connecting wall valve to ballcock

I have a toilet whose main valve I replaced with a Shark, but I haven't been able to get the metal tube from the Shark to the ball c*ck to fit. Always too long, but can't get compression ring off to shorten it.

What do you all think of the Brasscraft flexible connector covered with polymer braid? Will it hold up as well as metal? (Is the tube chrome plated copper?) The ratings are high, but those ratings are made between a day and a year after installation.

If Brasscraft is good, what about length? I bought 16", the only length they had. They also sell 12" (free shipping to store). The actual distance is 7". Using 16 means bending it around in a complete circle. In a way that seems like it would put less strain on the ends than using 12" which would have to bend fairly sharply at each end, yes??? I figure if it fails it will fail at the end where the plastic tube connects to the metal end, right?

I see now they also sell 9" and 20". 20" will be under the least bending stress.

9" will be the most, won't it?

Finally, appearance. I've avoided using flexible because I have the feeling it will look like a public bathroom, where they use flexible because speed of installation is more important than looking ritzy. I don't want my bathroom to look like a public bathroom, Even though you can't actually see this tube without kneeling on the bathroom floor! Maybe I should buy another metal tube and start all over again??

Reply to
micky
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Use the 16", put a loop in it...I've used flex plastic at home and a 46 toilet facility (nursing home) without failures.

Reply to
bob_villa

i used to be negative lie you on the flexible lines. but they work great, last seemingly forever. and honestly how much does appearance really matter?

try one and you will never go back.........

Reply to
bob haller

IMO, plumbing is not the place to save money so don't buy plumbing materials from McLowesDepotBigBoxExpressMart type stores. Do the job right, buy a new metal supply tube at your local plumbing store.

Reply to
Nym O. Matic

I've had two bad experience with braid covered tubing.

The first was the line to the toilet failing in the middle of the night, resulting to a flooded bathroom floor (luckily, the sound of the running water woke me quickly so I could catch the problem before it resulted in any damage). In this case, it was NOT the tubing that failed but, rather, the plastic "cap" that mates the tube to the bottom of the tank; it snapped resulting in that end of the tube being "exposed".

The other failure was a braided "heavy duty" hose supplying water to the washing machine. It *ruptured* within hours of being installed -- in the first or second load of laundry.

Reply to
Don Y

This happens when you over-tighten the plastic...which is meant to be hand-tightened.

Reply to
bob_villa

It *was* "hand tightened" -- and had been in place for more than

10 years!

The problem with "hand tighten" is that it is highly subjective. What *I* consider "hand tight" and what SWMBO considers are very different! Also, what you consider hand tight at 20 is very different than at 40.

Reply to
Don Y

That's pretty scary. I'm going to give it another try with solid metal. Thanks.

They sell metal at Home Depot. NYM.

Although for the record, I had one of them fail somehow -- I sort of forget. The first-floor powder room. I had replaced the ball-c*ck once, using the original meal line, which was only 10 years old, but that was 5 years earlier. I went out for about 2 hours and when I came home water was everywhere. I'm lucky I didn't go away for a week.

I didn't stop to look at the leak before I ran to the basement to turn the water off, and I can't remember what failed. But I should have been able to tell afterwards. I'm still using the same wall valve, so that wasn't it. It must have been the metal tube.

The water caused much of the vinyl tile in the powder room and in the adjjoinging hall to loosen, and with the other problems, I wasn't in the mood to fix it, so I just put the one or two pieces that had moved back in place, and I put a rug over everything so stepping wouldn't push them sideways, and when it all dried up, the tiles were stuck to the floor again. I coudlnt' believe it.

The water went through the floor and mostly ruined the boxes on the basement floor. I've learned from other floods for other reasons that boxes of the right size can be hard to replace, so i just leave them where they are and it doesn't take too long for them to dry out, though they're not very strong anymore. (Which is another reason I leave them where they are.)

Only once did I get mold and that was when I let the water heater leak for weeks, because I thought it was an immediately prior leak that wasn't drying up like it should have. In the case of that mold, I sprayed it with bleach, 100%, and iirc painted it with paint that had a little bottle of anti-mold added. (It's behind a workbench so I'm not positive I repainted it.

I don't know what makes this basement so dry. There is a sump that always has about 15" of water in it. In those days I didn't even keep the plastic lid on it, but the lid has holes to let the sump pump pipe go through.

Braided with stainless steel? That's scary too.

The braid is supposed to prevent that.

I had non-braided rupture, and I heard the noise when I woke up in the morning. I don't know how long it was going. I replaced it with stainless steel. I've had about 6 or 8 other floods, all for different reasons. I don't think there are any new reasons left.

Reply to
micky

In terms of tightening, online it says wrt the metal end to hand tighten and then 1 to 1 1/2 more turns with a wrench**. That might be reproducible. But wrt the plastic end, it doesn't say anything.

**And why do you have to go online to read instructions. Admittedly the label is not big, but another half inch would make it big enough to say " hand tighten and then 1 to 1 1/2 more turns with a wrench"
Reply to
micky

We had just purchased the washer/dryer so replaced the hoses at the same time. On one of the first few washes, I noticed that the washing mashine "sounded different" (from what I had only recently learned to "expect").

When I walked into the laundry room, there was a high pressure stream of water coming from one of the hoses, *digging* a hole in the drywall behind the washer!

It *could* have just been "sloppy quality control" at the factory. I don't really care the reason -- I've got a hole gouged in my wall and water pooling on the floor!

Keep in mind, we had deliberately chosen the "Heavy Duty" (whatever THAT means) version of these hoses!

Reply to
Don Y

I think heavy duty refers to the stream spraying from the hose.

Reply to
micky

Dang. And I know you're not an idiot. Maybe water heater hoses are hot all the time and don't last as long as washing machine hoses?

P.S. I thought about flexible, so I'm glad I made a point to use copper for my water heater.

Reply to
micky

Use the "corrugated" (? no idea what they are called... have lots of little "ribs" in them to let them flex) "pipes". Put the shutoffs upstream from these (as well as upstream from any expansion tank you've installed).

Reply to
Don Y

You're right. It was the corrugated I was considering. I dont' think they made braided for water heaters a few years ago or at least I didn't know about it.

So youre saying the corrugated won't burst like the braided stainless flex hoses for water heaters did for Bob F?

Reply to
micky

They *do* make braided hoses for water heaters.

Everything has a point beyond which it will fail. The braided hoses are a marriage of at least three "components":

- the braid that provides structural support for the pressure in the hose

- the tubing that provides water tightness

- the metal endcaps

These all have to be mated together.

The "corrugated" pipe is a formed piece of copper with flared end over which the endcap fits. There's no "seam" where two materials have to be married together (tubing with endcap, endcap with braid).

Reply to
Don Y

over the years i have had all types of lines leak.

including the hard metal type that must be bent.

i think the flexible lines are better, since they allow some flex, the hard lines will break over time

Reply to
bob haller

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