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Bad FlowGuard Gold pipe

7025 Views 7 Replies 5 Participants Last post by  beenthere
A piece of "Thompson FlowGuard Gold CPVC 4120 SDR 11 Potable Water" pipe developed a pinhole leak in an interior wall. When the sheetrock showed obvious signs of water damage I removed the sheetrock and exposed the leak. The licensed plumber I had in to repair the leak - he replaced the section with copper - said that the pipe is brittle like potato chips and crushed an end to show me how it shatters. The professional plumber version of the listserv has a posting by "ProTech" out of FL complaining about this "defective" pipe:
"Default Defective FlowGuard Gold cpvc pipe
I've been getting a lot of leak calls on clvc lately where the pipe splits down the center no where near a fitting. I decided to cross section the pipe and found extrusion defects on the inside wall of the pipe. The defects are little valleys that run the whole length of the pipe.

So why has this not resulted in law suits?

Pictures and video to follow."

Our house was built in 1997 by a large homebuilder Centex (now absorbed into another builder) in a mass tract building project (143 homes, Castle Chase subdivision in McDowell Mountain Ranch in Scottsdale, AZ. The plumber named 3 other nearby subdivisions by that builder that uses FlowGuard Gold plumbing pipe. The fact that this house was built as part of a mass-built tract would discount any claim by the manufacturer of FlowGuard that the pipe must have sat out in the sun and deteriorated. Would welcome getting in touch with others who have had problems with this pipe.
Thanks,
Craig
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My Flowguard Gold 1/2 inch pipe broke at the cut off valve last week. It was behind a laundry tub and very hard to get to. Should have had nothing to cause it to fail. Very concerned about the rest of the house as it was used everywhere.
I'm with you. My house was built in 1996. I am outside Atlanta. The problem occurred in the basement garage. It isn't that cold there. My entire house is plumbed with it. I am so frightened my upper floor will spring a leak and I won't know it until it hits the first floor or the basement. I can't go thru $1,000 deductibles each time with all the possibilities. Let me know if I can help in anyway. I have extra piping here, with the 1996 date on it.
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