1/2 inch fitting difficult to piece together

[dubele]

Hi,
I spent my weekend ripping out my upstairs plumbing and reinstalling. Diameter is 1/2". Everything went well except when I went to put the pieces together. They just would not go together. It seems they caught up. I can't imagine this is normal. Is this typical? I even took a new 1/2" 90° elbow and tried to push it on a new 1/2" copper pipe.....it was very very difficult. What's interesting is I had no problem fitting the fittings on the existing 1/2" pipe I ripped out. What am I doing wrong?
Thanks,
Doug

 

[Terry]

You must have the same batch of pipe that I picked up this week. It's like they rolled it out too large. You may need to sand the pipe to reduce the size.
Or go back and see if they have something smaller. It was frustrating for me too this week.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[dubele]

You must have the same batch of pipe that I picked up this week. It's like they rolled it out too large. You may need to sand the pipe to reduce the size.
Or go back and see if they have something smaller. It was frustrating for me too this week.

Hi Terry. Ok, I am a "weekend warrior" and I am not a plumber by trade.......I've done some plumbing though and never experienced this. Good to hear I'm not alone. I will sand it down or maybe take it back and get different pipe.

 

[Jadnashua]

Take a close look at the end...is the pipe really nice and round? On pipe like you are using, the OD remains the same, but the ID can change based on the type of pipe (K, L, M are the common ones used). The wall thickness varies based on the type. A good fitting should work on any of them, though. SOme of the fittings, especially from the big box stores are coming from China, so all bets are off.

(had ID and OD transposed...sorry, it was late - keeping weird hours)

 

[dubele]

It has to be the pipe I bought. The elbows and T's and other fittings fit in the old pipe. I'm taking it back. Thanks guys.

 

[hj]

quote; On pipe like you are using, the ID remains the same, but the OD can change based on the type of pipe (K, L, M are the common ones used). The wall thickness varies based on the type

Only give advice when you know what you are talking about. ALL copper has the SAME o.d., otherwise it would be impossible to use the same fittings with all of them. The I.D> changes according to the type's wall thickness. IF you have type "L" copper your cutter is going to leave a ridge that has to be removed, with a file or ridge reamer, so it will slide into the fitting.

 

[DougB]

If you have a flare block - try squeezing the tubing. You may have to heat it first, to anneal it.