P B Plumber Finding a leak in a floor
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- Опубликовано: 4 янв 2022
- A day in the life video blog of a plumber and gas engineer.
Looking for a leak on a sealed system that was losing pressure.
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I've just started my level 3 plumbing and been getting some experience with a plumber. He said to watch your vidoes and tbh I've learned so much from watching you. Love the vidoes mate keep up the great work!
What a terrific video for this non jandyman. It must haave been a nightmare for the owners but helped immensely by having someone who is a proper and trustworthy professional dealing with it.
I'm a bit late in seeing this. I had a similar issue before at a hotel. We left the heating on with all rads turned off. It made it much easier to find the leak as the boiler was at temperature so the heat escaped through the leak. We then found it with the thermal imagining camera.
Great video, thanks for sharing.
Excellent video. Thanks for all the hard work you put in.
Great video Pete, don’t you just love helpful customers like that. 👍
Great video. I know nothing about plumbing but was able to follow and understand the methodical approach. Very interesting 👌
Yo PB, thank you doing the vid! Happy new year to you!! 💪🏼🤙🏼👍🏼
Great video yet again P.B. So glad you had a good break and recharged your batteries( literally lol ). I’ve got a thermal camera really useful I got mine to fix leak on lead pipe in concrete floor but I’ve got a problem my pipe is shared under my floor with neighbour. Was going to renew with poly pipe surface mounted and just box in but can’t cause of neighbour really stuck at moment. Anyway hope family all good and keeping safe and looking forward to your 100.000 subscribers. Won’t be long I’m sure
Smashed it again PB. Very interesting video. Glad u guys sorted it. Customer seems like the ideal customer, making holes in the floor lol
Really enjoy your videos, keep up the good work.
Sir , you are doing great work
actually thought when you had thermal camera on at the entrance it did look quite spread out. Fair play to the guy for digging it at least 🤣 great video.
yeah when i was editing it i thought it looked more spread out, it didn’t register with me at the time tho
Easily done, I'd say on the day I'd of done the same 😃 👍
@@PBPlumber DEFO LOOK INTO OPENING A AMAZON SHOP SELLING TOOLS YOU REVIEW .. it’s a great passive revenue stream and ensures people get the right products.. it costs nothing just a few hours of time . Well worth hooking up with a 4th year student doing social media as they will help u sort and add additional revenue streams obv make themselves a wage for it but it’s ££ u are not making now so 50% of something is better than what u get from it now .. ALL THE BEST FOR 2022
Good job Pete repairing pipe under floor is sometimes hard but you did it so easily 🙂👍🏼💐
Excellent job Sherlock !!
Excellent vid wish you had more of those.👍👍👍
Great video Pete, Happy New Year folks 🤘😎🤘
Ace vid Pete, learnt a lot from that. Cheers mate.
Good video and a good example of the consequences of burying unprotected copper in concrete.
Great video Pete 👍🏻
First class video and quite surreal as I’m having somewhat of a similar type issue on my own system (again ffs). Old house, F&E system. Boiler is in good condition and has been/continues to be serviced every year, pump was replaced a year ago, both located outside in shed. Hot water cylinder on first floor with header and expansion tanks in the loft. Found a leak on both the flow and return literally 75mm apart from each other between two downstairs radiators right in the middle of a doorway when renovating the house. Both leaks had been "fixed" by a plumber during lockdown. Original pipe work to be fair was very poorly wrapped with no protection and then back filled with a very coarse concrete which caused the leak in my opinion. High traffic area too being in the centre of a bloody doorway so it was a no brainier and sheer luck that I even found it before the floors went down.
Ok, now I’m hearing water coming in to the house via the mains even when no water is being run. Can’t tell if it’s on the heating side as the noise is evident even if the heating is switched on or off but only seems to happen really at night or at least I seem to notice it more at night. This has been going on for over a month now. Bathroom is downstairs with the pipe work running vertical. It’s boxed in and tiled. Toilet is mains fed so it’s not a leaky cistern. It’s definitely coming into the house because when I turn the stop cock off, the water noise ceases. I’m tempted to carefully drill into tiles at the bottom near the back of the toilet and use an inspection camera but then saw this and wondered if the thermal imaging or helium options would be viable on an oil boiler system? I both love and hate this fkg house all at the same time but this is my last hurdle but I’m at a loss.
The first plumber I used who fitted the new circulation pump is to be honest a bellend, a guy from my previous town who I knew of but he left leaving a leak on the same "new" circulation pump he fitted right before trying to sell me a used oil tank. Second plumber who actually fixed my leaks even though he used plastic compression fittings, he did find and also resolved the leaking circulation pump issue ..during lockdown .. and did a fair job but while I genuinely rated the guys professionalism I was disappointed with the use of cheaper fittings however it got it fixed and my floors went down. Second time around when I called the second plumber out again i had to wait for just over 3 weeks to even get him here. When he did finally call out he only checked the ball valve in the loft and then as he was leaving informed I’d have to find any leaks myself but he recommended using leak sealer. I took the hit and spent £20 on MC4 at my local trade store and so far I’m still none the wiser but a little pissed off at having to bleed all of my radiators yet again caused by adding the leak sealer. Getting the hump to be fair even now.
Sorry for gassing, feel like this turned into somewhat of a rant halfway through rather than simply asking if helium and thermal could/would work on an oil boiler F&E system. I have photos of all of my issues by the way that I took when renovating the house so I feel this customers pain having to hammer out concrete floors.
Looking forward to the meal prep. They have been usual for me. Definitely good to get them out for the Jan fitness kick
Good work Pete.
Great job well done 👍🏻
Great video! Thanks for the shout out!
Hi spent 50yrs in the plumbing and heating trade and had quite a few under solid floor leaks not nice, can be a pain to find and repair. Anyway well done to you great video. In my last 20yrs before I retired I joined the Prison Service as a maintenance plumbing and heating engineer who got out of the domestic work. Plus it gave me a good pension. I hope you do well in the future. Kind regards Alan.
I had exact same problem and ended up paying for a new boiler, heating engineer took a guess at where the leak was cos new boiler was still losing pressure, and found it to be the plastic pipes under floor of the extension (he said often extensions used plastic instead of copper so more likely to leak due to degradation. He was correct! My other option was to dig the floor of top end Karndean flooring which I wouldn’t have been able to afford to re lay if random holes were to be dug all around house 🙁
Bit of lube on those slip joints keeps the rubber happy👍👍 interesting job😎
A absolutely great video m8
Great video Pete thanks
Worked at BG for 28 years and we used fernox leak sealer. Very rarely did it make any difference what so ever. Started using ct1 miracle seal and it never failed even on systems that were losing full pressure daily. It does not block boilers including combi’s as well.
It worked for me more than once
How much miracle seal did you use to plug the leaks?
My plumber has used one bottle on two separate occasions and it’s made no difference
Great video Pete, have you tried adding a fragrance to the system water before?
Lifting the carpets before thermal imaging might have been a good idea... 🤔
Subscribed mate! Enjoying these videos. I start my level 2 next week, can’t wait. Also a keen gym gower. What are your fitness goals?
i love the way you deal with customers that jabber on endlessly as they attempt to explain the details of the job you clearly already know lol just totally ignore them
Not really, customer was pointing out that the pipes were hot round the system till last rads, then return was cold - suggesting the leak was on return between last rads and boiler. Which i think it was from what he said?
I think the customer was well informed, knew what he was about and imparted very useful information. Only a fool would not at least listen to what he had to say. That is not to say you do not need to verify - just listen.
Clive long time no see. This is where you're hiding.
Heard a tip from skillbuilder. Put a cheap aftershave in the heating cct and literally sniff out the leak.
Excellent video: subscribed.
Shame the customer didn't take a video of the leak for you Pete! I bet it was a headscratcher, well done.
It's done mate subscribed now 👍👍
Hi Pete, always enjoy your videos, i hate these kinda jobs usually spend a lot of time on them for not much reward and always think how do I charge for my time, but in this case I'd probably have cut a fill loop in with a prv set to about 1.2 since the house is being knocked down soon. Off topic from the video but what is your honest opinion of the nerrad benders currently have a hilmor but on 22mm pulling sets it's twisting the pipe and was wondering does the nerrad do that before I invest in one, would really appreciate a reply thanks Pete
Very interesting video mate. Shame they didn’t start digging at that end ey 😂
I've found a good few times the leaks close to an outside doors, under sinks or close to heating source or cylinder. But also found not so common in passages.
I was told a s a youngster doing this search and discover when it is large and hidden . If you can locate the center of the , be it system or dead wire , open access , now you have done 50 % of the search , it is either behind and further or ahead farther along . Now do the same on the effectided end ( divide at center from open section end or beginning ) depend witch way the pressure/signal is lacking . So basically divide 50 % is fore or aft , then divide that next 50 % and you only have a 1/3 left to investigate.
Good tips. I have some tips for you too.
Dunno if that camera does it, but if you can set it to not have a dynamic/auto range and set it to manual range. set the bottom range 0c and highest range to about 80c. That will give you a consistant picture vs heat. IE your cuppa tea at 38c won't be the same bright yellow at 80c 4 seconds later pointing at a hot feed. If that makes sence.
It's not always possible, but it's alot easier if a client can keep the heating off for 24 hrs before you investigate with a heat gun. this is because of heat soak. if you start with a cold pipework and structure, you can observe the spread of heat before everything has heat soaked and reached an equilibrium. Shows up well on wet materials as wet stuff conducts heat faster. But again thats why it's best to have a fixed scale on the camera, as before and after pictures and recording will look basicaly the same with auto scaling. All the best, top fella.
Sirius, very interesting mate, thanks for your logical input!!👍👍
How do you find the press fit fittings did you favour those because of speed of the job as opposed to using yorkshire and trying to solder with water in the pipes brill video mate as always 👍
Decent video Pete👍 be worth investing in a moisture meter and some acoustic equipment. I use the Sewerin stuff for leak detection it is brilliant 👍 thot press fit looks decent 👌👌👌
Cau I have the model for leak detection please? Thank you
@@ivan79uk aquaphon a200 is decent 👍
Great video pb tanx for the upload,wondering why your camera didn't pick up the leak?
I had exactly the same but we are going to replumb downstairs circuit as they have separate circuits and put in drops
Worst thing about under slab pipes. Eventually they all fail. Nice work on the fix.
Hmm the bed tricky area ,found my self in some embarrassing situations moving customers beds lol
Remove all carpets then you've got underfloor heating! Great job! It would of been a nightmare trying to find where the leak was.
Nice job
By far the quickest, easiest and most accurate way to find leaks is by use of sonic detection methods. Small accelerometers (like microphones) are located between a pipe run and the sound of fluid passing through the leak is detected. Time delay between the 2 sensors is calculated and the leak location is determined within a few mm.
Thermal imaging is all well and good, but through carpeting and concrete is highly optimistic.
you would not correlate in a house... surely just listen at all available points.. correlators get confused by branches and caviation...
i often use a combination of acoustic and tracer gas
Enjoyed the video, i have been doing leak detection for over ten years and there are very few vids out there... It is hydrogen we use not helium... actually it is 95pc nitrogen mixed with 5pc hydrogen and it is a really effective process although as you can imagine every job is different and poses new challenges... Although the gas is a smaller particle and should leak more easily.. it is cold which straight away is a change from the normal leak condition of heat up or cool down as the system is being used... push fit plastic system leaks can be very fiddly to recreate the leak. The infra red survey is best done from cold... leave off over night, that way you get sharp outlines and hopefully can pick up the bloom you are looking for before the heat spreads too much - in this case it would have been hard because the leak was at a nexus point of pipes in a tight area.
We can hear water movement in the pipes, sounds like a seeping toilet valve. There's no visible leak above the slab anywhere, so it's probably under the slab in our 35 year old house in Florida. We have extremely hard water and just did some bathroom mods. Shower, wall toilet and maybe we shook loose a ready to blow copper line when we did the bathroom. Seems like a pinhole because the well pump doesn't really come on too often , maybe once an hour.
I bought a 2 bed 1910 built mid-terrace house in 1991 by myself and I had a major water leak under the kitchen floor a few weeks later. I got an emergency plumber out & the old lead pipe was relatively easy to get to under the kitchen floor which was made up of quarry tiles on top of sand, but both this and 12% mortgage interest rates definitely didn't help my finances and stress levels! 😬
Amazingly lucky that customer didn't damage any pipes digging out floor. Last time I did that that's what happened to me
Good videos.
Had the same issue in the kitchen had to dig the kitchen floor up to find a lead pipe folded back on itself
Really enjoyed the video
Just wondering did you attempt the festive swim in the sea 🌊
The scale on the thermal imager display is dynamic. Can it be set to stay the same? I'm just wondering if this would make it easier to use.
Brilliant video. Have a leak under concrete. Helps provide me with a few ideas (especially the comment further below in regards turning of all rads before further testing using thermal). Thank you.
i always put a microfiber cloth over the agitator just in case of starches...
Top video as always mate 👍🏻 quick question what adaptor do you use on your flusher to get on the Worcester filters?
Have a look on adeys online shop 👍
Sometimes, jobs are not that easy to resolve...glad it was in this instance !
I’m disappointed the that the heat sensor didn’t pick up the leak, and that the customer had to find the fault by himself.
Forgot to say, I've subbed.
done these jobs before. I also find leak sealer can take a while to work, it will only plug small weeps though.
Although people say leak sealer works I've never witnessed it working for myself. Tried again and again but no joy. System cleaner yep.
The helium thing reminded me of a tip from Roger Bisby to tip a cheap bottle of aftershave or perfume into heating system then have a walk round and see if you can get a wiff of it anywhere, not sure how well it would have worked through a concrete floor though.
What would be your poison of choice, Brute, Hai Karate, lynx Africa?
@@Daniells1982 bit of joop I recon 😂
You'd smell the leak from next door mate 😂
Those jobs you remember, are called experience.
If it's only a temporary fix.
Why would you just not use speedfit?
Probably need to do a similar job in my house. Does anyone know how you would repair the holes in the concrete floor?
Is it just backfilling with the excavated material on top of the pipes the screed the surface?
Subscribed. 😁
Good evening PB.
Fairplay PB sometimes the pipework in the concrete floor is done in gunbarrel wrapped in fiberglass 🙈
Do you need to drain down to remove the fernox after you have flushed around system or do you leave it in?
I had a plumber come and he changed my expansion white bottle but installed a much larger bottle and since have been losing pressure everyday
But you some Geophones and push air in you’ll hear it bubbling
Bagging a prv is a good little trick, I cut the finger off a rubber glove and do the same, it holds itself and no need to tape it
Too much information there..😁😁😁
Won't you get a cold wet finger though?
Does it matter that you connected the pipes to opposite pipes than what they were? At 30:16 you can see right side goes into closest to camera pipe. At 32:30 you can see left pipe goes into closes to camera pipe. IDK just curious if it matters.
Hi Pete, thanks great vid. When you use MC3 cleaner with magnacleanse do you drain the whole system to remove it before using inhibitor or is there a way to neutralise the system and leave it in? Thanks
You should always flush out any cleaners unless they are specifically designed to be able to be left in and you have a suitable filtration system, which is unlikely on a domestic installation. Typically these products contain chelating agents which remove deposits and films from surfaces, so if left in the system will continue to slowly strip material from the internal surfaces, particularly metallic surfaces. Remember also that you need to purge the deposits that the cleaner has removed, and they're not all magnetic!
Hi Pete, curious as to what happened with those two end rads that weren't getting warm until you flushed the system and found not much debris on the magnets? Did they run hot after you opened all the rads?
I suspect it was more likely that the system was poorly balanced rather than any sludge buildup.
25 years in this game and still learning daily
If its all coming out
I would of left the speedfit in
Tbh i also would of tried ct1 leak sealer first as its a temporary job ,that stuff is the nutts
Good video though
Great video as ever. Always interesting to watch. Did you realise you swapped the flow and return connections to the branch pipe when doing that repair?
Well spotted mate 👍🏻
I've just checked. No, I think the repair was OK and the pipes weren't swapped.
@@davidceredig-evans8772 watch it again. Pipes on the left are Td in the other way round.
Yeah definitely got the pipes mixed up
I have never ever ever done that before :D. Balancing is gonna be a headache.
I’ve just had that same scenario leaking through the heat exchanger, it was a navien piece of crap straight water heater and my customer had higher than rather water bill, I determined that the internal piping going through the heat exchanger was leaking. He would shut the cold water feed off and condensate pump would stop running (idk if you guys use condensate pumps In 🇬🇧 that’s what was happening) Get this I called my supplier to get a heat exchanger replacement and they called distributor and they said customer had to call Navien directly to have heat exchanger shipped to them 😂 are you kidding me! Anyway those units are junk do not buy, seems like units are made better elsewhere, I’d love to install Worcester-Bosch units here in the states! Cheers mate! Is that something like a propress system?
Is that white stuff round the pipes asbestos?
cut pipes each end cap off one then pressure test ?
let me guess Boxt install no flush? also you can turn the pump speed up on the 8000, its a 15/75 pump on them
Why not leave the temp speedfit on if it worked? Good videos by the way. Thanks for sharing tips and tricks.
yeah me and ben wondered that, but he told me he didn’t feel confident leaving it on and wanted it in copper 🤷🏽♂️
There’s a specific design for speed fit designed for central heating only .
First thing to check would be to see if the rads were balanced.
Should these pipes not be totally wrapped, going to happen again until all the pipe work is replaced. I had a leak in my house and my pipes were wrapped. This pipes do not stand a chance.. Houses built around 2001 year that is have a lot of issue due to bad copper also. How old is this house? Good interesting video Mate..
I rap electric tape around copper tube before concreting
When u were doing the thermal that spot stuck out to me.
How much did you charge for that job?
That looked like a decent leak. The ground underneath is completely washed away. I'd be worried about a sinkhole in that part of the house
Heating pipes were literally thrown inside the concrete, on an uninsulated ground... well, it is a very rich country and can waste shit loads of energy.
I like your tool bag, details please, I may buy one myself 👍👍
Sir , I am from Bangladesh, I completed my SSC in 2016 and HSC 2018.Now I am doing ielt and I want do plumbering course in Canada, so what should I do
Hey how do those tap on fittings seal onto the tubes?? I used to work with my Dad many years ago back in the days when lead pips were still being used in some places and am just interested in how far technology has come in the meantime. Nice job by the way.
I think those fittings crimp on to the pipe. They look a bit like Yorkshire fittings, but they are solder free.
@@rubberneck2 Yes mate like In said technology has come a long way since I last did any plumbing I was used to cast iron baths and downpipes gutters etc etc
You're ALWAYS better off soldering those connections because the slip/crimp fittings rely on an O-ring to seal and they ALWAYS LEAK over time, while leaks in soldered joints are rare.
They surely leak when the tube isn't free of defects like dents or score marks, as seen in this case.
But as the plumber said its only temporary as the house is being demolished
We’ve been using pro press for both gas and water for 3 years now, mostly commercial, and have yet to have a problem and stuff gets beat to hell in commercial spaces.
Interesting I didn’t think you could use propress under a slab. I noticed the fittings look different over there as well. Ours have another bit of fitting past the o ring. We’re also not allowed to solder under a slab. We’d run 4 separate lines and tee it in the wall. If we absolutely had to have that tee or we’re doing a repair under a slab we have to braze it.
Use of soft solder is simply asking for trouble.
Silver solder (brazed) results in a joint stronger than the copper pipe.
Press fittings have a cost and strength disadvantage... only good for saving time and perhaps risk of using flame.
@@BTW... couldn’t agree more. I always silver solder under a slab. I don’t know where your at but I’m pretty sure both codes in the US require it. Though not going to lie, I’ve soldered under a slab before. It was because I didn’t have any silver solder or only had a portable torch, I can’t remember. It was couplings so I figured it wouldn’t be under a lot of stress compared to other fittings
@@joshcowart2446 Here in Australia.
@@BTW... seems like y’all’s code or at least what y’all consider best practice is sake as us. I didn’t mention pro press in my reply. I use it in repair situations when I can’t get the water drained out. I’ve also used them in situation where I’ve had to shut down a building and tee in to a main. It’s much easier to put a press tee and valve and then turn the water back on than it is to blow all the water out and solder. My company uses it on all commercial new construction. That’s for two reasons. One it probably saves them money on time and two they have a lot of young people who can’t solder. A couple of them can do it in a bind but they wouldn’t know what to do at a job where every single fitting is solder. However in the back of my mind I worry about those jobs. A repair is one thing but a whole job is another. I’m hesitant to install an o ring or any washer that I can’t change. I worry how those o rings hold up long term. I’ve seen solder joints that are 70 plus years old and fine. What happens to pro press in 20 yrs. I worry that’s it’s like a lot of things with building these days. They’re built to last 20 yrs but not longer. Another factor I just recently learned about was how they deal with freeze. I’m in Texas and we had the unprecedented 4 day snowstorm without power last year. One of our jobs had a 1” (28 mm) line running 50’ (about 15 m) under the floor on a balcony of a high rise. It feeds some planters up there. Contrary to popular belief when a line burst from freezing it isn’t directly from the expansion. Copper can take that and will even stretch. What it does though is create an ice block and then as it freezes more and more it create thousands of pounds of pressure down stream. This is what causes the pipe to burst. This pro press fitted line just pulled every single fitting apart. I think it was 3 couplings. The amount of damage is more severe because you have a wide open pipe now as opposed to a gash. Though once a pipe hurts it may put out so much that it doesn’t matter. Also they had to pull up the floor in 3 separate spots to repair it. Whereas solder it would have burst in one spot. Basically the cost to repair will be higher and possibly the damage will be more if it freezes.
@@joshcowart2446 Happy to say pipe freeze is very unlikely here, except in alpine zones.
Bit of a worry that 'youngers' in the trade don't have solder skills, or don't seek to learn. Bit of a worry.. and how low can it go?
I hazard a guess they don't know how to measure, bend and fabricate pipework too, without the need to add unnecessary couplings, Yeah, there is that 'instant gratification' of just grabbing a bucket of press fittings and wacking stuff together on the fly, with little need for accuracy, yet pretty certain no leakin' first time.
And there is that factor of horror job sites where you can't get out of the place quick enough... the kinda places you remember years later.
Man, basic soldering - I learned how to soft solder at 8 years old in the electrical/electronic field... and in my early teens plumbing fittings, a few years later in the sheetmetal fabrication field... some roof plumbing too (where now it's pop rivets and silicone bog to do the job... nasty. That was prior to any trade training.
Late teens brazing copper, brass and steel.
Done a fair bit of instrument plumbing during my apprenticeship (electrical fitting/mechanic). I had used swagelok fittings prior to that anyway.
Early 20's it was a mix of electrical and refrigeration fitting... in-field fault diagnosis repair. Interesting trade the HVAC.. gotta know electrical plumbing, gas systems, mechanical, sheetmetal and air handling.
Freezing... uhghhh. Seems a pressure relief 'fuse' would be a fair idea in the 1" branch you described. Press fit has it's normal design pressure with safety margin, sure. But to deal with freezing down a closed line.. a copper end cap and lower gauge annealed tube over a tundish drain located at every level... in an easily opened service stack... when extensive use of press fittings are used.. perhaps?
I sure have my doubts about press fittings, but they are regarded as acceptable for hot/cold mains water and Nat gas supply here... so it follows that failure in service due to freeze is covered by building Insurance, I guess.
I've actually seen press fittings in service, that have been accidental not crimped by original installers sitting there not leaking! Doesn't stop me having thoughts before sleep though, sometimes.
But back to the heating line repair in floor... I see 4x 45 degree press fittings where a saddle set bend could have been used for clearance... OK, perhaps 1x 45 close to the main line tee. Then again... braze fabricate the repair piece including the Tee and use 3x straight slip couplings to patch it in.
May be a silly question/point, but you re connected the pipes a different way to what they were originally, will that not affect it in any way?
no such thing as a silly question mate. the only way it would effect the system is if the thermostatic radiator valves weren’t bi-directional (or there was something random like a non return valve, but there shouldn’t be one of those in that location)
them pens are the best pens you can ever get