Nails in my Tubing

Robert O'Connor_7

Helium, and a good tester. This WILL find the leak(s).

Alan(CaliforniaRadiant)Forbes

Nails in my Tubing

We did a job earlier this year in Silicon Valley; two floors with radiant heating. The floor system is composed of a subfloor with 2 x 4 (flat) sleepers; we ran our tubing up and down between the sleepers and pressurized the system to 100 psi. The voids were filled with Gypcrete and hardwood floors nailed into the sleepers.

Every now and then we'll get a flooring installer who starts daydreaming and misses a sleeper and nails some tubing. It happened 3 times on this job during the flooring installation. No big deal; you get in there and fix it and pressurize the system again.

But now, the owners have moved in and we get a call that there is another leak. When we get down there, the contractor pulls more flooring up and there are two more leaks. Now the owner and contractor are wondering just how long this will go on and how to figure out if there are any more nails in our tubing without tearing up the whole floor.

We can re-pressurize the whole system again, but it was pressurized before and it was tight, even with at least 3 nails penetrations.

Any suggestions?


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Weezbo

i have this valuable experienc too:(

so far my ultra sound machine ive been using for years seems to tell me on the first go around. later its dash over and fix it for free....or you gotta like this work.....the hand held temp gage works on heating loops and water lines the ultra sound with an exploratory hole seems to catch it. basically... its all a case of being considerate of what the other guys got to do to fix things ..and doing your best to re state that abundantly.carpet layer tagged the pex,we put 2X4 on the flat . finish carpenters staple the under layment with 3/1/2" staples ?i ask them to take the effort to use smaller fasteners for 1/4 ' UNDERLAYMENT..sheet rock screws do to rerouting pex by an electrician? insulators wrapping red tape over a slice with a sheet rock knife,1/2"exploratory holes drilled into a piece of half" pex with a 18
" GREENLIE? its wonderful. helium i never used helium might be good.it is a nobel.

hr

That's a real drag

often the tube will not leak as long as the nail seals tightly! Sometimes it takes some time for the nail to rust away, then leaks appear.

I had a Warmboard job go two years before the leaks started showing. I was able to fix 8!! from the crawlspace below by chiselling below the nailed portion. A real pain.

I'd take the tube up to the point where it just starts to scream Psi wise, Most tube will handle 100 psi, but check the listing on the tube.

100 psi air over the water will help locate "rouge" nails, usually.

Disconnect the boiler first

Hope the madnailer will pay.

hot rod

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Alan(CaliforniaRadiant)Forbes

Perforated Tubing

Thanks, guys. I like the helium idea and had the owners call American Leak Locator. I think they use a hydrogen/helium mixture and an electronic sniffer to find the leak.

hr: I see that Warmboard is printing a tracing of the tubing pattern on the bottomside of their plywood sheets so you can see where the tubing is when you're looking up at it. I like that.

Alan

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steve gates

18 years to rust tru

while remodeling a H/Inn we found a damp wall. yep nail hole with nail. 18years old. Never wept enough to drip to the floor below. The mold wasn't very bad either.

Also found a joint that the solder didn't flow into one side. Didn't leak till I replaced the valve inches away. There was a bead around 3/4 of the pipe and absolutely nothing inside. Amazing simply amazing!

Mark Eatherton1

Speaking of leaks...

I "inherited" a job here locally. Was originally called in because the heating system was losing pressure. Found a frozen and broken line in a crawl space. Fixed it. Later, a plumbing line froze and broke in the attic. Did LOTS of water damage to a hardwood floor. Hardwood flooring contractor comes in and takes up damaged floors. Uses extra long staples to put new wood down...

H.O. calls me Monday morning to tell me theres zero pressure in his heating system and he has no heat. Mentions that there is water running out of a can light in the basement...

My crew shows up and explains to hardwood flooring contractor that there are tubes stapled up to the bottom of the floor, and his extra long hanging in mid air doing absolutley no good staples have punctured the tube in numerous spots. He claims no one told him so and claims he won't pay for repairs...

One full day for two men, and 8 repair couplings later, crew leaves after performing 100 PSI hydrostatic test on system. Explain to HO that sometimes, it takes years for another leaker to show when staple finally rusts out...

Get called back last night by hardwood floor contractor that water is once again pouring from ceiling in basement in different area than original fix...

Can someone explain to me the benefits of having a staple go completely through the plywood sub floor and hang out in mid air by 3/4"?? Am I really that stupid that I can't see the benefit of air staples?

Hardwood floring guy says "I ain't never seen such a stupid way to install heat in my whole life"...

Guess who's probably not going to be paid...

I expect we'll be back there soon:-(

Alan, I feel your pain...


ME

Bryan_16

staple length

Asked this question of a home builder, "Why do the staples have to stick out below the bottom of the subfloor?" Answer, "The underlayment mfg wants them to penetrate the sub floor, besides that, those were the only staples I had in the truck." No kidding, real conversation.

Jack_23

Bummer

Can't advise on your problem but one thing I used to do when doing radiant was to "odorize" the tubing. I used to put a few drops of oil of wintergreen into the tubing, and then pressurize for the pour. I'd give all the hands a whiff and tell them if they smelled it the tubing was perforated and give me a heads up. Worked pretty well and there was no question as to there being a leak.

Wayco Wayne_2

Good idea

I used to do that with pnuematic control lines if I had a leak, back when I did commercial control work. Didn't think to use it for radiant tubing. Kudos. WW

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Mark Hunt

Mad nailers


We did a home a few years back with Kitec, direct staple up.

The builder was going under and was late with payments. An angry tile contractor used 2.5" screws to fasten sub-flooring, seemed like a screw every 2", and hit the tubing at least 15 times. The system was pressurized and working, but no leaks materialized immediately. A few showed up after a month, while others waited a year. I have to believe it was deliberate.

Oddly enough, I have never had tubing punctured by hardwood flooring contractors. Electricians account for most of the damage, followed by plumbers.(Quite often the plumbers were fellow employees of the company I was working for!)

I did have a stair installer get my tubing once. He decided that there was not enough room to work on the ballister in the hallwaqy, so he relocated to the master bedroom. When he screwed the ballister to the floor, he hit the tubing and immediately saw water. So he went to his truck and brought in a skill saw to take up the floor!! You guessed it, he cut through even more tubing! Poor guy.

Hope everything works out for you!

Mark H

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jim lockard

vacuum

When doing A/C work some times the line sets will hold pressure. I always pump up and then pump down or place the system in vacuum. It has been my exper. that a drywall screw or shot nail may hold pressure for a while but will not hold vacuum also.

Bob Gagnon plumbing and heating

post it



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Bob Gagnon plumbing and heating

post it

everywhere. on the floors, at front and back doors before the hardwood contractor shows up to give his quote. bob

Bob Gagnon plumbing and heating

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