New water lines above or below subfloor?

[DearArgosy]

Doing a near complete remodel. have the floors repaired and the underside all open ready for new insulation. looking at going with PEX piping. if i run it under the subfloor it would be secured to the bottom of the plywood, wrapped in the foam pipe insulation, and further covered by the new fiberglass floor insulation i am installing. being all PEX i should have no fitting below just the pipe running from one spot to another. Or should i run it all above the floor as the original system was??? we hated how the one pipe from the front freash water tank to the back was in a box channel visible along the wall, very tacky.

All above floor? possible just the one from the front tank below? or should have no problems with all runs below??

Thanks for the advise, This forum is awesome and everyone here

[idroba]

Tough question to answer with anything but an opinion. If the water lines are below the floor you will have a helluva time getting to them in the future, if any problem develops. The heat/insulation issue is dependent on just how cold you are planning to camp in. Very hard to stop freezing when the lines are below the floor. Insulation only slows down the rate of heat loss, will not prevent freezing as eventually the pipes can fall below 32, even with all the insulation in the world.

The original copper pipes in the Argosy were often not run very well (same for AS). You can put pex pipes where the copper ones could not easily go. I have just re plumbed my 22' Argosy and the new job is much nicer than the original one, from the space use standpoint.

Overall, my feeling is stay above the floor.

Just things to consider.

[barts]

Idea -

If you're redoing all your plumbing w/ PEX, take the time to run the hot and cold lines together, and insulate them together... later if you want, a small 12V circulation pump can be used to keep the hot water running in a circuit - this will keep your trailer's plumbing from freezing when away from power w/o having to run the furnace, and you won't have to run the water for a while for it to get hot.

If you run the pipes below the floor, you'll need to aways use compressed air to purge them when winterizing, or put the drain valves underneath.
I'll leave the plumbing above the floor.

- Bart

[wahoonc]

I am going back above the floor, but as pointed out with the PEX you can route things a lot neater. I want mine above floor, we use our AS almost year round.

Aaron