Pex

Pex piping or tubing is used to waterlines in residential construction, residential service, and sometimes in commercial construction and service plumbing. Pex stands for cross link polyethylene. And was first invented in the late 1950’s. Pex was put into use in some situations shortly after that time and has proven to be very reliable. Much better than the older gray colored lines called poly-b, which have had problems with breakage and splitting.

Pex is generally used in new homes as the tubing is very easy to join and the labor to install the tubing is much less then that of copper water lines. Pex comes in 3/8, ½, ¾, and 1 inch in sizes . When joining pex tubing there is two main methods.

1. Crimp the lines together with crimp rings and brass or copper pex fittings.

2. Use an expanding tool to expand plastic rings that will contract over the pipe and plastic fittings.

Pex Fittings

Pex fittings are used to join two or more pieces of pex tubing together. The fittings are made of brass, copper, or plastic. The rings to join the fittings are either copper or plastic. The plastic rings and fittings go with the Wirsbo pex system. The brass, copper fittings and copper rings go with the other pex systems.

Pex is used in houses mainly, but can be found in small commercial buildings.