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I discovered a slow leak in the house I purchased which was causing all sorts of moisture related issues. (pretty sure the previous owners knew about it cause they had just installed new carpet and just happened to leave a water key, but that's another story...)

After cutting open some access to the shower valve, I quickly discovered the source of the leak was where the male Cpvc adapter fit into what appears to be a female copper adapter that has been sweated to the shower valve.

Upon trying to remove the existing cpvc adapter, it snapped and began deteriorating on me, now I am stuck with a valve that has the threading of the pvc adapter still in the copper adapter with no obvious way to remove it to replace it with another.

(it was difficult to capture a picture of the plastic inside the copper adapter as there is a wall stud the runs parallel to the piping, but it is the right hand side of the valve above with nothing attached to it.)

What is the best course of action to resolve this? Is it possible to find a way to destroy/remove the remaining plastic without messing up the copper threads? Or will it be necessary to remove the entire shower assembly and go from there by replacing the metal adapter or possibly the whole assembly if it is unfeasible to "unsweat" and replace the copper adapter?

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  • Have you considered a shark bite fitting? Just a thought. Jan 29, 2020 at 14:55
  • Where are these copper threads you're referring to? Also, I don't like the way the vertical CPVC+Cu pipes are run on the edge of the stud (appears to against the back the shower wall).
    – SteveSh
    Jan 29, 2020 at 15:20
  • @CalvinNHobbes A sharkbite, while convenient for joining the two CPVC pipes running vertically here would not have resolved the stuck threads inside of the metal fitting.
    – John
    Jan 30, 2020 at 15:44
  • @stevesh the plastic stuck in the metal threads cannot be seen in the picture but they are inside of the fitting that has been sweated to the shower valve. That fitting is facing right towards the vertical CPVC piping
    – John
    Jan 30, 2020 at 15:46

1 Answer 1

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Generically, an extractor of the appropriate size.

"Pipe thread extractor" or "internal pipe wrench" yield results in a search.

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    Pipe thread extractor did the trick
    – John
    Jan 30, 2020 at 15:43

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