Making Connections

It seems obvious that all watershapers would have a clear understanding of the materials commonly used in pipes and fittings and would know all about the primers and glues and mechanical approaches used to connect plumbing joints. That’s not always the case, however, which is why I’m rarely shocked to see system failures that are the direct and inevitable result of improper plumbing connections.

It’s amazing to me that these connections haven’t been properly made, of course, but what’s even more amazing is that these problems often arise with installations where lots of good work has gone into calculating proper hydraulics and laying things out in efficient ways. None of that matters when the pipes start to leak!

Much of what follows should be familiar territory, but this issue of making proper connections is so important that no series of articles on hydraulic fundamentals would be complete without covering what it takes to join Pipe A to Pipe B. [more]