Connecting PEX-A to PEX-B

hey it's quinn your favorite plumber here today to talk about how to transition from pex a to pex b or vice versa we've got a lot of comments requesting this so what do we recommend a few ways to do it and pros and cons let's get started okay the first thing we need to do is identify what type of pipe we have pex a or b so if you zoom in close you can see most of the pipe is listed on there this says open or pex dash a whereas the peck style b if you look says pecks dash b the second way is to identify the style of fittings peck style b will have rings metal rings either crimp or clamp so these are crimp rings whereas the peck style a is expansion ring so the rings are going to be made out of a pex or similar material so that's how you'll identify what type of pecs you have okay let's look at how you connect type a to type b so for example if your house was plumbed in type a you're a diy are going to do an expansion don't want to spend the money on an expansion tool and want to run pex b that's great here's that a transition the recommended method to transition is to use a pex b insert style fitting into both the pex a and pex b pipe we'll use the crimp ring on the pex a and we'll use our insert style pex b fitting right and we talked about the differences this is the pex a fitting which is a little bit larger you'll notice it won't fit into the pipe without expanding it with the expansion tool hex b the crimp style insert fittings will uh be able to be hand fit in there so we have our uh pex a with our pex b fitting that crimps down then we will get the other end and put on our crimp ring and there's our connection so as you can see we've transitioned from pex a to pex b or vice versa using a pex b coupling with the crimp rings insert style fitting so we did use crimps in this and that's the the ring method people have asked what do we prefer i prefer the crimp rings i think it's a more reliable long-term solution there are is the clamp method which is a little bit easier for install but i have seen more clamps fail than rings so side note that was another question figured we'd get it answered there i do have a disclaimer here okay as a contractor this insert style fitting into the pex a is not a manufacturer recommended transition it'll work in the real world but the man manufacturer does not recognize this as a transition so if you're a contractor transitioning from type b to type a what you need to do is ask the manufacturer on how they want you to make this transition get that in writing and so it doesn't void your warranty the next joining method people have asked about is a shark bite fitting there is a shark bite coupling that'll go from pex a to pex b or pex to pex i don't recommend them shark bites in general i think are great for a temporary solution but they're not a great permanent repair so i would not recommend shark bite as your permanent transition lastly there is threaded adapters that you can go um maybe i should grab one huh lastly there is a threaded joint way to go from pex b to pex a or pex a to pex b and this is what the engineer or manufacturer may recommend you do if you're a contractor that needs to have a certified joint so you can see i have a mip adapter pex a to mip and then i have a pex b to fip adapter which is a threaded threaded joint here and then you do your pipe dope and tape get that all sealed up and then one side the pex a side would have the expansion ring and then the pex b side would have the crimp ring so that's what the engineer or manufacturer may want you to do if you're a contractor but it's worth asking because this this transition is way more expensive than your standard pex b coupling okay in summary we took a look at how to identify the pipe either by the pipe label or the connection style of your fittings uh between text b and pex a and then we talked about our recommended joining method which is a pex b insert style fitting with the crimp rings between pex a and pex b this is the simplest we also covered a shark bite our thoughts on that and then potentially using threaded adapters as another option and if you have more questions about pex a versus pex b we have a full video on that the joining methods and really dive in a little more so check that video out if you're interested so if you thought this was useful like us follow us and make sure you keep asking questions we're going to keep answering as many as we can and making more videos of what you guys want thanks for [Music] watching [Music] you

Channel: Williams Plumbing & Heating

Views: 13,791

Rating: 4.9344263 out of 5

Keywords: pex pipe, pex pipe installation, how to connect PEX-A to PEX-B, sharkbite plumbing fittings, sharkbite fittings, sharkbite pex, pex crimp vs clamp, pex connection types, pex joining methods, pex adapter fittings, pex adapters, pex a to pex b adapter, pex plumbing installation, pex-a vs pex-b, pex threaded fittings, pex insert fittings, PEX A, pex a vs pex b, pex a installation, sharkbite vs, sharkbite vs crimp pex, pex plumbing, pex tubing

Id: O2pRkDMKsQ4

Length: 5min 15sec (315 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 02 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/trentontrees]

Why does he not recommend shark bites as a long term solution? They have a 25 year warranty.