Pipes

schweigert

i bought an 1880 house in 2011. i have hot water radiators. love the system, but i have recently had two separate pin hole leaks on the bottom of 2 1/4 inch o.d. iron pipes that carry hot water to radiators. i realize they must be corroding, i did read somewhere not to drain any water from system,this would help keep pipes from corroding. previous owners might have drained every year though, i dont know. i temporarily patched them, hoping to make it to spring. has anyone else had this problem? do i have to replace whole section of pipes? do i have to replace with iron pipes, or is there other options? about 50% of these 2 1/4 in. pipes are wrapped with asbestos also,(just to complicate my problem). thanks to anyone that can help.

Eastman

Schweigert, there are other possible issues that result in oxygenated water unnecessarily corroding the system. Can you post some photos? The expansion system can be a common culprit.

Jamie Hall

Is this a gravity or pumped system? If it's gravity, you have to keep the pipe sizes the same, or things will go out of balance. Pumped you might get away with smaller pipes.

I would replace whole sections of pipes when you do the work. You can put a temporary patch on -- there are several -- but they aren't permanent and when you have one pinhole, trust me -- you will have more.

I would replace with iron. And don't forget to reinsulate them...

icesailor

First, get an asbestos remediation done ASAP. Its cheap at twice the price. Once done, you won't have to worry about it.

Did they or did they not drain the house seasonally? I had quite a few houses that had old steel pipes in them what had been fine for years and I started draining them seasonally. I always worried that what is happening to you, might happen to me. I never had a problem.

It sounds like your pipes are 2" ID steel pipes. No where the issue of they were 2 1/2" ID or larger pipes.

Once you get rid of the asbestos insulation, you can look for "pimples" on the bottom of pipes. You might notice that they are only on certain sized pipes. All steel pipes are not created equal.

Ironman

Silicone wrap is the newest temporary patch and it seems to be very effective.

Here's a link to a recent thread about it:

http://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/152253/silicone-wrap-my-experience