The following month it was the unpleasant odor of mold. Investigating beneath the master bath cabinet we found water stains. Tearing open the wall we found that the Poly Butyline piping used to plumb the house was failing. There was a small leak somewhere in the concrete slab the house is built upon. We could tear up the hard wood flooring and concrete until we found the leak, or we could re-pipe the house by running PEX tubing through the attic and down the walls. We chose the latter. It was a messy job, but the plumbers got all of the plumbing changed in one day, and that was followed the next day by the drywall contractor who patched the holes created by the plumbers. Now we just have to paint nearly every room again.
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| Once Barbara's necessities were removed we knew we were in trouble |
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| We opened the wall and removed all doubt |
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| The water was seeping up from the blue sheathing on the left. |
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| Nearly 40 holes were cut in the interior walls |
PB pipe was outlawed in the late 90's because of the high failure rate of this product.
Central Florida is particularly hard hit for this problem because so many homes were built in that time frame. Copper pipe is not immune. The soil here is highly corrosive and electrical charges from the numerous lightening storms take a toll on the copper. The home I owned prior to this house needed to be re-piped, and it was copper.
If your home was built in the 80's or 90's you may eventually face this if your house was built with PB pipe.
My future posts hopefully will feature lighter topics. Next up, my 50th high school reunion.
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