Charlotte Home Inspetor Tells How to Avoid a Dielectric Connection

www.askthecharlotteinspector.com Charlotte home inspector Preston San recently inspected a ho that had two different types of plumbing pipes in use. Fortunatuately the Charlotte homeowner did not have them connected directy to each other or he would have had a dielectric connection. What is a dielectric connection and how do you avoid it? If you put two metals together in water, one of them corrodes to protect the other. This is known as electrolysis. The action of a sacrificial anode rod, and that of a battery, are both examples of beneficial electrolysis. However, usually in plumbing, electrolysis is something you want to avoid, especially in connections, since it means that the corroding part is eventually going to leak. To prevent plumbing electrolysis, dielectric connections are used to separate dissimilar metals. These photos show three ways to do that. The photo on the right shows a 3 copper flex line. These are fairly common on residential water heaters. The photo at left actually is rather unusual. On commercial water heaters, one often finds dielectric unions (the lefthand connection); once in awhile, one finds stainless steel flex lines (the righthand connection). It's quite rare, however, to find a water heater that has one of each! www.homeinspectioncarolina.com



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