Where will you be when Sharkbite o-ring goes south?
IdahoDon
| Posted in Construction Techniques on
I was just thinking of how many o-rings last as long as soldered copper and I couldn’t think of any – although I’m sure they use a high quality material in the o-ring. What’s the lifespan of a sharkbite fitting? On their website it’s never addressed other than referencing standards it meets.
I’ve used them, and probably will again in certain situations, but it’s hard to get excited about buring something in a wall unless it will last as long as the rest of the system.
Replies
Generally an O-ring only fails when there's motion.
(In any event, since even an O-ring exposed to gasoline will last 30 years, "where I'll be" is dead, most likely.)
I'm fixing an oring in my truck AC that has lasted since 1985 - I would have liked it if it lasted a while longer!
Yeah, and that O ring in your AC was subjected to enormous vibration stresses, not to mention severe thermal cycling.
And a water main failure can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and flood several homes.
I'll be in the same place I was when the copper fittings on my duplex went south, or where I was when the polybutylene pipes in another house split, or where i was when the galvanized pipes in my first house sprung pin holes, that is, I'l be replacing pipes. I hope PEX will prove to be more long lasting then the rest but only time will tell. In the meantime I use Sharkbites to make repairs that woul dbe expensive to make otherwise.
It's not just sharkbites that rely on O-rings. There's PressFit, Viega and others that rely on the O-ring, and they're being used extensively in commercial applications, and for large diameter piping.
I've wondered the same thing, but have not found a good answer.
Can't do it
I just can't, with good conscience, bury a sharkbite fitting in a framing cavity. I've only used a few over the years, always exposed in a basement.
Just one of those things for me.
Of course, keep in mind that the water pipes under your street use rubber gaskets to join them, and have for 75-100 years.
If a water main fails it floods the street - if a client's plumbing fails it hopefully doesn't flood more than one floor! lol
Water damage is so expensive to fix that I'm still a believer that not enough is done to protect supply lines.
that's fine...
...since I'm not personally liable for the repair if one fails. lol
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(But i do share your concern with using a technology that doesn't have a track record. Standard copper has a roughly 100 year history. PEX, after several disastrous false starts, has a pretty good track record of 20 years or so. SharkBites have been around for what? Five years? I'm just saying that the O-ring itself is a pretty well-known technology -- probably 75 years -- and is not likely to be the precipitating cause of a failure. If SharkBites have an Achilles heel it's probably somewhere else.)