Due to a slight 'administrative error' I now have 3 rolls of PTFE gas tape.
Is this just the same as normal PTFE tape but thicker? OK for general plumbing use?
Due to a slight 'administrative error' I now have 3 rolls of PTFE gas tape.
Is this just the same as normal PTFE tape but thicker? OK for general plumbing use?
Yes and yes.
Its ok to use, but not as easy to work with I find.
(might be good though when you want to set a parallel thread fitting at a particular stopping point (e.g. like an outside tap on a wall fitting) which can take yards of the normal stuff!)
general
I use it all the time in preference to the thinner stuff for gas, compressed air and oils. Much easier, you only usually need one or two turns to make a sound joint.
But recently I've taken to Loctite 542 thread sealant which is absolutely brilliant stuff - you can assemble threaded fittings finger tight pointing where you want them, and within minutes you get a sound seal and good mechanical fixing that can be undone later.
AWEM
What is it like in parallel to parallel threads?
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Very good - they say only use it on parallel threads up to 1/2" BSP but I confess to using it up to 1" sucessfully on a 15Kw water chiller recently.
AWEM
Definitely, and especially where tolerances of threads etc. seem to result insome cases in poor results for ordinary tape, such as radiator tails and HW cylinder fittings
And it's tight to hydrogen! (This is a very non-trivial point if you're plumbing laboratory machines.)
Even 200 Bar H2!
I think our stock bottles only come out at about 1800psi (about 120 bar?), but I don't see any reason for concern at higher pressures. Since the bottles weigh about 80kg each, but have to be shipped in a 800kg bottle rack, we tend to send out several bottles at once. 3 bottle in a rack provides redundancy better than one bottle of 3 times the volume or pressure), and redundancy is important against some idiot checking bottle pressure by opening the bottle valve without a regulator/ meter in the fitting (it has happened, repeatedly), or a novice being unable to undo the regulator fitting with a 10" spanner, so he gets a bigger spanner, then a bigger one, then a cheater bar, then shears the regulator fitting out of the bottle valve (poor boy didn't know about left hand threads).
That's a good point, why do gas cylinders / fittings etc use left handed threads?
|Aidan Karley wrote: | |> the bottle valve (poor boy didn't know about left hand threads). | |That's a good point, why do gas cylinders / fittings etc use left handed |threads?
They *don't*, only *English* ones have left hand threads for Flammable gasses, which indicates the contents. Camping gas which originates in France has a right hand thread. I **HATE** the left hand threads on my Propane bottles, and after all these years I have to work it out every time I touch one :-(
Flammable
*worst*It's a perfectly sensible safety precaution to avoid connecting a fuel gas to an oxygen or other non fuel gas regulator, which could have literally explosive results. It is particulary vital with acetylene which will detonate if too high a pressure is set when the gas is a vapour rather than disolved in the kapok & acetone of it's cylinder.
The left hand threaded components are clearly marked with a groove turned into the hex spanner flats.
AWEM
The message from Dave Fawthrop contains these words:
I've put an arrow in marker pen on the regulator. Mostly for the benefit of my son, to be honest, but it's handy.
They don't, only fuel gas cylinders are LH.
Supposedly it's to stop you mixing fools and oxidisers.
Sorry, being sloppy in terminology! Yes I was thinking of propane bottles.
Spose it makes some sense... then again fools are so ingenious! ;-)
You must be an Einstein then.
Only 3? We had 12 cyl MCP's until the fire....NOT H2 related BTW.
I imagine that everyone must seem like Einstein to you.... :-)
Matt, you don't imagine things you just make things up.
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