# Mice and plastic pipes.



## Jacob (19 Sep 2021)

Mice nibble underfloor pipes and cause fine leaks. They obviously stop when they get squirted enough but the fine spray carries on and a wet patch appears eventually. Happened twice now
How to deter them other than by replacing with copper?
Just fixing one now and I'll put some traps down


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## Old.bodger (19 Sep 2021)

Wrap in Ali foil or Ali tape helps and block any likely access holes with stainless steel wire wool. I also leave a good sprinkling of bait blocks under the floors.


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## Jacob (19 Sep 2021)

Old.bodger said:


> Wrap in Ali foil or Ali tape helps and block any likely access holes with stainless steel wire wool. I also leave a good sprinkling of bait blocks under the floors.


Can't block access holes its a suspended floor open full size of the building. I'll try the ali tape. Not poison - did that years ago and had foul rotting stench for weeks!


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## clogs (19 Sep 2021)

all our heating pipe are in solid concrete floors.....mmmmm.....
we just use glue traps now.....
check em daily, swift smack on the head cures the problem....
best ever, got 3 of the blighters on 1 sticky pad in a day, all at once....

oh and we have three cats......hahaha.....


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## Rorschach (19 Sep 2021)

Use a fine mesh covering over any access holes, you can maintain the ventilation while making it mouse proof.


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## RichardG (19 Sep 2021)

Is it speedfit? I'm sure their guidance notes stated that it should be installed in conduit if there's any chance of coming into contact with rodents. Could cover with pipe insulation as a sacrificial mouse snack?


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## deema (19 Sep 2021)

Steel cable ducting over the top. The sort you pop into walls before plastering for example depending on the size of pipes


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## Jacob (19 Sep 2021)

This sort of stuff? 7 10 13 15 18 21 25 28mm Split Loom Wire Flexible Tubing Conduit Hose Cover Car | eBay
Hoping to be able to work it in over the pipe and under the joists without too much extra work.


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## Krome10 (20 Sep 2021)

Interesting timing for this thread as we're about to have some plumbing work done and I'm going to insist copper is used rather than plastic. There's some existing plastic. Not too much though, so thinking to have that replaced at the same time. 

There is a feed of plastic coming off the top of the HW cylinder and down the back of the cylinder. When it reached the floor, it's joined to copper. Do you think plastic pipe in such a position is at risk, or just plastic pipe at floor level? Here's a couple of pics: 











Still deciding what best to do with electricity cables in the loft. They seem to like them more.... 

Cheers


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## HappyHacker (20 Sep 2021)

Squirels love electricity cables. I replaced all the cables in the gap between the ceiling (very high) and the tiles on a large scout hut once, many had all the PVC removed, no dead bodies (squirrels) though. Fortunately they were having the roof replaced so I could get access. Rats are also partial to cables.


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## John Brown (20 Sep 2021)

Some years ago we had a problem at our tennis club with the 12v halogen downlights. Muggins went into the attic to investigate(shows how long ago it was - I probably couldn't squeeze in there now). There was a quite large traditional transformer ( Es and Is) up there, with multiple secondaries for individual rows of lamps, and cyclindrical glass fuses mounted on the top of the assembly, one for each secondary. Squirrels had pulled out most of the fuses - no idea why. I replaced the fuses and taped over them, and as far as I know, it's been fine since.


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## Spectric (20 Sep 2021)

mice will chew all plastic pipes if they get in your house as well as pvc wiring and can be a real pain. Seen a lot of wiring damaged and a few indoor showers caused by mice.


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## Stuart Moffat (20 Sep 2021)

I have 10mm copper solar panel pipes come down from the roof through to a storage tank. It had quite expensive insulation round them. squirrels ate nearly all of it,


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## Old.bodger (20 Sep 2021)

A bit off topic, but, for vermin issues with cable, use ‘flexishield’ but do make sure it is correctly ‘glanded’ and terminated.


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## kmcleod (1 Oct 2021)

we've had the problem, and after fixing the problem wrapped the pipes in a fine copper mesh sleeve, bought from the evil empire, (Amazon), which seems to be suitably detering the little pippers...


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## mikej460 (1 Oct 2021)

When we bought our house it had an annex that we didn't need at the time so used it for storage. One day in the middle of a very cold winter I went out to discover water pouring out of a door. After switching off the water and electric I discovered that water and central heating pipes had been routed through the annex attic and mice had eaten most of the pipe insulation causing a pipe burst. I sealed off the water supply but the bill for the damage came to £1.7k.


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## Jacob (1 Oct 2021)

mikej460 said:


> When we bought our house it had an annex that we didn't need at the time so used it for storage. One day in the middle of a very cold winter I went out to discover water pouring out of a door. After switching off the water and electric I discovered that water and central heating pipes had been routed through the annex attic and mice had eaten most of the pipe insulation causing a pipe burst. I sealed off the water supply but the bill for the damage came to £1.7k.


I suppose you could blame the unprotected insulation rather than the pipe work. Mice can only gnaw a tiny hole in plastic before the water jet would overpower them.
We have got into the habit of turning water off if we go away for more than a day or so - the damage could be astronomical


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## mikej460 (1 Oct 2021)

Jacob said:


> I suppose you could blame the unprotected insulation rather than the pipe work. Mice can only gnaw a tiny hole in plastic before the water jet would overpower them.
> We have got into the habit of turning water off if we go away for more than a day or so - the damage could be astronomical


Absolutely, I had no idea there was pipework in the attic otherwise I'd have isolated it all.


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## doctor Bob (1 Oct 2021)

Squirrels have eaten my lead garden gate post cappings, I think they sharpen their teeth on them. Got the air rifle out but think I only shot his left testicle off as he scarpered pretty quickly but was making funny noises.


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## Sandyn (1 Oct 2021)

After reading all the stuff about mice chewing plastic water pipes, I'm getting paranoid. An old house, it's impossible to seal up every hole where mice could get in. I was horrified today to see a load of mice [email protected] in a corner of my workshop. When I mentioned it to my wife, she started laughing. "Oh....that will be the Niger seeds I spilled"


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## MorrisWoodman12 (2 Oct 2021)

kmcleod said:


> we've had the problem, and after fixing the problem wrapped the pipes in a fine copper mesh sleeve, bought from the evil empire, (Amazon), which seems to be suitably detering the little pippers...


And did you connect the copper mesh to the Moroccan ultra high voltage supply?


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## Krome10 (2 Oct 2021)

mikej460 said:


> When we bought our house it had an annex that we didn't need at the time so used it for storage. One day in the middle of a very cold winter I went out to discover water pouring out of a door. After switching off the water and electric I discovered that water and central heating pipes had been routed through the annex attic and mice had eaten most of the pipe insulation causing a pipe burst. I sealed off the water supply but the bill for the damage came to £1.7k.



Just so I can understand you correctly... They were plastic pipes and the mice got to them/chewed them, and caused the leak? Or they were copped pipes, the mice chewed the insulation, and so the pipes froze and burst causing the leak?


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## mikej460 (2 Oct 2021)

Krome10 said:


> Just so I can understand you correctly... They were plastic pipes and the mice got to them/chewed them, and caused the leak? Or they were copped pipes, the mice chewed the insulation, and so the pipes froze and burst causing the leak?


The latter


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## Adam W. (2 Oct 2021)

We have more traps than mice in our loft. Just before the winter sets in I go on an extermination spree with an abundance of traps loaded with rasins.


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## diytoolbox (20 Feb 2022)

Adam W. said:


> We have more traps than mice in our loft. Just before the winter sets in I go on an extermination spree with an abundance of traps loaded with rasins.



Do the traps work?


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## Sporky McGuffin (20 Feb 2022)

I don't k ow how much mice are like rabbits, but when we had house bunnies the only thing they wouldn't chew through was nylon braiding - TechFlex I think.


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