DIY gas piping FAIL

[W1ATR]

Check out this one from another forum. Some dumbass piped the LP gas supply line into a furnaces' condensate drain instead of the gas valve.

http://hvac-talk.com/vbb/showthread.php?t=408212

[WQ9E]

Jared,

Some friends of mine are 4'th generation water well drillers and they have also put in a few home natural gas wells.  Several years ago they were called in by someone who had purchased a house where the well had been installed back in the 1920's and the current owner was having some problems with it.  When they arrived they found that he had found some problems with the existing pipe and had replaced it with several pieces of garden hose and couplers he purchased from Kmart.  He was furious when they informed him they were shutting off the gas at the well before he blew himself and his neighbors up with his garden hose running through his garage into the kitchen and then down through a hole into the basement where it finally connected back to black pipe.

A potential Darwin award winner.

Rodger WQ9E

[k4kyv]

It says I have to sign up and register for the site in order to view the photos.  Does one of the photos show the house blowing up?

We had propane installed here about 20 years ago, by a professional.  The heater worked OK but there was always the slight smell of gas.  I thought that was normal that a small amount of unburnt gas would escape while the heater was operating, and it would be something we would have to get used to.  Then one day we had visitors, and one of the guys was a professional plumber. He noticed the gas smell and said something was wrong.  So we investigated, and put soapy water on all the joints.  A gas leak will cause the soapy water to bubble up where the gas is escaping.

All the  joints proved OK.  Turned out to be a defective gas valve.  There was a tiny pin-hole in the body of the brass casting, which had been purchased new by the installer.  We went to a plumbing supply store and bought another valve, and my guest helped install it.  The smell of gas went away.  He told me he thought the gas accumulation in the room could have been enough to cause an explosion if someone had lit a match near the floor, even though the flame from the pilot and heating nozzles hadn't set anything off.

The professional installer did everything right.  He just happened to get a defictive valve from his supplier, and the smell of gas wasn't obvious before he left after completing the job.

[W1ATR]

Didn't realize that site worked that way. Here's a couple of the better pics.

[W1ATR]

Don. Leaking valves like that do happen more often these days due to the influx of poorly made chinese castings on the market. This is why we do pressure tests in the inch/water column range with sensitive gauges to ensure that even the slightest pinhole is found. For any type of explosion to happen, the atmosphere has to be so dense (stoichiometric combustion ratio near 14.0 to 1), that you would be able to smell the gas outside. Just a slight whiff in the air isn't enough for a big KaBoom because all we would be smelling is the Mercaplan (odorant) dissipating into the air. Naturally, these are not words to risk dying by. A strong gas odor is good enough reason to get the hell outside and shut off the supply.

Rodger. People like the garden hose guy that do stupid things like that often deserve what they get. The sad part is the collateral damage to family and neighbors. I red tagged a unit once that was connected from the shutoff valve on the supply pipe to the equipment gas valve with a washing machine hose and adapters purchased at home cheapo. I disabled the unit and dropped a tag at the firehouse. The customer was ripped and the fire marshal was amused. Just for sake of my own amusement, later that month I sent him a bill for $200 for the after hours call. Still havent been paid, lol.  

[AB3L]

Jared, have you seen anything about Gastite corrugated gas line? A guy from work in the Health and Safety department told me about a problem with it after I told him it was installed in my house.
He was sent a story of a house blowing up that had the Gastite in it used to feed a second story heater in a house. Apparantly there was a lightning strike to the house and the charge looked for a path to ground using the gas line. The static jumped the gap in the stainless like a spark plug and burned a hole in it. From there the wall filled with gas and BOOM.
I showed my contractor the attached letter from Gastite and he ended up replacing the gas feed with black pipe citing the expense of copper at the time and the length of the run. The installation letter from them came out after some court proceedings about the explosion as a way of letting them still market the product.  

[W1ATR]

Yeah, it not only applies to the Gastite brand, but all CSST. The CSST sold by Omega-flex is named Trac-pipe and is considered top of the line. While the standard stuff still needs to be bonded to the electrical panel, they also sell a newer version called Counterstrike that does not require any bonding. In CT, most of these towns want each run installed to be star bonded back to the panel with either  8ga or 6ga THHN (stranded wire). A 1000ft roll of 6ga THHN is a freakin fortune and this adds a large chunk onto the bill. Some towns want it done by an electrician, which when this is the case, the customer can count on an additional $350-$600 for a simple gas piping install.

Me personally, I'm more 'old school' and like to fit black iron wherever I can. CSST is a bit faster to install, but material costs are around twice that of black steel pipe. While it's perfectly safe when installed right, csst is more prone to piercing and impact damage. If seen people pierce it trying to hang pictures on walls, and siding guys get it from the outside with nails. I've also seen people break csst lines just moving stuff around in their basement. Black iron on the other hand is much more durable and more permanent in nature, but it requires skill and expensive equipment to install correctly. I was on a service call recently and while working on the equipment, I noticed the 1" supply line overhead was shiny, almost polished. Come to find out, this customer has been doing his morning chin-ups on that pipe for the last 10 or 15 years. After I picked my jaw up, I went out to the truck and cut him a piece 3ft long and hung it in a different location so he could use that instead.

73  

[Ed/KB1HYS]

That was a darned nice thing to do! (the chin up bar).

[W1ATR]

Yeah, when I put his new bar up, I used 4 of these super heavy duty 'U' clamps and 8, 4" deck screws. First thing he says to me is "Nice, this is a lot stronger than the gas pipe. "Gee,,,Ya think?" lol

[AB3L]

Me personally, I'm more 'old school' and like to fit black iron wherever I can.

I take that to also mean "I can measure accurately". I ran black pipe myself in the last house with my measurements presented to the local old style hardware store.  They cut and threaded, I put it together...worked out fine.
I've seen some garbage installs, clearly evident that they couldn't measure worth a damn. So it becomes easier for them to just pull the flex in.

On the other issue of the clamp, when I called around about the grounding issue no one could tell me the correct type of approved clamp for the gas fitting. The "gas industry" didn't  know of one and the local electrical inspection agency didn't know of a specified clamp for the case in point. The picture shows a water pipe clamp but didn't call it that.
Thanks

[W1ATR]

On the other issue of the clamp, when I called around about the grounding issue no one could tell me the correct type of approved clamp for the gas fitting. The "gas industry" didn't  know of one and the local electrical inspection agency didn't know of a specified clamp for the case in point. The picture shows a water pipe clamp but didn't call it that.
Thanks

Yeah, it's just a standard bronze electrical grounding clamp like what you would use on a water pipe. It has to be clamped to the fitting and not the csst itself because it has teeth.

I keep these tape measures on the truck for helpers that have marked graduations. aka 1/16, 1/8, 3/16, 1/4, 5/16, etc... You would be amazed how many people can't work a tape measure and not screw it up.

[WQ9E]

Jared,

Thanks for the CSST info.  My house is mostly black pipe but when we had the master suite added a few years ago the water heater and furnace for that section were connected in with CSST.  My black pipe is grounded where it enters (just after the second LP regulator) but should additional grounds be run at the other end (beyond the fact that the appliances themselves are bonded to ground)?

Given that it is only about a 25 foot run with only a couple of 90 degree turns perhaps I should just have it replaced with black pipe?  That is a pretty ugly failure mode with lightning punctures!

Rodger WQ9E