Another Underground Insulated PEX thread

[hondaracer2oo4]

I know this has been discussed many times already and I have read through all of the threads I could find. I still want to make my own pipe. I want to hear from people who have made their own and are satisfied with the results and possibly have some heat loss numbers to back it up. I was looking to run 2 1 inch lines for the boiler and 2 3/4 lines for the DHW. I was looking at using pool noodles because they are closed cell foam, cheap and are much thicker than any closed cell pipe insulation that I could find. Also found the LOW E brand 1/4 inch thick foil faced insulation that alot of ebay sellers use. I found a price of $460 for 120' by 4' roll. Rapping 5 raps with that I could get 100 feet out of it but is pretty pricy I thought. So what have other people used that have been successf in not losing more than a few degrees over their run?

 

[hondaracer2oo4]

Does anybody have experience with the Time Saver Pipe from Pinnacle supply? If you have used it could you tell me what the layers of the microfoil foam rap look like? I called pinnacle today and they told me that when they rap the tubes only the outer layer after everything is rapped has the 'microfoil' layer. By the pictures though it appears that every layer has it going all the way around every rap. I asked about buying a roll of the microfoil and the price was $221 for a 4x125 foot roll. I think that I could probably rap 100 feet of pipe 4 times but Im not sure. Thanks.

 

[kyle1!]

No responses

should tell you that this is not a place to try to DIY. Some have succeeded but most have to redo their line installations because of a faliure. The aggravation of doing it again plus time/material is just not worth it. Scrimp and save for the good stuff.

Brian

 

[ogden]

Im building mine right now and im using one inch pex line with the standard pex line insulation inside of a fore inch pipe. and im filling the remaining gaps with spray fome insulation. not shure how it will work but i think it will be fine .Im gonna bary it around three feet

 

[goosegunner]

I have used a few different items.

1. Double 1" with mico foil in a drain tile with my OWB. It worked ok but flow for pool heater was not adequate.

It was not O2 barrier pex either.

2. Made my own for manifold to pool exchanger. Alum pex with bubble wrap in drain tile. What a pain to wrap and stuff. It only gets used occasionally. I definitely would not want it for winter home heat.

3. Debated about commercial spray foam in place and Logstor. Went with logstor 32 mm which is about the same as 1-1/4" pex. Better flow and the logster has an extremely tough outer jacket.

Make sure you use something that will last, give you plenty of gpm, and has an O2 barrier. You never know what e future will hold. You may want a pressurized system some day.

Gg

 

[hondaracer2oo4]

So as far as the o2 barrier vs the non o2 barrier is the only reason I would need the 02 barrier if my boiler was pressurized? So did you use the microfoil stuff that has a 1/4 inch of closed cell foam sandwiched in foil? Do you know what you heat loss is from the boiler to the house, number of raps you did and how far is the run? Also do you think I should go with the 1 1/4 over the 1 inch? Thanks.

 

[goosegunner]

So as far as the o2 barrier vs the non o2 barrier is the only reason I would need the 02 barrier if my boiler was pressurized? So did you use the microfoil stuff that has a 1/4 inch of closed cell foam sandwiched in foil? Do you know what you heat loss is from the boiler to the house, number of raps you did and how far is the run? Also do you think I should go with the 1 1/4 over the 1 inch? Thanks.

I bought my Microfoil pipe from Anderson wood boiler supply in Wisconsin. It was quad wrap. I had it on the ground in the winter. Their claim that it had 2 degree heat loss was way off. It was buried in the snow and there was 10 inch tunnel around it that had melted away. It had foil with foam around the pipe. 140 feet of pipe.

Size really depends on heat loss of your home and other loads. Garage? DHW?

O2 barrier will give you the option in the future for closed system.


gg

 

[AIM]

If ya spent $5000 on your boiler.
Spend $10,000 on your lines that are underground.

I'm a huge do it yourselfer but when I was faced with putting down new lines, I couldn't come up with a way that was even equal in quality to what I could buy.
That pipe with the 2 lines sprayfoamed in the 4" tile just looks like the cats meow.

Like about everyone else here will tell you. Underground pipe is not the place to skimp.

 

[Kevin in Ohio]

Like about everyone else here will tell you. Underground pipe is not the place to skimp.

Ditto. My lines are not the premanufactured type, just 2 lines laying together with a slotted foam insulation wrapped around them. Why? That was all that was available at the time.

When I did installed I took all the precautions I could to avoid heating groundwater and if you go this route I'd suggest you think about it too. I started by diigging my trench 6 inches lower than needed, Put in a 4 inch slotted field tile, with sloop, and covered it in pea gravel. Then I put a smooth bore, solid(Hi Q) tile and covered it with pea gravel 3/4 up. Topped it with soil. I ran a rope while putting the sections together to pull the pipe as well.

At the low of the pipe where it entered the building I drilled several holes "just in case" water got into the solid pipe. I went back and forth on this as pipe seals with orings but I figured I had to have an escape if water did get in there some how. Pipe comes into my basement and I can pull new if needed VERY easily.

That said, I had no problems with my pipe.

Would I do it again? I would do everything the same but I WOULD use the new manufactured stuff in the smooth bore pipe. To me it's not worth the savings to worry about heating ground water. I had a friend who thought it was too much and said his soil drained well. After burning over 30 cord the first year and seeing a melted snow line above the pipe he ended up having to redoing it. Don't be like him.

 

[ijon1]

Having to do it again is a #####. When you think you have it done, you don't. Thats why I am putting in the good stuff.

 

[slangegger]

If you have read all the DIY pex theads, Im shocked you would still want to make your own. Its just not worth it. Your not the first one to think "It will be fine. That Thermo Pex is way to expensive".

I did a lot of reasearch before I bought mine, and I dont recall anyone who made thier own not ripping it up, or wishing they would have bought the good stuff. There are a lot of pics here that show thawed ground in the dead of winter. I bought 280 feet of it. It cost me $3,000. I wouldnt do it any other way. Its in the ground, and I dont have to worry about it.

Guys here love to debate things. Stihl vs Husky, 60cc vs 70cc, Dodge vs Chevy, and so on, and so forth. However, if you do your homework, a vast majority of the people here will agree, SPEND THE MONEY ON THE PEX. DO NOT SKIMP ON THIS PART!!!! There is a good reason for that common opinion.

 

[Mogollon]

I had good luck with my DIY install

I had a run of about 80' from the wood boiler to the house with 1" pex.
I first put 1/2" wall, 1"1/8 ID. foam pipe insulation on each pipe, then put 2"1/8 ID. foam pipe insulation on top of that. Then I wrapped both pipes together with foil bubble insulation. On top of that I wrapped 1/8" foam on top of the foil bubble, then wrapped the whole thing with stretch wrap, the stuff for shipping stuff on pallets.
I shaded the ditch with sand (a lot of the ditch had to be jack hammered) so some of it is shallow.
I have taken IR temperature measurements when it has been below zero outside and running 175f water through the pipes and have very little heat loss. There is very little noticeable snow melt difference where the trench is, and the system has been running 6 years.

good luck.

 

[Deereman76]

I tried the DIY route about 10 years ago. The Snow never sits on top of my pipes..... Major Heat loss. this Fall we are planning to have a Spray Foam Contractor do some insulation work on the house. When he was out to figure an Estimate, he commented that he gets lots of jobs just spraying underground pipes. When he comes out this fall I am going to dig up my pipes so he can spray them!

 

[Windwalker7]

I know this has been discussed many times already and I have read through all of the threads I could find. I still want to make my own pipe. I want to hear from people who have made their own and are satisfied with the results and possibly have some heat loss numbers to back it up. I was looking to run 2 1 inch lines for the boiler and 2 3/4 lines for the DHW. I was looking at using pool noodles because they are closed cell foam, cheap and are much thicker than any closed cell pipe insulation that I could find. Also found the LOW E brand 1/4 inch thick foil faced insulation that alot of ebay sellers use. I found a price of $460 for 120' by 4' roll. Rapping 5 raps with that I could get 100 feet out of it but is pretty pricy I thought. So what have other people used that have been successf in not losing more than a few degrees over their run?

I did this with mine. 2, 1 inch and 2, 3/4 inch wrapped in Solar Guard (1/4 inch foil faced insulation) About 4-5 layers of wrap.

I ran everything through a 6 inch schedule 80 pipe. Anyway, I think it was called schedule 80. It was thinner walled than schedule 40 and had belled ends that I glued together. I have a 100ft run from boiler to house.

This will be my forth season. I have not noticed a heat loss. I have a ranco thermostat at boiler with temp readout and a thermometer inside house at the heat exchanger. Whether one thermometer is off or what, they always read the same temperature. So it must not be losing much.

It was a mother getting it wrapped and all stuffed in the 6 inch pipe.

Here is how I did it.

I got two sections of the 6inch pipe and ratchet strapped one piece to the tailgate of the truck and ratchet strapped the other section of 6inch pipe to a saw horse. I got the four pieces of pex and pushed them through one section of 6inch pipe. They came out of that pipe and there was about a 6 foot gap before they went into the other section of 6inch pipe.

This way I could somewhat contain the four sections of pex to be wrapped with the solar guard. I first taped the pieces together then wrapped with Solar Guard and zip tied again to hold the Solar Guard in place.

I did not seperate the sections of pex. I just wrapped them all together. I know others advise to seperate but I didn't. That pex is just too hard to straighten out and to contain.

The Solar Guard came in 4'x50' rolls I would unroll about 5 feet and cut. I'd wrap it lengthwise and zip tie. I got about 4 or 5 wraps. I would then unroll another 5 ft section and butt it up against the pervious section. I would then just wrap with some duct tape at the joint between the sections.

I used lots of duct tape and zip ties to keep the four sections of pex together under the insulation.


Once I got the 6inch pipe in the trench and glued together, I ran a wire eel, for unclogging drains through the 6 inch pipe. I tied a rope on it and pulled it through. I wrapped, tied, taped the rope to the four insulation wrapped pex pipes and pulled it through.

It was a bear, me and the wife, one pulling, one shoving that through the 100ft run of 6 inch pipe.

Anyway it worked. It was alot of work but I am glad how things turned out.

My pipe is burried about 3 ft and I have seen very little snow melt where it is at.

 

[Windwalker7]

I believe many problems arise when people use drain tile to contain their pex.

I believe this drain tile plastic to not hold up well underground.

 

[Kevin in Ohio]

I believe many problems arise when people use drain tile to contain their pex.

I believe this drain tile plastic to not hold up well underground.

If your referring to black field tile that's a new one on me. I grew up farming and have used the stuff since the early 70's and the only thing I've seen mess it up is from being crushed in a wet spot or "kissed" by a backhoe. It's the GROUND WATER that will cause the most problems if you do not have proper drainage around or at least, under it. Ground water will wick the heat from the pipes in a hurry and you'll have massive heat/energy losses.