Called out by a tenant this morning as she could smell gas - tested with 
leak detecting fluid - couldn't find anything - it was obviously very 
slight. Using our noses we homed in on the area round the governor - it was 
definitely there. It was a new meter 9 months ago, but the governer looked a 
good bit older and I noticed some corrosion around one of the annular 
corrugations on the pipe. Got British Gas out and they confirmed it was the 
pipe between the incoming main and the governor, but maintained that whoever 
ran the pipe work from the meter had dropped flux onto the pipe and not 
wiped it off - and had burnt throught the pipe in less than 6 months!!
We know that copper resists the corrosion by flux for many years - I believe 
it was dicussed recently - but this pipe (the flexible one) isn't copper and 
is apparently easily corroded by flux - be warned.
Unless he was telling porkies!

On Wed, 14 Sep 2005 22:17:20 +0000 (UTC), "Hugh"
 wrote:


>Called out by a tenant this morning as she could smell gas - tested with 
>leak detecting fluid - couldn't find anything - it was obviously very 
>slight. Using our noses we homed in on the area round the governor - it was 
>definitely there. It was a new meter 9 months ago, but the governer looked a 
>good bit older and I noticed some corrosion around one of the annular 
>corrugations on the pipe. Got British Gas out and they confirmed it was the 
>pipe between the incoming main and the governor, but maintained that whoever 
>ran the pipe work from the meter had dropped flux onto the pipe and not 
>wiped it off - and had burnt throught the pipe in less than 6 months!!
>We know that copper resists the corrosion by flux for many years - I believe 
>it was dicussed recently - but this pipe (the flexible one) isn't copper and 
>is apparently easily corroded by flux - be warned.
>Unless he was telling porkies!
>

So the corroded pipe is iron? Perhaps he was just guessing?

Mr F.

Mr Fizzion wrote:


>>it was dicussed recently - but this pipe (the flexible one) isn't copper and 
>>is apparently easily corroded by flux - be warned.
>>Unless he was telling porkies!
>>
> 
> So the corroded pipe is iron? Perhaps he was just guessing?


Sounds like one of those stainless steel corrugated things... There is a 
warning in the FAQ, see "Purge Procedure point 7":

http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/GasFitting.html


-- 
Cheers,

John.

/=================================================================\
|          Internode Ltd -  http://www.internode.co.uk            |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
|        John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk              |
\=================================================================/

On Wed, 14 Sep 2005 22:17:20 +0000, Hugh wrote:


> Called out by a tenant this morning as she could smell gas - tested with 
> leak detecting fluid - couldn't find anything - it was obviously very 
> slight. Using our noses we homed in on the area round the governor - it was 
> definitely there. It was a new meter 9 months ago, but the governer looked a 
> good bit older and I noticed some corrosion around one of the annular 
> corrugations on the pipe. Got British Gas out and they confirmed it was the 
> pipe between the incoming main and the governor, but maintained that whoever 
> ran the pipe work from the meter had dropped flux onto the pipe and not 
> wiped it off - and had burnt throught the pipe in less than 6 months!!
> We know that copper resists the corrosion by flux for many years - I believe 
> it was dicussed recently - but this pipe (the flexible one) isn't copper and 
> is apparently easily corroded by flux - be warned.
> Unless he was telling porkies!


He wasn't this is a known problem, flux attacks stainless steel very
quickly. Were they refusing to fix it because of the negligent installers,
or just whinging?


-- 
Ed Sirett - Property maintainer and registered gas fitter.
The FAQ for uk.diy is at http://www.diyfaq.org.uk 
Gas fitting FAQ  http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/GasFitting.html
Sealed CH FAQ http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/SealedCH.html