CladMaster
Minister of Fire
When I got home last night I was eventually able to thaw my pipes and get the boiler to circulate hot water. Fortunately there's no ruptures or leaks anywhere in my loop (it has one zone). However, I now have a very slow leak where my fresh water supply feeds the boiler. The problem I believe is that the line coming in to the boiler is initially CPVC and then meets copper piping about 2 ft before the line goes into the front of the boiler. The CPVC end is a threaded male end that goes into a female copper fitting. The slow leak appears to be right down in the threading. I've been told by my plumber that these kind of connections can sometimes leak over time as joining CPVC to copper doesn't lend itself to the best of seals. I'm not sure how true this is, but in lieu of changing this connection now, for the time being I'm hoping a bit of the silicone sealer stuff in the purple tube will seal up the very slow leak until I can somehow replace this in the spring. I believe you can now buy compression fittings that work much better between two different materials and are more effective at preventing leaks. I'd do it now but I'm a bit fearful of having to drain the boiler, repair the leak, and then refill everything and add anti-freeze to a system I just had tuned up and anti-freeze added to four months ago. This very slow leak doesn't seem to hinder the performance of the boiler in any way. Any thoughts on this idea?
Try the fittings called 'Sharkbite', no spanners or wrenches needed, nor do you need to get out the solder and torch.
http://www.sharkbite.com/usa/