Gray Pex?

[rquad]

I'm looking at buying a house. It has brand-new plumbing throughout, but the pipes are gray. The pipe says "BOW 3/4" (CTS) Superflex 2110 SDR-11 100 PSI". I was scared off when I first saw this, thinking it was the cheap Quest stuff. With further study, I suspect it is Pex, but I've never seen or heard of gray Pex. And I do mean the pipes are gray - they are not white, off white, milky, or any other color like traditional white Pex. These pipes are the same exact color as cheap mobile home Quest.

Is this Pex?

 

[stevemachine]

Poly B, google it. That stuff is brutal. It's wrecked a lot of homes and now is banned. But some houses have it and its fine with no issues. Probably depends on how chlorinated you water is, Chlorine makes poly b brittle

 

[stevemachine]

Maybe post a pic to confirm but I bet its poly b

 

[reedplumber]

Never seen gray pex, seen gray poly pipe though, different monster, different fittings, it's what they use in trailer houses around here lol

 

[havasu]

There was a multi-million $ settlement involving PB Pipe, but unfortunately the settlement is done and the money was spent. Lets hope that is not what it is.

 

[rquad]

Maybe post a pic to confirm but I bet its poly b

Here's a pic...

If it's new construction, how could it be Quest/PB? I thought they didn't make it any longer.

 

[journeyman]

That looks like quest to me. Either way plastic pipe is junk. It will always be a problem more so on the hot side due to expanding and contracting. Copper is also the best choice. But it is expensive to repipe a home. Hope everything works out. Always a good idea to turn water off to house especially if your gonna be gone for a long time. Better to catch a problem when some one is home rather then when someone is not.

 

[phishfood]

Around here, I have seen homes with polybutylene piping outlasting copper piping. Central Florida seems to have a bad problem with copper piping developing pinhole leaks.

Not to say that PB is necessarily a better pipe than copper, it isn't. But quality of installation and matching the type of pipe to water conditions makes saying any one pipe is "best" all of the time rather difficult.

 

[phishfood]

The only thing I found with a web search for that was a BOW PEX product, but it doesn't seem to be available in gray. If I had to guess, I would say PB.http://www.rundle-spence.com/index....Pipe.Valves.Fittings,Pipe,Pex.Tubing...BowPex

 

[reedplumber]

Ok took me a minute lmao sorry I coulda answered this sooner, that's not pex or poly b pipe, it is a polyethylene pipe but its classification is actually sdr-11. Which actually is a differentiation of wall thickness, there's sdr-11, sdr-21, so on so forth sdr-15 those are just thickness schedules. Fittings on the other hand may be a booger. We use sdr-11 pipe ALOT for geothermal, so chances are its good pipe and won't have any problems with it for a long time. Like I said finding fittings may prove to be the tough part because all of the sdr-11 pipe and fittings we have done have all been butt or socket welded like gas poly.

 

[rquad]

Ok took me a minute lmao sorry I coulda answered this sooner, that's not pex or poly b pipe, it is a polyethylene pipe but its classification is actually sdr-11. Which actually is a differentiation of wall thickness, there's sdr-11, sdr-21, so on so forth sdr-15 those are just thickness schedules. Fittings on the other hand may be a booger. We use sdr-11 pipe ALOT for geothermal, so chances are its good pipe and won't have any problems with it for a long time. Like I said finding fittings may prove to be the tough part because all of the sdr-11 pipe and fittings we have done have all been butt or socket welded like gas poly.

Thanks, that is a more helpful clue. If it's polyethylene, then it's the same kind of stuff as pex, which makes me feel better about it. I saw at least one gatorbite or similar fitting used on it, so maybe it takes standard fittings (or can be adapted over to CPVC)??? There's no way of judging the quality of installation, either. I do know that the pressure is on and there are no obvious leaks. It's still a mystery why someone would plumb a house with this kind of pipe.

In any case, it's good to know it's not PB.