Recent Events, 9 April 2007

The "Favil West" Waterfalls

Pictured at left is the delightful sight of the recently turned on upper waterfalls.

For now, at least, I have renamed the falls "The Favil West Waterfalls."

 

 

 

If as we have been led to believe the persistent efforts of Favil West with the City was responsible for the City's about face and decision in allowing Sun City to turn on our waterfalls, Mr. West deserves the Community's whole hearted congratulations. Let us hope that the flowing waterfalls will not be temporary and will stay with us in the months to come.

If Mr. West is capable of performing a water miracle of such magnitude for the Community's overall benefit, perhaps he can be persuade to do likewise and devote his considerable efforts to bringing the Community a lesser water miracle, but no less important, by bringing needed personal services to the Community Services Building, which lacks both water and bathroom facilities.

My personal belief is that were this his personal priority, a badly needed and deserved bathroom facility would soon be forthcoming.

In the past few months, City building inspectors have been making almost daily trips to Sun City to inspect the work performed by plumbing companies who have performed a re-plumb.

Typically, that inspection included areas where the outside stucco wall had been breeched and opened to gain access to certain plumbing lines.

Frequently, as illustrated, the removal of the stucco exposed a sewer drain clean-out. Note the tiny screw hole in middle of the clean-out cap.

 

 

 

 

The problem, according to City inspectors, is that the clean-outs were not installed correctly, i.e., according to the building code. When these code-violation clean-outs have been exposed in this manner, the City is requiring the plumbing company to bring the exposed clean-outs forward to the outside surface of the wall (as shown at here) rather than leaving the clean-out access openings located several inches in back of the outside wall. The end result is there is no screw, no hole in the cap and no opportunity for water to leak inside of the home to cause any water or mold damage.

Plumbing news

Some general thoughts. While more, and for some homeowners, preferred plumbing solutions now appear to be on the horizon, many homeowners will not be able to take advantage of these options. Those homeowners have already rushed out to obtain what they believed would remediate our shared Kitec problem. We hope their decisions were well founded. However, in the process of repiping with one product or another, it is sad to note that many of those homeowners seem to have lost sight of the reason for the repair effort.

While I have attempted to focus attention on the real culprit, the brass fittings that are subject to dezincification, homeowners have worried over other less important matters, such as which plumbing system to use, CPVC or PEX, which PEX piping system was best, which joining method was better, which warranty was better, even which company was faster or cleaner. In the end, homeowners were seemingly able to justify whatever decision they made. Few, however, gave little thought to addressing the problem that brought us to where we are today—the brass fittings. Some homeowners went ahead and had their brass Kitec fittings replaced with seemingly equally susceptible brass fittings, most likely not realizing the short-term consequences of their decisions.

So, you might wonder, “how did we get into this mess?” Pulte made that decision for us when they decided it was in their best interest to NOT offer our homeowners a repair. What Pulte did, instead, was to say to each of us, “here, take this money and do something.” Of course, no one really knew what that “something” was, least of all whether their “something” was any better than the “something” being done down the street or would result in any improvement over those defective Kitec fittings being bypassed.

The contractors did not really care, however nice and agreeable they seemed—they only wanted your agreement or contract and our money. Each would convince you of the worthiness of their particular plumbing product, CPVC, Vanguard, Wirsbo, or Zurn. Some contractors would stress the benefits of the warranty, as worthless as that might be, or they would offer a range of freebies, while others would charge extra for, say, ball valves or for repiping the badly corroded water heater fittings, and a range of other items and services.

From Pulte’s perspective, they made a calculated decision that did not serve Phase 1 homeowners well. As Pulte’s candidate Jeremy Fritz said, Pulte chose a different option in addressing the Kitec problem, compared to their recent offer to repair the REHAU plumbing problem. That different option afforded Phase 1 homeowners can best be illustrated with this analogy: In making their monetary offer, Pulte essentially dropped each homeowner into a different spot in the ocean, each having absolutely no clue in what direction to navigate to reach a safe haven to accomplish that needed repair. While some would make that journey safely, too many would flounder and not be so lucky, making unhelpful or unwise decisions along the way. Too quickly, Sun City’s homeowners lost sight of what that needed repair was all about, those brass fittings.

For those homeowners who have yet to replumb and who wish to eliminate all vestiges of brass from their re-plumbing project, homeowners have three options:

1. CPVC;
2. PEX by Vanguard, using Sioux Chief's copper sweat fittings for transition;
3. Copper.

Uponor (Wirsbo) is not an option since Uponor does not offer a non-brass solution, although they will soon have available here something almost equivalent in the form of a DRZ fitting that contains less than 10% zinc. Their new fittings are based on the same alloy that IPEX used in manufacturing their DZR fittings for Kitec, which are no longer available in Nevada.

One should understand that the elimination of brass in any form is a desirable goal since standard brass is subject to dezincification. As to whether, under what conditions, and at what rate DZR rated fittings will eventually dezincify here is unknown. What can be said is that a DZR fitting by design of the chemical properties making up the brass alloy and by the manufacturing process employed will inhibit the process of dezincification. Does that mean a DZR fitting will last for 50 years, 30 years or less is not known? It's clear, however, that a DZR fitting is far superior to a standard brass fitting.

Some homeowners like CPVC. It's clean appearing, does not entail breaching the outside stucco wall, and it avoids the use of brass fittings. It's a rigid, thin-walled plastic pipe that is joined with a special resin cement, similar in use to sprinkler PVC pipe that many homeowners are all too familiar with. It has many adherents and an unusual number of detractors. CPVC shares with PEX some uncertainties or potential risks. As plastic-based products, compared with the use of copper alone, there remain some uncertainties about long-term use insofar as reliability and use under the type of extreme weather fluctuations we experience in this desert environment. While plastic ultimately may prove to be an excellent plumbing product for Nevada and elsewhere, industry experience of relying on the use of plastic to provide potable water has been spotty in the past as well as in Nevada with our own more recent experience.

While the use of plastic in one form or another for potable water serves the building industry well as a low cost and low skill alternative to copper, we may have to wait another 25 or more years to see how well homeowners are served by the use of PEX and CPVC.

If the Developer is going to front the payment for a new plumbing system, there may be other more reliable plumbing options than by replacing one plastic system with another plastic system.