Greetings, we are currently replacing a plumbing line that goes from our house main to the garage where we are going to place a water conditioner. A plumber we spoke to suggested running copper pipe up the wall of the house, under the eaves, and into the garage. He also said that he could do the same job with copper going into the attic and then pex going into the garage from the attic. Has anyone here had experience or heard of running water lines up high in the way he suggested? Thanks!

you know of course, that if the temperature drops to 32 degrees the water in the pipes exposed to this temp. will freeze. and the line will probably burst, which you wont know until the weather warms and you have a flood . His idea is terrible, there's got to be a better way

This message has been edited. Last edited by: nona,

Well, we live in southern California, which doesn't necessarily mean we'll never see temps that low. We were just wondering if this type of routing is common.

It's not common for a couple of reasons:

1. The potential freezing problems mentioned by Nona.
2. With water lines up in an attic space if they do break (by freezing or other causes) you are going to have damaged ceilings, walls and floors.

Not sure from your description if this is an attached or detached garage but am assuming that your house is built on a slab so that there is no basement or crawl space. While this does make it more difficult you really want to avoid running water lines outside anywhere - unless they are underground.

Beyond that, Pex is far more forgiving than copper when it comes to large temperature changes. I think at this point I would be looking for a different plumber to take a look and see what he says.

IMPHO it is plumb silly to run the main all across the house, however many curliques and squirrel runs into the trees the plumber thinks would look cool, for all the potential issues and flow restrictions you would gain. the conditioning system should be located by the rest of the water supply strictly from a cost measure, as well as a maintenance issue.

there has to be a place to put it. it could be the cause of cussing later, like the pinhead decision somebody made to put the water softener next to the shutoff, in between floor and stack cleanouts, and blocking access to everything as well as keep fatsos from fixing the furnace. if they'd moved the water heater two feet to the side, and put the softener in there, it would have been much better.

some folks don't think.

your plumber wasn't even in the line when they handed out the ability, seems to me.

it needs to be revisited by another plumber. may cost $100 more now, but saves a ton later.

Southern Calif, Central Calif, it's common to run lines overhead. But it also pretty common to read about burst water lines and how they flood a home. So when it's done, they need to be well protected against freezing. Yes it freezes in California. I've been on remodel jobs, someone else has done, and saw unprotected copper in the attic. Thats an problem waiting to happen. It's just a fact of life with slab built homes.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Re-mdlr,

All our waterlines are in the attic in Phoenix. It is very common here. We have no basements to run them through, so attic it is!.