Mold in Pex

John MacGregor_3

jc,
Try draining your system down and refilling with one cup of ammonia or roman cleanser per gallon of water, let it circulate for a couple of days and see what happens. If it is mold it should be gone (or at least dead). You may have to give it a couple of doses and flushes, but that should take care of the problem.

....jc

Scenario...

Folk's,
I had H/W baseboards and pex roughed in to my house about '98. The system was pressurized(with air) and sat there until last October when I finally got a boiler to power it. Well, the system performed poorly, so now it's being retrofitted. What we are seeing in almost all of the pex is black patches of material. The only thing that I can think of is that it's mold.

Some of the pipe is being replaced, and some of it is not accessible, so it's staying. Is the mold a problem? What can be done to remove it?

Thanks for any ideas!
....jc

Scott25

mold

Sounds like you had a good environment for the production of organic material. Your own little petri dish....

Possible cause: moisture is present in pex when installed and possibly the air compressor added a little water or oil to the mix. Sealed the ends, nice temperature to grow since its never been put into service..

When a closed system is operating the temps experienced will "kill" the majority of stuff in it.

Try circulating a biocide (walmart/pool supply store) mixed with the water in the proper dosage and it should kill it. Be ready to flush the snot out of it because the dead organic matter can clog stuff really good.

Always check with the manuf. for compatibilty of chemcial with the pex.

Scott

Ken_8

My fave?

TSP. Extremely potent on germs et al. Almost as good as bleach and actually good for the system by keeping solder flux and other acidic elements neutral or higher in pH.

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