how to repair the pipe. and where to buy the parts....next week! Only one store in Albuquerque sells Polly pipe this large and has the proper compression fittings to make the permanent repairs.
So now I have a new problem. I need water. I drove the 50 miles into town and found a vinyl +braided with nylon threads heavy duty tubing a Home Depot and bought 6 radiator clamps. It is rated at 70 PSI.
The vinyl tubing is 2" I.D. The Polly is 2.12" O.D. I headed the vinyl tubing in boiling water and was able to do a tight slip fit of four inches on either side of the cut Polly pipe ends. I use three radiator clamps per end and went to my water meter.
I was really P'O'd when I found my water meter has a pressure regulator rated at 15-150 PSI. The darned adjustment screw was almost fully screwed into the regulator! Not having a pressure gauge to connect to a faucet, I backed off the pressure to the lowest pressure adjustment and had my wife turn on a faucet once I opened the water main valve. There is a new water tank on top of my mountain,200 feet higher than my house. High water pressure has been a problem in the past.
I increased the PSI out to where we could take a shower, and I guess it is 40-50 PSI max. A marked difference from what it had been.
The vinyl hose blew off after one hour. And it filled the trench almost full by the time I could get to the water main 125 yards away and turn off the water. As I went back to the trench to pump out the water, The water level dropped to fully empty in a matter of seconds! A great sound like a tub draining could be heard! Darned if a 4" hole opened up at the base of the house foundation. The water did not go into my basement.
I will drop in a bore scope in the AM and see where all the water went.
There may be a small cavern under my house? I live on a limestone mountain.
I will see if I can make a "brace" to prevent any movement of the vinyl hose as well as lowering the PSI again.
If you have any ideas on how to stop the vinyl hose from blowing off without damaging the Polly pipe, I'd love to read them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top