Peculiar one today

[WaterTight]

Cut a piece of what I presumed would be (and still suspect must be) imperial half inch copper that was in a tight space with little visibilit to replace the very old stopcock above it which had had a few repairs attempted on it and the customer just wanted a new one.

Cleaned pipe well. Felt it. Felt smooth and good. So cut it. Then found it was too thick to fit anything on it. Not even nearly. No olive or compression fitting or soldered fitting would even begin to fit on. It was just slightly too big. It wasn't distorted or buggered. Took bit I cut out to best local merchant and spoke to the guy who knows the most. He was confused too. His best guess was at some point it came slightly close to being frozen but didn't and had swelled in a bizarrely uniform manner.

A philmac sorted it but still, puzzler. Any ideas what it might have been?

 

[WaterTight]

Incidentally it went into a soldered stopcock. The other pipe that came out the other of the stopcock was imperial and stuff would fit on it. So whatever it was it did go into the stopcock, at least originally.

 

[Ray Stafford]

The frozen-but-not-burst theory sounds credible.

 

[GasmanxxxR1]

I had exact same thing once, frozen but not split and the pipe had swollen to a uniform size just too big for a fitting

 

[Best]

I thought straight away maybe expanded when once frozen.
You will notice that a lot of modern cheap fittings & valves are a very snug fit, - even on new pipe. Modern brass nuts are grinding on the new copper as you turn them.
The Conex fittings & valves are a bit wider & their nuts are slacker on the pipe & ideal for joining to 1/2" or 1" copper, for example, which is very slightly bigger diameter than 15mm & 28mm & pipes that are very slightly expanded with freezing.
The way I test a pipe that has had a burst because of frost damage, is to take a brass nut and slide it up the pipe to see if it jams where a swollen part that isn't immediately obvious is.

 

[Alex Pelton]

had this before. old thick walled copper 1/2 inch had to buy 1/2 inch to 15mm end feed coupling was still a tight fit though.

 

[WaterTight]

had this before. old thick walled copper 1/2 inch had to buy 1/2 inch to 15mm end feed coupling was still a tight fit though.

had one on me and tried it, no way was it going on. looks like the frozen theory holds water. was just glad there was enough room for a philmac. if there wasn't i'd have had to remove kitchen cabinets and lift floor to find straight bit. don't think there was any way i could have known before cutting it.

 

[leelister6]

This is where my socket former has got me out of the doodoo a few times. There's quite a lot of this old half inch copper in the council properties round here and the only way I've found is to form a socket with a bit of 15 then your away.

Toolstation: Monument Copper Pipe Jointer Socket Formers 15mm

 

[clarky101]

Could it have been old 17 gauge copper?

 

[stevetheplumber]

i was going to say about the socket former but was beaten to it i lived through the change from imperial to metric and ive never seen a half inch to 15mm converter obbviously something theyve developed recently

 

[WaterTight]

speedfit even do 'em. good thing to have incase of unforeseen setback situations.

 

[Centralheatking]

15mm and 1/2 inch standard copper are boyh the same o/d
Mind you there is still alot of Rhodesian copper about from the 60,s
thin walled rubbish and all very funny o/d sizes
Us ols people on here will remember this stuff
I am %^ Centralheatking .

i was going to say about the socket former but was beaten to it i lived through the change from imperial to metric and ive never seen a half inch to 15mm converter obbviously something theyve developed recently

 

[WaterTight]

15mm and 1/2 inch standard copper are boyh the same o/d

if that's true why do half inch to 15mm conversion fittings exist? and why is one end snugger on the pipe?

 

[Centralheatking]

Honestly never seen or used one on copper - either end feed, comp, or yorkshire
when you get to 22mm and 3/4 inch its alot different

CHK

 

[Ermintrude]

I love the stainless 1/2 tube for 70s it rocks my world . Usually on Fridays. I just tap the 15mm Yorkshire straights on to 1/2. 1" is a bit of a hammer though. Use a large flat faced hammer or insert a bit of scrap tube and hammer that to save fitting.