>> I read an article somewhere can't place it now. But the jist of the article
>> was that PVC pipe was a very bad idea for plumming high pressure air lines.
>> there were several reasons listed, the most compelling being that should the
>> pipe crack under high pressure it has a tendancy to explode into tiny bit of
>> high speed shrapenal. This didn't sound like my idea of pleasant weekend
>> experience. I am sill looking for an inexpensive way of plumbing my shop for
>> air. I will probably end up using 3/4" air hose. This will give me the
>> felxibility of rerouting it as my shop changes.
>> --
>If you use the super-economy stuff this may be true because it is only
>rated at 180 or 200 psi. I don't see why it should'nt be reasonable to
>use schedule 40 PVC which is rated at 480 psi and only costs about $.15
>per foot (1" dia). If you're still paranoid, you could get schedule 80
>PVC rated at 630 psi at about 50% more cost.
That was my point in asking. Even with a rating of 180-200 psi, that is
considerably higher than most home shop compressors can even come close
to. My Sears unit can generate up to 125 psi and that is when it cuts off,
it doesn't cut the motor in again until tank pressure drops to about 110 psi.
So with those numbers in mind, I'd think 180 psi rating should be fine,
especially since most stuff is produced with a safety margin in order to
be sold by the manufacturer with a high degree of confidence that every piece
is capable of sustaining 180 psi.
I wonder if the cracked PVC in the original poster's garage was deliberately
done by the prior owner. It wouldn't surprise me to find that the person
just didn't want to pass on to the new owner the fruits of his installation.
The posibility would be even more likely if there are (is) more than one cracked
piece of PVC. Once a crack happened, there couldn't be any pressure maintained
to cause other sections of the PVC to also crack.
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Bill Sohl (K2UNK) BELLCORE (Bell Communications Research, Inc.)
Morristown, NJ email via UUCP bcr!dancer!whs70
201-829-2879 Weekdays email via Internet whs70@dancer.cc.bellcore.com
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