First fixing radiator pipes on drops

[Mgrant]

Hi, when first fixing radiator pipes on drops, i.e the ground floor. On new build properties. What is the usual practice/ practices of doing this. I have before seen 15mm plastic pipes dropped down the wall with nailing clips, so dot and dab plastered over. Then the pipes exiting the wall in copper at the required pipe centers for the rad. via a 15mm plastic elbow that is chased in to the wall abit. With this method though when soldering the elbow to connect up to the radiator at the second fix stage. You would be soldering just 2-3 inches away from the plastic elbow in the wall. Anyone else seen pipes installed this way? Is it the correct way of doing it?

 

[smtplumbing]

alot of new builds is dropped down in 10mm right into a rad

 

[Mgrant]

alot of new builds is dropped down in 10mm right into a rad

10mm plastic to a back box?

 

[smtplumbing]

yeah well sometime no box from what i have seen haha

 

[Dannyparty92]

Single gang electrical box not forgetting the gromits of course 🙂 or you could do the same with 15mm but dry liner may moan if the 15mm is not chased in.

 

[AWheating]

you need to be 600mm away from the plastic to solder, especially on drops as the heat rise's up the pipework. So you can either do what some do and use a plastic coupler but this will push the plasterboard forward. You can do what i do on all my 15mm drops and do the entire drop in copper with some pvc tape and then some sticth lagging over the top.

if you go for 10mm to a center box or face plate then you want to make sure the rads are not to small (length) or they will be unstable on the brackets. If they are over 1400 long then have two seperate drop for either side to help avoid pipe sagging.

the best face plates are something like these:

Toolstation: Radiator Pipe Guide N Seal Face Fix

they have one for brick/block walls that sit behind the plasterboard and on for stud walls that sits on the surface of the board. Both seal the wall to stop air testing failure.

dont forget your trace tape if your using plastic and its an NHBC site.

 

[MarkAqua]

We have done the following before now and it worked no problem:

Copper all the way down on a 4" DP course, with pulled bends at the bottom

Continue copper horizontal to the centres of valves then solder a bend on with a short piece sticking out

Then because we had issues with theft on one of the sites we coated the copper in suitable corrosion protection and then used dry wall adhesive to coat the pipes so they couldn't be seen. We also pushed nail plates into the wet dry wall so that in the future anyone drilling or nailing the wall wouldn't hit the pipework

 

[kozak1968]

Corner rad valves straight into wall. But they are not cheap ( £25 )

 

[CXR100]

run 10mm copper down wall behind dot and dab and cover in pvc tape , bend them all the way, and bring flow and return about 1 inch apart right under where rad will be , solder 10mm elbows on these second fix and run 10mm pipe under radiator (hiding it under-inside it, then do an offset and a 90bend straight into angled valves = no visable pipework , only 2 10mm elbows to leak under rad , and you can use this method on upstair radiators etc , no pipes to knock with hoover etc , easy in future if rad size needs to be increased etc. this is the tidiest way to do it imho