Speedfit to cap gas?

[R D S]

Someone has written 'gas pipe under floorboard' on the upstairs wall. You pull the board up and there it is, with a speedfit cap on.

That can't be OK, can it? Or can it?

[Tim Watts]

No.

[Brian Gaff]

Depends whether its still connected to a supply I guess. Brian

[newshound]

It's certainly not ideal, but the standard cooker bayonet fitting relies on O rings to seal as well.

Best, obviously, is a soldered on cap. How about a copper push fit? I have always found them pretty secure.

Compression fitting? Allowed on gas fires.

Taper threads with PTFE? Fibre plus sealant? (Still needs soldering, obviously).

[Andy Burns]

Not allowed either.

"These fittings are WRAS approved products and must be used for water only."

Makes you wonder why a company called Hamilton Gas Products stocks them...

[John Rumm]

Its not considered and appropriate fitting for gas. Will it leak? probably not. However its performance in a fire would be very poor.

Compression stop end, or solder fitting stop end would be the fittings of choice.

[Tim Watts]

I think you'll find in the gas regs that it's positively verboten, not "not ideal".

The only place plastic pipes (and indirectly, fittings) are permitted in outdoors as in the main supply. And cooker hoses, and as you say, the bayonet connector - but those are specifically regulated.

No.

If accessible, yes. I'm not 100% sure if "under an accessible floor" is prohibited though - I default to "only soldered copper or iron under floors etc".

[Andrew Gabriel]

Cooker hoses are stainless steel hoses, with a rubber covering. Rubber hoses are not permitted (even though bunsen burners have them;-).

Anaconda (flexible) pipes are also popular with installers who need to route 28mm (equivalent) pipe through convoluted places. They are also stainless steel hoses but with a PVC covering and special termination fittings. Very expensive, unless you are paying for an installer's time.

Compression are not allowed under a floor. I'm not sure it's just an access issue, but also the possibility of a tiny leak in a confined space. There are also requirements on venting compartments of certain sizes containing gas pipes.

[newshound]

Sorry, I wasn't trying to imply they were legal, just that having discovered it the risk is not particularly severe. So, for example, if there was an opportunity to disconnect the run at the "source" and cap it off in (say) a month, then I would leave it rather than trying a legal fix. A "time at risk" argument.

Perhaps the bayonet connector has viton O-rings which have better high temperature performance than nitrile.

No dispute there!

[Andy Burns]

When re-fitting parents kitchen recently, they'd previously had free-standing gas cooker, now gas hob and built-in waist height fan oven, so the old bayonet went and rather than having to work out exactly where to position rigid pipework for connecting the hob, used one of these

Just fix a stub of 15mm pipe pointing downwards in approximate position, then the anaconda droops down and loops back up to screw into the hob, very easy.