Discuss Quality of a heating installation in the Central Heating Forum area at PlumbersForums.net

An electrician asked me if we could remove ceilings to make his work easier, so we did. It was full if artex anyway.
If ceilings are Artex they may contain asbestos and should either be treated as asbestos or sampled andl laboratory analysed. If sampling proves not asbestos, you can merrily rip them out. If it contains asbestos, removing it safely is expensive, but it may be possible to find a workaround that involves leaving the Artex in place.

Any tradesman who disregards the potential of asbestos in Artex is a cowboy IMO - do you really want that person's contaminated tools and vacuum cleaner in your house?
 
If ceilings are Artex they may contain asbestos and should either be treated as asbestos or sampled andl laboratory analysed. If sampling proves not asbestos, you can merrily rip them out. If it contains asbestos, removing it safely is expensive, but it may be possible to find a workaround that involves leaving the Artex in place.

Any tradesman who disregards the potential of asbestos in Artex is a cowboy IMO - do you really want that person's contaminated tools and vacuum cleaner in your house?

I was informed (on paper) by my solicitor that the house is asbestos free.
 
I've seen worse, much worse.

If I pay £6648.37, and I'm being told it's going to be a premium service, it has to be premium, perfect and quite as a mouse.

Did you ask for him to drill joists?

No, I'm not a plumber, not a builder, I pay, so I don't need to be. We had a brief conversation about what I would like to do with the existing floor (it involves long nails and screws). It is funny, but the biggest disappointment is not the quality of their work, it's how they respond to what I have found: pretending it is great work and refusing to visit and evaluate what the young and clearly inexperienced employee did.
For me you need the following.

Joints cleaned up.
Notches opening up to give enough room and some felt wrapped around.
Pipes moving away from other pipes and cables or protecting.

So it basically has to be redone. How can I know how much of that led got inside and potentially block the water flow?
 
If I pay £6648.37, and I'm being told it's going to be a premium service, it has to be premium, perfect and quite as a mouse.



No, I'm not a plumber, not a builder, I pay, so I don't need to be. We had a brief conversation about what I would like to do with the existing floor (it involves long nails and screws). It is funny, but the biggest disappointment is not the quality of their work, it's how they respond to what I have found: pretending it is great work and refusing to visit and evaluate what the young and clearly inexperienced employee did.


So it basically has to be redone. How can I know how much of that led got inside and potentially block the water flow?

No heating system will be as quiet as a mouse. Metal expands and contracts as it heats and cools, its physics. Mind you I've heard some flaming noisy mice.

So there was nothing agreed about pipe depth below floor.

You mean solder, none will be blocking the pipes, it's all hanging out the bottom. Gravity and flux take care of that.

As I mentioned in my previous post on the matter there are a few issues you need sorting, but there are also two sides to every story. Would love to hear the other side and hear why a big, reputable company is behaving in the manner being reported here.
 
No heating system will be as quiet as a mouse. Metal expands and contracts as it heats and cools, its physics. Mind you I've heard some flaming noisy mice.

A figure of speech. I am aware of physics, but that doesn't mean you should hear pipes banging against the floor or other pipes when you simply walk across the room. At least in my opinion.
So there was nothing agreed about pipe depth below floor.

No. I never tell people how they should do their job, especially If I have no idea about it. I simply describe what effect I do expect and trust they will do their best. I also pay for not being forced to become an experienced plumber before asking for a plumbing service. If a business client ask me for an application, they discuss specification, but when a “normal” person ask for the same, I do not expect them to discuss sorting algorithms, benchmarks, and libraries I can choose from. There's always trust involved, and in my opinion I should do everything not to break it.

You mean solder, none will be blocking the pipes, it's all hanging out the bottom. Gravity and flux take care of that.

As I mentioned in my previous post on the matter there are a few issues you need sorting, but there are also two sides to every story. Would love to hear the other side and hear why a big, reputable company is behaving in the manner being reported here.

Yes, it would be great to understand why, but all I get is: “there's nothing wrong with the installation”.
 
Drilling joists is very rare and absolutely not standard practice for any rigid pipework. It would involve an awful lot of extra joints in a retrofit situation so may be argued to be not altogether better. It is what I personally prefer as pipes are easier to insulate, but I have not been able to consistently use this method even in my own house. In fact, I was taught at college that it is not possible to drill joists and run 15mm plus diameter copper tube through them in retrofit situations (this isn't entirely true and, me being me, a long discussion followed). Depends very much on what other services are already in place and of course you cannot drill a hole in proximity to an existing notch, nor is it good to make new notches and holes if there are exiasting ones that can be re-used. It is the hardwood floor installer's job to avoid hitting the pipes and I would expect the person laying the floor to be able to work around perfectly normal pipework notches. Nailing through a pipe would be bad carpentry, not bad plumbing.

Of the soldering pictured, much of it is perfectly acceptable. It is entirely normal to have a slight drip under a horizontal joint and far better that than risk a dry joint. I agree others of those solder joints pictured are really messy. That said, I know an old plumber who, back in the days when solder was considered expensive, was pulled up on 'going through a lot of it'. He replied, 'I don't have have many leaks though, do I?'. His employer said no more on the subject. Lead solder is still allowed to be used on heating systems and has a reputation for being less brittle than lead-free solder. Indeed, I still carry both types in my van.

Failure to clean the pipe after soldering is less impressive and suggests a rushed job. I have seen pipes with excess flux left on the outside of them that have still been providing good service after 40 years, and if your system was properly flushed during commissioning to remove any excess flux inside the pipes I'm not quite sure why the pipes would pinhole, but I would still want to see the excess flux cleaned off,

My biggest concern with the installation quality in this case is pipes being run for long spans unsupported and poor design of pipe layout relying on the inherent flexibility of lengths of copper tube rather than proper bends being formed. Bend it around old pipes if you must, but use a bending spring or pipe bender - not just curve the length of pipe like a banana. Any plumbing textbook will apply the standard clipping distances of 4' for 15mm tube and 6' for 22mm tube on a horizontal run and I would not expect to see those long unsupported runs you have shown. Also, good practice for a pipe laid in a notch is either to fit a pipe clip every couple of joists of so, or to felt-line the notch to allow for movement. I agree that pipes should not be touching one another at any time.

Basically, if you'd bought the house like that, I'd suggest to snag the parts causing you noise or fouling the floorboards and leave well alone. For a new installation, this is poor, however.
 
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