Date:   2 July 2007

FLOODED OUT AGAIN?

With what seems like vast tracts of the country under water it is ironic that in the first few months of 2007, the products liability team at Buller Jeffries has been inundated (no pun intended) with claims involving the "escape of water" from plumbing fittings-sometimes in substantial blocks of flats which have only recently been completed.

One of the features of this kind of legal work which retains the interest and "buzz " is learning about the mechanics, or sometimes the physics or chemistry behind events of this kind.  Indeed, what one learns as a lawyer in this way can prove to be quite useful at home - for example, learning to repair a leak in a pipe on a Sunday evening by fitting a new compression joint!

I mention compression joints because I have learned from this kind of work that examples are being found, with increasing frequency, where the actual brass of the nut of the compression joint has been attacked by a chemical phenomenon known as stress corrosion cracking ("SCC").  Some examples are very striking-one can see that the brass hexagonal nut has simply cracked and broken apart because of SCC.

Given that we probably all have 30 or 40 compression joints in our houses, and similarly in our offices, the potential problems are not insignificant.  Fortunately, the cases in which I have been involved where failure was attributed to SCC have mostly involved new or recent buildings -  so there seems to be no need to go around the house looking for problems.  In any case, it is doubtful whether anything would be visible  from the outside of the joint.

In dealing with these cases, I have had considerable help from expert witnesses, who have explained that for this phenomenon to arise, there has to be some stress in the joint, i.e. in the metal part of the joint such as the nut, and there has to be some chemical external influence, such as ammonia which may be present in the area around the outside of the nut e.g. in lagging. 

For the lawyers, or indeed all those involved in investigating these cases, the difficulty is to find out whether the stress is due to some abnormal external influence, such as over tightening of the nut, or arises simply from the forces inevitably applied when the nut is tightened over the brass olive – which is supposed to provide a leak proof joint.  Similarly, an extensive investigation may or may not provide any  answer  to the question of what external chemical precipitated the phenomenon and how it came to be present-let alone who should be responsible in law.

In one sense, the attempt to answer these questions goes against the current trend of claims culture, or "someone has to be to blame."  There will clearly be a number of cases where it will be impossible to show that the making of the joint, or the materials used, were at fault, and in consequence, claimants will not be able to establish that there was any breach of contract or negligence on the part of those who created the building, be they main contractors, subcontractors and so on.  In those cases, the loss is likely to fall on those who insure the completed building, at what may prove to be very considerable expense.

Some readers may have come across plastic, push-fit fittings in new build developments or in DIY stores.  I used to be very sceptical about the integrity of  these and claims are appearing already (when the securing instructions have not been followed)  but maybe they are the way forward – at least in eliminating the risk of SCC.

Roger Coates