On 29 Sep 2003 12:21:06 GMT, (Andrew
Gabriel) wrote:

In article ,
(N. Thornton) writes:

Hi

It seems crazy to me to save an hours work and fit something that may
flood the place 20 years later. I wouldn't touch it myself.

I'd be dubious about the longevity of the o-ring seal.
Normally, I see up to perhaps ~20 years life of those
in similar circumstances.

The future can seem a long way off, but it comes anyway. Imagine if
you'd fitted pushfit in 1972, thinking 'millennium? hah' and now got
flooded from it. Not for me thanks.

Proper pipework fittings are
a) known to work well from experience
b) have a very long life
c) are a bit more work, but not much.

d) need [more] skilled workforce to correctly assemble.
This is the big one -- plumbers have become impossible to get
hold of. (A friend having an extension built has been told by
the builder that he will not be able to get a plumber to do
the plumbine parts, due to extremely short supply.) A less
skilled workforce can probably do a more reliable pushfit
installation than they could a soldered copper one.

Personally, as my DIY time is free and I can do soldered
copper fittings without any problems, that is what I use.
However, I can see a market for pushfit.

I use pushfit because I'm crap at soldering and haven't got the time
and resource to practice until I'm any good - most often a job needs
to be done NOW, like today when I unscrewed a floorboard and
discovered that a year ago I'd managed to screw into the cold water
pipe that feeds the bath

As an aside I was in the local plumbers merchants for another reason
(bloody 1 1/4" waste on the bath innit) and noticed ALL the current
plumbing products, even Kuterlite and Yorkshire, were guaranteed for
25 years. Doesn't that drop us into a swings/roundabouts scenario?

cheers

witchy/binarydinosaurs