6

members' vote and even reversed themselves later. The sole negative vote on the membership ballot came from a competing industry. In the reconsideration following this negative vote, the decision to ignore it was unanimous at the task group, subcommittee, and committee levels.

Highly significant in this regard is the statement in the letter of Mr. Munger, set forth above:

That the Plastics Pipe Institute endorses PVC Thin-Wall DWV, as it does all thermoplastica piping products with ASTM standards.

One may, I trust, be pardoned a suspicion that the ASTM D-20 Committee on Plastics operates very much as a party caucus, allowing full scope for intracaucus debate with the proviso that it be confidential and internal, coupled with a clear understanding that industry members stand together like brothers when they have to face the rest of the world.

I am not criticizing the industry caucus technique as such, and as a Member of Congress I would be hard pressed to do so. It seems a highly effective technique from the standpoint of industry interest but what about the consumers' interest? I am also disturbed by the fact that D-20.17 is actually a joint committee sponsored by ASTM and the Plastics Pipe Institute. Stationery printed for use of the subcommittee bears the insignia of both ASTM and PPI and the names of both organizations in the letterhead. Apparently such joint subcommittees are provided for in ASTM procedures. I am not questioning the legality of the operation, but am only pointing out further evidence of the intimate collaboration between ASTM and a trade association of the industry most likely to be affected by the approval or disapproval of a proposed standard.

An ASTM letter ballot goes out to the membership I understand it is some 15,000 strong-with perhaps scores of propositions to be voted on. In each case, the ballot contains only an identifying number and subject. In each case members are voting to approve, withdraw or reaffirm a standard. In each case there are three possible votes: affirmative, negative, and abstain. If a member wishes to learn what he is supposed to be voting on. he may request a copy of the proposed standard and also argument pro and con distributed at the industry committee level.

It seems to me that pressure is extremely great for a party not directly in425-841-25342

CONGRESSIONAL RECORD

volved to either abstain or mark a pro forma affirmative on most votes. Voting negative takes time and trouble. A negative vote must be explained in writing. whereas an affirmative vote or abstention need not be. Even those members who feel they will be seriously hurt economically by approval of a new standard must think twice before voting in the negative. The day will come when the nay-sayer will want an ASTM approval for his own standards and the possibility of retaliation lurks in the background. It certainly seems that this type of balloting exerts heavy psychological pressure on industry members of ASTM to convert the entire organization into a private industry caucus, in much the same way that committee D-20 appears to function as a plastics industry caucus.

In the case of D 2949, material distributed to those few members requesting information so they would know what they were voting on included the proposed standard, letters from the task group chairman and the subcommittee chairman urging full D-20 committee approval, test data, and the minority report set forth above.

The test data apparently originated entirely with the B. F. Goodrich Chemical Co., an organization obviously having a great economic interest in an affirmative result. There was no record of any testing whatsoever conducted in any Federal or other public facility, or in ASTM or other private facility. The test data were submitted over the signature of R. C. Wilging who was also chairman of the 3-Inch Thin Wall Task Group.

This is an extremely interesting triple play. Mr. Wilging is, I am sure, an entirely honest and reputable individual. However, conducting tests for his employer, B. F. Goodrich, acting as the chairman of the Thin Wall Task Group, and further, apparently, as a member of both the subcommittee and committee, simply places him in a totally untenable conflict-of-interest position. It is, of course, disquieting to learn that the entire testing which garnered ASTM approval and thereby FHA and HUD approval with the further consequence that all municipalities must accept the product or be subject to losing much sought after Federal funds was performed by a manufacturer of the commodity affected by the standard.

Mr. Wilging, being responsible as an employee, the proponent of the standard as chairman of the task group, and an objective member of the committee acting as both judge and jury is neither

credible nor tenable. Where is the testing carried on by ASTM referred to by. Secretary Romney? Where is the quasipublic institutional guarantee of objestivity so widely proclaimed?

Is testing by a manufacturer what Mr. Munger refers to in the letter cited above when he says:

The granting of such a standard [ASTM D 2949] indicates that this product has undergone the same rigid testing procedure and evaluation by producer, consumer and general interest groups which all thermoplastics piping with an ASTM standard must have endured.

There is not any presently available evidence of any testing or evaluation, rigid, or otherwise, by any consumer or general interest group.

I am also disturbed by the statement in Mr. Munger's letter that PVC thin wall DWV had been assigned an ASTM standard number. While the date of his letter does not appear, it is published in a magazine issue dated March 15, 1971, at a time when the issue of final approval was pending before the ASTM committee on standards. The letter must have been written well in advance of the decision of that committee which was made on April 8, and certainly well in advance of the effective date which was 30 days later.

I am also reliably informed that some industry members have advertised the granting of an ASTM standard for thin wall PVC before the final approval action became effective. Such an example was an advertisement by Genova Products in the March 1971 issue of the Iowa Plumbing, Heating, Cooling Contractor, official publication of the Iowa Association of Plumbing, Heating, Cooling Contractors, Inc., Boone, Iowa.

The premature usage of the ASTM approval was at the least a most serious impropriety. Certainly, if there were any doubt about final approval, members of the ASTM Committe on Standards might think twice about the consequences of a negative decision which would cause embarrassment and perhaps legal expense and trouble for prestigious members of a constituent industry.

The minority report cited above makes much of what may be called Gresham's law of building materials, that is to say, bad materials tend to drive out good materials. I would hope that present HUD policy will not have this effect-I very much fear that it will until some effective method of consumer representation and home buyer representation is provided for within the deliberative councils of

SPEECH

OF

HON. BILL NICHOLS

OF ALABAMA

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Thursday, December 17, 1970

Mr. NICHOLS. Mr. Speaker, in recent months my attention has been called to case after case in which the Department of Housing and Urban Development has coerced the legislative body of some municipality to approve plastic pipe for drain, waste, and vent usage. HUD has demanded this as a prerequisite for obtaining Federal loans or grants.

In this campaign, HUD has apparently set a very high priority on the conquest of Alabama city and towns. The current November-December 1970 issue of HUD Challenge states that 63 Alabama communities have approved plastic pipe for residential construction. I can

assure Secretary George Romney of

Housing and Urban Development that this is not a tribute to the quality of plastic pipe but to the quality of HUD's skill in using taxpayers' money to ride roughshod over States rights and local rights.

HUD's action has been very effective. In Anniston, Ala., commonly referred to

as the soil pipe capital of the world, workers in soil pipe foundries are now on a 3-day workweek and have been for several months. Officials estimate that HUD's methods have reduced the orders for various soil pipes by 30 to 50 percent. This policy on the part of HUD and Secretary Romney does not only affect the foundry workers in Anniston but also constitutes a complete disservice to the American home buyer, and a totally illegal and unmerited windfall to particular private interests, especially the plastic pipe industry and homebuilder lobby.

Mr. Speaker, HUD claims authority to pursue this policy under a section of the National Housing Act. The idea that HUD has the authority, under this section, to advocate the use of plastic pipe must have been thought up by a junior attorney in the office of the HUD general counsel who has his eye set on greater things. That section gives HUD the power to require and superintend maintenance of a minimum standard housing code in a workable program jurisdiction. It gives HUD no power whatsoever in promoting any building material.

I am not so naive as to believe that bureaucratic ambition placed in control of hundreds of millions of Federal dollars is going to be stopped by a small thing like the legislative intent of Congress. It is another matter when the bureaucratic policy does positive harm to millions of hard working American men and women who are led to place an unjustified trust in a decision of their Federal Government.

There may be those among the general public who believe that when HUD forces J 412-818-23655-8

a municipality to approve a building material like plastic pipe, it is acting out of considered judgment following the most thorough and impartial testing in Federal facilities. This is not the case, however. Testimony presented to a subcommittee of the House Select Committee on Small Business during this Congress has substantiated the fact that neither HUD nor any other Federal agency has ever tested the performance of plastic pipe in drain, waste, and vent systems, Plastic pipe and fittings have been tried in Europe and the results have been very unsatisfactory.

Mr. Speaker, I am incorporating in the RECORD a study entitled "Investigation of the Performance of Plastic Drainage Systems in Europe." conducted August 10-21, 1970, by Rom Rhome. The study was undertaken for plastic pipe interests and is distributed by Uniroyal Chemical in Naugatuck, Conn. Some exhibits which contain photographs of plastic pipe failures or statistical tables

have been omitted because they cannot be reproduced in the RECORD at this point.

A major finding of Mr. Rhome is that widespread failures of polyvinyl chloride plastic drainage systems have occurred in European countries with the introduction of automatic dishwashers and

washing machines with self-contained

water heaters. He states that this material has been eliminated entirely from standards in some European countries.

I hope that my colleagues will take the time to study this report. Perhaps Secretary Romney or some of the officials who made this arbitrary decision can tell me why, so I can answer some of my hardworking constituents in the Anniston area who have been seriously hurt by a Government that is supposed to protect them. The study follows: INVESTIGATION OF THE PERFORMANCE OF PLASTIC DRAINAGE SYSTEMS IN EUROPE (By Rom Rhome)

1. STATEMENT OF OBJECTIVE The purpose of the investigation was an on-the-spot assessment of the behavior in service of plastic drainage systems, particularly PVC This information was needed to evaluate more properly the proposed ASTM specification which would reduce the wall thickness of 3" PVC DWV pipe from its present Schedule 40 dimension.

The assignment included verification of reports of PVC DWV failures, assessment of the effect of wall thickness upon these fallures, and the impact of the failures upon the subsequent acceptance of PVC plastic for drainage service.

Since the proposed 3" PVC Thin Wall Specification would depart from the standard outside diameter of 3.50" (which has become established throughout the United States for plastic pipe for both pressure and drainage service), a corollary assignment was to evaluate this departure from standardization in the light of the international trend toward uniformity in dimensional standards.

Soope

The scope of the study was confined to soil, waste, and vent piping within buildings (commonly referred to as "drainage" or

"DWV" in the United States) and did not extend to underground sewer or storm drain lines, pressure piping, or rain carrying systems.

II. SUMMARY OF FINDINGS

for

1. In Europe PVC pressure systems were designed with heavy walls and conservatively rated for a life expectancy of fifty years. The most common dimensional schedule PVC corresponds to a pressure rating of 10 atmospheres or 147 ps1. The wall thicknesses are very close to Schedule 40 PVC drainage pipe in the United States conforming to ASTM D 2665.

2. In determining the design stress for PVC at ambient temperature of 20° C. (68" F.) proper recognition was given to elevated temperature. On the Continent, both pipe and fittings for pressure service were subjected to 1000 hours of hydrostatic test at a continuous temperature of 60° C. (140° P.) before the ambient temperature rating was

4. Exactly the reverse, however, has been true of PVC drainage piping, which was grossly underdesigned with thin walls to meet the difficult competitive situation prevalling at the time with cast iron, steel, and even asbestos cement (within buildings).

5. With the introduction of automatic dishwashers and washing machines with self-contained water heaters. widespread failures of PVC drainage systems have occurred. These heat deformation failures occurred in both 3" and 4" soll stacks as well as waste lines 2" and smaller.

6. As a result, PVC has been eliminated entirely from standards in some countries for waste lines as well as 3" soil stacks, with the higher heat resistant plastics, particularly ABS, being used instead.

7. In some countries thinner than Schedule 40 PVC DWV has been retained, but with the restriction that the product be used to handle domestic effluent only. Such service restrictions prolong the use of trad!tional materials, particularly cast iron, which are thereby required for all commercial installations which could be handled with adequately designed PVC pipe.

8. In the Netherlands, for example, the use of thin wall PVC is continuing, but with the restriction that effluent temperatures not exceed 158° F. This virtually rules out PVC in all modern structures containing automatic appliances.

9. Uniform outside diameter is the most important single achievement in the standardization of plastic pipe. Recommendations of the International Standards Organization have established a single schedule of outside diameters for both pressure and drainage service now in use on four continents. This uniform metric standard for outside diameters parallels the similar standardization in the United States on Iron Pipe Size Outside Diameters. Any effort to introduce nonstandard dimensions, such as the 3.250" O.D. proposed for thin wall PVC DWV in the United States, is a serious departure from dimensional standardization.

III. UNITED KINGDOM Interviews in the United Kingdom included four leading pipe and fitting manufacturers, two departments of the British Ministry of Technology, a raw material supplier, and a pipe fabricator-installer. These contacts, like those in other countries, are detailed in

2

Appendix B. Since a two-way exchange of information was involved in every interview, sponsors of this investigation should feel at liberty to visit or correspond with the persons

listed.

PVC and ABS pipe have been used in the UK for both pressure and drainage service. Both materials have performed quite successfully in pressure piping. In drainage, however, thin-wall PVC has produced widespread fallures, with ABS and other heat resistant plastics displacing PVC entirely from the smaller diameter DWV market.

A brief explanation of the development of British pipe dimensional schedules will help. to explain the reasons for the success of adequately designed PVC pressure pipe and fallure of PVC thin-wall drainage pipe. Standardization on iron pipe size outside diameter

From inception British plastic pipe dimensional schedules have utilized the Iron Pipe Size Outside Diameter the same as in the United States. IPS OD's apply through the complete range of sizes from " through 24. Three inch nominal, for example, is 3.500 specified OD, which is equivalent to 88.7 mm.

With the eventual entry into the Common Market, British manufacturers generally are making preparations for adoption of the metric system. In the case of 3" pipe, the largest British plastic pipe extruder is using 3 OD pipe labeled 90 mm. since the same pipe meets both dimensional tolerances, (Some useful conversions of metric to British units of measurement are presented in Appendix A)

Design stress, pressure class, and wall
thicknesses for PVC pipe

The British determine design stress for plastic pipe materials in much the same manner as in the United States and on the Continent (which is described fully in the next section) There are available in the British pipe dimensional tables wall thicknesses which approximate our Schedule 40 for each pressure-rated pipe size Had these dimensions such as Class D (181-201 wall thickness for 3) been selected for PVC DWV, service fallures could have been avolded, as in the case of the United States where Schedule 40 PVC has performed with consistent success.

Introduction of PVC into drainage service

In the early sixties British extruders introduced PVC for both rain carrying systems and sanitary drainage. Wall thicknesses varied from 087 to 110". Rain carrying systems operated without incident, until today it is estimated that 90% of new installations are with PVC as opposed to metal.

In soil pipe installations, PVC pipe produced conspicuous failures.

It should be noted that lead stabilization of PVC for non-potable water uses is universal in Europe both in the United Kingdom and on the Continent. In the UK. PVC DWV pipe must have a minimum Vicat softening point of 81" C. (178 P.).

The

In the UK the heat resistance requirements of drainage systems result essentially from the use of back boilers and, more recently, automatic washing machines. back boller is a water heating device installed behind the fireplace. It literally "bolls over" spiling 212 F. water into the drainage system. Automatic washing machines as well as dishwashers with self-contained heating units came into increasing use starting in the mid-sixties. Thermostat malfunction can cause boiling water to be discharged.

Collection of failure reports

The British Ministry of Technology in cooperation with the Ministry of Public Build

When tested according to BS 2782 "Methods of Testing Plastics" Method 102 using 5 kg load.

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CONGRESSIONAL RECORD

ings and Works has documented over forty heat deformation failures of 3" and 4" PVC soil pipe installations. It is admitted that a far greater number than those actually reported occurred.

Exhibit A presents a typical 4" PVC soll stack failure where the pipe folded and collapsed some six inches below the sink waste entry.

Technical investigation of PVC failures

The Ministry of Technology conducted a technical investigation of fallures and a laboratory analysis of PVC pipe performance for carrying hot wastes. An outgrowth of this investigation was the adoption of the 81 C minimum softening print requirement.

It was determined that wall thickness had the most significant effect upon the ability of PVC pipe to withstand heat distortion. It was found that with the inner surface of the pipe at 212 F.. the following times were required for the wall thickness indicated for the O. D. to reach the recommended Vicatsoftening point of 81° C (178° F)-(1) 110" wall 85 seconds. (2) 125 wall--115 seconds. (3) 181 wall did not reach 81° C in 200 seconds, only 73 C (163° F). No read. ings were taken on the 1811 wall pipe after 200 seconds. Nor was Schedule 40 PVC (216" wall for 3 pipe) examined Another obvious omission from this evaluation was that cag measurements of pipe with varying wall thicknesses under continuous dow of water at various temperatures starting at 212 P were not conducted.

Instead of pursuing the technical evaluation of wall thickness to its logical concluslon-that wall thicknes es equivalent to those established in the United States for PVC DWV can virtually eliminate ag fallure the British plasties industry adopted .125 wall for 3 and 4 PVC soil pipe on the basis of a cycling test. In this test 75 gallons of water at 91° C (192° F) (not the boiling temperatures encountered in servie) flow through stack for 90 seconds alternating with "cold" water for 90 seconds, with a rest period of 60 seconds between cycles The test section is a vertical stack. Horizontal soil lines are not tested. The test is repeated for 2500 cycles.

laun

We have no doubt that 3" x 125" wall PVC pipe passes such a cycling text. Recognizing the limitations of the product use of such 3 PVC soil pipe and the UK. confined to above ground drainage systems only. carrying normal domestic effluents. All commercial installations-restaurants, dries, schools, office buildings, etc. are requir ed to be metal pipe. It is apparent that through underdesign of its own product, the British plastic industry is prolonging the use of metal pipe, where adequately designed PVC could be universally used for sanitary drainage.

Signicance of the British experience

1. In the UK as well as on the Continent PVC drainage pipe was designed to compete size for size with metal pipe under the competitive pricing prevailing at the beginning of the last decade. Wall thicknesses were arrived at to produce a product which would displace traditional materials on the bats of material cost rather than superior performance and installation saving. The resulting PVC DWV pipe was technically inadequate. As a consequence, the use of traditional materials, particularly cast iron, has been prolonged, and the waste line market has been lost by PVC to higher heat resistant plastics primarily ABS. (Please note EXHIBIT B).

2. When the technical investigation of fallures disclosed that PVC soll pipe with a wall thickness up to 110" was incapable of adequate performance, the industry settled upon a marginal increase to 125 wall, with service limited to household drainage only. This situation illustrates the practical diffoulty of significant upgrading once an in

ferior product has become established in the market.

3. British experience has demonstrated the wisdom of the approach followed in the United States in selecting the Schedule 40 dimension for ABS and PVC pipe. Both prod ucts have performed with complete success. They can be used without restriction both above and below ground; in multi-story con. struction; and in commercial and industrial as well as residential building. In the United States complete displacement of traditional drainage materials by genuinely superior plastics is proceeding at an accelerated rate. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that there is resistance to downgrading of product with a reduction in wall thickness, thereby inviting a repetition of the British experience of product failure and loss of market for PVC.

IV. SWITZERLAND AND GERMANY Interviews included Gebruder Anger, now a division of Rheinstall Corporation (a basic steel producer) Munich, Germany, and Georg Fischer AG, Schaffhausen, Switzerland, Gebruder Anger is reputed to be the largest plastic pipe manufacturer in Germany with current annual production estimated at 50 million lbs. of PVC pipe and fittings. Georg Flacher is the largest manufacturer of PVC pressure fittings in Europe. Its Plastics Division is part of a large diversified concern which began as a cast iron foundry in the early 1800's.

These conversations provided background on the development of PVC pipe standards on the Continent. PVC pipe began in Germany, and the German DIN Standards have set the pattern for the subsequent ISO spectfications of the International Standards Or ganization.

The dimensions in the German DIN Standards for the 3" and 4" pipe with which we are primarily concerned are set forth in the table below. An explanation follows of the manner in which there dimensions were developed.

(Please refer to Appendix A for conversion from metric to British units of measure.) GERMAN DIN STANDARDS FOR PVC PIPE

Our own 100,000 hour design strees rating of 2000 psi for Type I PVC and 1200 pel generally accepted for Type II PVC are derived from the system used on the Continent for determining design stress Our 2000 pet PVC compounds would be rated as PVC-100 or 100 kg cm. Similarly our 1200-pal Type II PVC would be PVC-60. The principal difference is that the European stress rating is based upon the extrapolation of burst data to 50 years, rather than our 100,000 hours or 12 years. This entails a reduction in design stress of some 30% from levels accepted in the United States. (Again, please refer to Appendix A.)

A further refinement is that on both pipe and fittings a 1.000 hour test is run at 60°C (140P). According to Anger data, it is aesumed that pipe which survives the 1,000 hour test at 60° C at a pressure of 10 atmospheres (147 psi) is capable of fifty years of service at the same pressure for 50 years with water at 20°C (68°F).

Wall thickness

The resulting wall thicknesses using a design stress of 100 kg/cm for Type I PVC

are shown in EXHIBITS C and D. The most common pressure rating for PVC pressure pipe la 10 atmospheres or 147 psi (which approximates the Class 150 or 150 psl cast iron and asbestos cement pipe in the United States). Fischer, for example, manufactures a single line of pressure fittings rated for 10 atmospheres of pressure. Fischer, however, uses high Impact PVC-60 with roughly double the wall of the PVC-100 pipe in the same system.

For drainage the Germans selected the minimum wall thickness of 1.8 mm for 4 atmospheres of pressure for 90 mm pipe, and extended this wall thickness down through the 32 mm or 14" size of waste lines. (Exhibits C and E)

Here two fallacies are evident:

(1) Pressure testing at 60°C (140°F) does not establish the ability of PVC to handle hot wastes in drainage systems at temperatures up to 100 C (212°F), and

(2) The smaller diameter waste lines which would have the thinnest walls under the pressure rating concept are those which are most susceptible to sag since they are adjacent to automatic appliances generating high temperature effluent.

We can conclude only that the misapplication of thinnest schedule intended for pressure systems at ambient temperature has accounted for the widespread failures of drainage systems in Europe.

Photographs of PVC DWV fallures from Germany are presented in Exhibit F. We were unable to secure a complete German report at the time of our visit because of absence of key personnel on holidays. Additional information will be forwarded when it becomes available.

Standardization of outside diameters The ISO standard establishing uniform outside diameters is presented in Exhibit G. The identical outside diameters are also being applied to drainage pipe in all plastic materials, not merely PVC. These ISO standards are now embraced by a total of 22 countries in Europe, North America, South America, and Asia.

Our particular problem concerns an effort to introduce a non-standard pipe diameter. 3.25 O.D. as PVC DWV, when all of our plastic pipe standards for PVC and ABS for both drainage and pressure have been standardized at 3.50" O.D. in the U.S.

All of the manufacturers and standards organizations Interviewed stated that they would resist a similar departure from dimensional standardization.

Another point of interest is that the forthcoming ISO standard on PVC drainage pipe will show two columns for wall thicknessone at 1.8 mm, minimum and the other at 1.2 mm. The outside diameters, however, will remain unchanged.

V. NETHERLANDS

This country has the highest standard of living in Europe, the densest population, and is far ahead of other European countries in the per capita use of plastic pipe. Holland also leads in the use of ABS in lieu of PVC for DWV because of the high temperature service requirements of Dutch drainage systema.

Among the companies visited, Wavin is the world's largest plastic pipe manufacturer. Its Current annual company-wide production of PVC pipe to over 220 million ibe-which 18 equivalent to the total production of PVO pipe in the United States in 1969. Polva produces over 55 million lbs. of plastic pipe at its Dutch plant alone. Though smaller than the other two, Dijka is huge by U.S. standards, specializing in ABS and PVC drainage pipe. Another large Dutch extruder, Kumy, is actively promoting ABS for DWV.

Standards activity is highly organized in the Netherlands. We visited Foundation KOMO, which lasues standards on sewerage and drainage materials; KIWA, Ltd., a related

J 412-818-23655-8

new

Introduction of ABS in Holland The new KOMO ABS specification is nearly ready for promulgation. A key feature of the KOMO specification is that ABS is recommended for use where effluent temperatures up to 90°C (104 P) are encountered. This is not a particularly impressive requirement, since, in our opinion, plastic drainage pipe should be designed to withstand prolonged discharges up to 100°C. However, since the KOMO PVC specification contains a service limitation to effluent not exceeding 70°C (158°F). ABS would appear to be required in all installations.

TNO tests and revision of the PVC
DWV specification

In the new KOMO PVC DWV specification minimum wall thickness is revised upward from 1.8 mm. to 3.2 mm. The minimum wall extends down through 32 mm. (1%), producing an D/t ratio of 10:1 for this size of pipe.

The new 3.2 mm. PVC wall thickness was recommended by TNO based upon laboratory cycling tests. With great difficulty we obtained information on the TNO tests. The test results were highly favorable to ABS. However, the test results which we examined were incomplete and largely inconclusive.

The test temperature was essentially the same as in the British tests-90°C (194°F). Since the temperature was a full 18°F below bolling, the test is open to criticism for not similating temperatures encountered in actual installations. The test setup, however, was considerably more realistic than the British tests, since it involved three elements, each approximately 6.5 feet in length a horizontal waste line of 14" or 2" diameter, followed by a vertical stack and horizontal soil line each 3 or 4" in diameter. Supports were placed at mid-span on the soil line and at intervals varying between 1' and 2' on the waste lines. The cycle amounted to one minute of water at 90°C, followed by a rest period of 4 minute, then 1 minute of cold water at 10°C (50°F),

It was the intention to test systems consisting of 1.8 mm. PVC, 3.2 mm. PVC, and ABS for 1500 cycles each, then measure the resulting sag. The problem was that in each case the test had to be discontinued because of failure of expansious joints in

3

the pipe assembly or the plastic to metal connections. Moreover, trouble with the apparatus caused frequent interruptions of the test cycle.

ABS ran 1400 cycles before the test was discontinued with a broken connection. No sag was measurable in the ABS. The 1.8 mm. PVC registered sag of approximately 4" in the waste line and nearly 4" in the soll line after 244 cycles.

The 3.2 mm. wall pipe was tested for 300 cycles, then 910 cycles before the test had to be discontinued. Sag was hardly measurable. No complete tests on this wall thickness of pipe were recorded.

The foregoing tests served only to confirm the complete unserviceability of 1.8 mm. wall PVC and the relative superiority of ABS under far less than critical conditions. Unfortunately the tests did not establish the true limitations of 3.2 mm wall PVC or, more important, the wall thickness of PVC which would have qualified the material for unrestricted DWV use. This would have been easy enough to do, first by verifying the successful PVC DWV experience in the United States, then testing the PVC pressure pipe readily available in Holland rated for pressures of 10 or 16 atmospheres. CONCLUSIONS FROM THE DUTCH EXPERIENCE

1. PVC DWV systems with 1.8 mm. wall thickness proved incapable of handling domestic effluent from modern appliances.

2. Based upon inconclusive tests, the Dutch propose to raise the wall thickness to 3.2 mm. (125) while at the same time limiting PVC DWV to drainage systems where effluent temperatures do not exceed 70 C (158 F). This virtually rules out the product for use in modern buildings or even minimal living quarters which eventually receive up-to-date appliances,

3. Through underdesigning the wall thickness and service capabilities of the PVC DWV, the Dutch market is turning away from PVC for drainage service.

VI. FRANCE

In France we visited Plastimer, a leading producer of both ABS and PVC resin. The Plastimer operation is a consolidation resulting from a series of corporate mergers. We attempted an interview at the CSTB (translated Scientific and Technical Center for Building), but no one was available who spoke English and the key personnel concerned with pipe standards and testing were away for the month of August on vacation. A shutdown during the French August vacation and time limitation prevented a visit to Pont aux Mousson, the large cast iron pipe manufacturer which is the leading PVC pipe producer in France, and which also controls Glamorgan Pipe and Foundry in Virginia.

At Plastimer we visited both the PVC and ABS product sections. In France PVC has dominated plastic pipe. It is generally known, however, that the usual failures of PVO thin wall drainage systems have occurred coincident with the introduction of modern appliances. CSTB is conducting a study pointing toward heavier wall PVC DWV pipe.

In France as in other European countries, difficulties with thin wall PVC have paved the way for ABS DWV. To our surprise we learned that there are already three manufacturers of ABS pipe fittings in France, with the ABS pipe apparently being imported.

VIII. NORWAY AND AUSTRIA Time and distance prevented a visit to these countries. We learned, however, that there is a substantial ABS pipe manufacturer in Austria and two in Norway. In both countries ABS is gaining increasing acceptance at the expense of PVC both because of its superior low temperature impact resistance as well as higher heat resistance.

We had the opportunity of examining the Norwegian pipe standards for drainage pipe. Here PVC is confined to 110 mm. (4") diam