On Tue, 26 Apr 2011 17:43:32 -0700, "Steve B"
wrote:


"DerbyDad03" wrote in message
...
On Apr 24, 9:10 pm, "The Henchman" wrote:
Had to do an emergency repair of an elbow last week that leads to my hot
kitchen sink anhot d dishwasher. Since I'm a new homeowner I didn't have a
propane torch or spare copper pipe parts or solder (never soldered pipe
before) so I invested in a $6 sharkbite elbow instead. snapped on easy, no
leaks, handles the pressure and the quick on and off that the faucet and
dishwasher demand.

The elbow is under the floor joist, for hot water, in an unfinished
basement. Easy to check up on and easy to re-repair. Curious to people's
opinions on whether this type of repair is considered permanent or not.

I've used SharlBites twice and have no complaints so far.

One time I turned off the water, cut a pipe, capped it and turned the
water back on before the commercial was over. I didn't miss a second
of the football game and my wife, who was in the kitchen making dinner
at the time, never even knew that I had turned the water off.

Another time I used a SharkBite Tee to tap into a copper pipe at the
front of the house (which was at street pressure) then ran a length of
PEX across the basement ceiling and used a SharkBite straight
connector to connect the PEX to the copper pipe at the backyard hose
spigot. Less than an hour's work to get street pressure to the
backyard hose.

Both of these connections were made in the tight quarters near the
basement ceiling above storage cabinets - not a location where I would
have wanted to sweat copper.

One of the many advantages of the SharkBites is their ability to
swivel even after installation. With copper, you need to "aim" each
fitting to get the pipe to run in the direction you need. With
SharkBites, you just pop them on and swivel them in any direction you
want.

Costly yes, but damn convenient. In my case, I feel the cost was
justified based solely on the fact that I didn't have to sweat
fittings in locations where access was severely limited.

reply:

what he said ................



Same situation for me. Putting in a bathroom in daughter's basement, I
needed to get the water to the toilet - I had the concrete cut out for
the drain but didn't want to remove any more concrete than necessary,
so I drilled the concrete and put a plastic pipe in as a "sleave" and
the copper pipe inside that -kinda hard to solder down under the
concrete, but the shark-bite worked beautifully. - packed with sand
after. Then I needed to bring water down the end wall for the basin -
but the furnace duct was 2 inches from the wall, and against the
joists - and was to be boxed in with drywall. Virtually impossible to
get to with torch to solder it, so again a shark-bite was used.

At $8+ each, vs $0.37 for a solder LB, I thought long and hard about
it (I'm a cheap guy) - but there will be no question if I ever get
into that kind of situation again.