Plumbing fittings

[Greenhand]

We need to change some of the plumbing (seriously, whoever mounted the water pump so that the elbow bangs against the cabinet should be shot). I had decided to change out to SeaTech, but the stores around here seem to be letting their stock dwindle out, so I purchased some parts from Whale. We found out yesterday that SeaTech stems do not seal into Whale fittings. As a matter of fact, you can almost always just pull the 15mm tubing out of a Whale hose, without having to hold down the collet. The Seatech are easy enough to order online, but I wanted to check in with other DIY plumbers.

Do most people use these quick connect systems? If so, which ones? If not, what do you use?

[rwidman]

You may be able to find suitable fittings at a hardware store or home center. My boat came from the factory with QEST fittings.





http://www.amazon.com/Zurn-QAE33R-El...&keywords=qest


I found some at the local Ace hardware store when I made some modifications.

[FlightPlan]

You should know that Zurn was extensively sued over the defects in the Qest fittings. I found that the Sharkbite fittings will work on the OD of the grey tubing. I had failures in the Hex coupling and determined that they never should have designed it with a hex because it causes one to use a wrench which is not recommended or necessary.

I think the Whale fittings are British metric or something like that and don't hold on the American tubing.

The world is going downhill with PEX tubing these days and it has proven to be very good at replacing copper in the residential plumbing world. When done correctly, no fittings are required except at the terminations to fixtures. There are three types of PEX assemblies: Upornor, Viega, and I can't remember the third at the moment.