Radiant tubing leak

Unknown

soaped up the manifold? if it's wirsbo and he didn't lube those little o rings before inserting the fittings they can become damaged and leak very small just like you're saying. If not it sounds like someone found a tube with a nail. Another thought is to just bite the bullet and fill the tubes with water, pressurize and look for the wet spot. Good luck.

Missed the part about the blueboard. That complicates the water solution a bit.

Gary Elovitz

Radiant tubing leak

The homeowner suggested that the radiant tubing (stapled up to the sub-floor above) be pressure-tested BEFORE the joist space was blown full of foam insulation and the ceiling below blueboarded and plastered. The contractor said: "No need to do that - my tubing NEVER leaks!"

I bet you can guess what came next. The tubing was pressure-tested after the ceiling below was installed, and one manifold does not hold pressure. The leak is pretty small - it takes a whole day for the air pressure to drop significantly. The contractor has tried to listen for the leak with a stethoscope, but no luck.

Any ideas of how to find a small leak in tubing stapled up to a plywood sub-floor and "buried" in insulation below?

Thanks!

FATBOY040575

WHAT IS YOUR PRESSURE

What pressure are you pumping into it? Maybe try more air pressure and hope it will make the leak louder.

Jeremy_14

That sucks. Do you know roughly where the failed loop is run? Is the finished floor already laid on top of the subfloor? The only option I can think of is fill the loop with 60 psi of water and watch for damage. Maybe the water bubbles up through cracks in the subfloor because of foam insulation.

Bob Forand

Cap off

Unsure of how many loops you have on your manifold, but perhaps you can cap off all but one loop. Try to find it one loop at a time. At least you should be able to better pinpoint where it is. Once you have found that loop, you can hook up the others, and then find the spot on the floor that doesn't heat up.

Could the flooring be taken up, versus the cieling below ? If it is, it will be easier because you will be able to see the tubing.

I wonder if there may some sort of sealant you can use, once you have found the loop. Perhaps a manufacturer will be able to shed some light on a possible sealant.

Good luck..

Gary Elovitz

Radiant tubing leak

They have pressurized up to 100 psi with air. I don't think they can go much higher.
Thanks.

Jeremy_14

Try isolating the loop, hook an air compressor, or Co2 canister onto it with extremely high pressure and listen.

FATBOY040575

If and when you do find the leak, because it is staple up you could just cut the hole(leak) out and use a coupling. In order to do that though you need access to the leak, like said before try to isolate your loops remove one loop at a time. This will take some time but will give you a better idea of where the leak could be.

Gary Elovitz

Thanks

Thanks to all for the responses - they gave me a few ideas that we will try.

steveex

Just had a problem with a staple up system, leak was caused by the carpet guys, if you have carpet on the floor check the tacless around the perimider. Thats wherei found my lovely leak.

steveex

Pull up carpet, remove tacless very slowly, if it is from that you will see water.

tim smith

Is the floor finished above, if not maybe you can try this.

If no finish floor but sub floor, drill small holes ever so many feet against the edge of joist in each bay, this way you should miss tube and of course minimal depth of drill. Fill the tube w/ helium and use a sniffer in each of the holes to detect. Maybe you can locate it this way. We usually use american leak detection to do this. They use sound alot but on really small leak like this they may not be able to hear so they may sniff it out. Just a thought. Tim

JJ_4

Infrared

Not sure if it would work in your flooring system, but we used infrared for a snowmelt leak. Could see "spread" where the leak was. Call a commercial company that typically does scans on electrical panels and they probably have done hydronics too. Not cheap, but fast.

tim smith

Maybe a thermal imaging camera, just trialed one the other day

You could fill with say 160 water and hopefull see the spread where the leak is before it leaks too much. Popped in my head when above mentioned the infrared. Maybe above post meant this when he said infrared. Good luck, Tim

Mike Thomas_2

Might Not Leak

If it takes that much pressure with air, it might not even leak with water in it. Juice it up to 20 lbs with water and see what happens.

Dave Belisle

small leaks

Try finding someone with a hydrophone . I have two units, one has a notch filter so I can block out the background noise . They are SUPER SUPER sensitive and are the best way I have found to locate leaks....

The leak will get louder as you get closer to it and then you will get a doppler effect when you pass over it....

BP&H