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How to Inspect Mobile Homes or Manufactured Housing for Defects: detailed procedures, defect lists, references to standards. Ver.3.4 - 04/25/07 - Steve Vermilye, New Paltz NY and Daniel Friedman, Poughkeepsie NY, Hudson Valley ASHI Chapter Seminar, Newburgh NY, January 4, 2000, NY Metro ASHI Fall 99 Seminar, Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza, White Plains NY, October 2, 1999. Our page top photo shows our associated Steve Vermilye inspecting an on-ground, tipping, heating oil tank at a mobile home occupied by farm workers in Ulster County, N.Y.

Use the links at page left to navigate this document or to go to Other Resources. The Green links show where you are in our document & website. © Copyright 2009 Daniel Friedman, New York State License # 16000005303 All Rights Reserved. Information Accuracy & Bias Pledge is at below-left.

MOBILE HOME PLUMBING Defects

SUPPLY PIPING - Mobile Home Supply Piping Defects and Plastic or polybutylene water supply piping failures, leaks, and litigation

Freeze Protection Suggestions for Mobile Homes, Double-Wides and Trailers:

• Note on use of heat tapes on plumbing or oil piping: The US CPSC recommends that heat tapes be connected to a GFCI-protected electrical receptacle (or on newer wired-installations AFCI circuits) for fire safety but HUD rules do not allow connection of the heat tape to GFCI because they don't want to risk frost damage: so note conflict between frost damage and life-safety concerns. Heat tapes used on exposed plumbing at extra risk of freezing, e.g. below the units.
• If mobile home supply piping has frozen, burst, and leaked into the structure, you'll need to remove and discard any wet insulation - or else face a mold problem.
• Simply adding insulation, in any amount is by itself unlikely to be sufficient to protect a mobile home from freezing if it's left unattended with heat off. Rather people design the plumbing to be drained when the home is left.
• If the trailer or mobile the home is occupied then you'll need to look carefully at supply pipe routing and maybe even add heat in some areas. We dislike heat tapes - as they can be unreliable and possible fire hazards, but they can work in some cases.
  
  High-quality plumbing pipe heating tapes that can be crossed over one another without melting and shorting out (fire hazard) are available. Of course if the home loses electrical power this solution won't help much. To reduce the mobile home fire risk when using heat tapes, use metal-braid shielded heating cables connected to a GFCI protected electrical outlet so that if the heating tapes short out the circuit will trip.

• Trailer & mobile home water entry lines are often exposed to freezing below the unit - (photos above left and right).
• If the mobile home water supply is provided by a pump and the pump is found to have cracked (and the home is located in a climate where freezing weather occurs, pump cracking probably means it froze and was not drained or protected from freezing.
• If mobile home drains are freezing the same frost protection or heating concerns need to be addressed as we've just listed.
• Open drains or leaky connections (crawl)
• Leaky supply main (crawl)

DRAIN WASTE VENT - Mobile Home & Trailer Drain Waste Vent Piping Defects

• leaky traps rot walls and floors faster than conventional construction especially where OSB or chipboard was used for subfloor material in the mobile home or trailer
• Drains added (added laundry or bath) not under unit or ? (photo at above left shows a laundry drain spilling onto the yard surface by the mobile home)

MOBILE HOME & TRAILER or DOUBLE-Wide Heating FUEL SUPPLY Defects & Concerns, gas and oil piping

WATER HEATER Defects in Mobile Homes, Trailers, Double-Wides

• Heat Tapes - use metal-braid shielded type connected to GFCI so if short will trip;
• gas-fired in sleeping areas
• electric (usually); bad wiring connections, tipped on rotting floors,
• relief valves: to hidden location (below trailer, can't see leaks), and usual issues of down-sized pipes
• Improper exhaust venting, risk dangerous carbon monoxide leaks into the interior - see Carbon Monoxide - CO

MOBILE HOME PLUMBING Fixture Defects

• Tubs: usual leaks at fittings; missing components,
• history of leaks and no maintenance;
• Fixtures or fixture drains damaged from freezing underneath the home in cold climates

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DEFINITIONS of Mobile Home, Doublewide, Modular, Panelized Construction
MOBILE HOMES, DOUBLEWIDES, TRAILERS
INTRODUCTION to MOBILE HOMES
PRIORITIES OF MOBILE HOME INSPECTION
MOBILE HOME LABELS
MOBILE HOME ROOF DEFECTS
MOBILE HOME EXTERIOR DEFECTS
MOBILE HOME TRUCTURAL DEFECTS
MOBILE HOME ELECTRICAL DEFECTS
MOBILE HOME HEATING
MOBILE HOME COOLING
MOBILE HOME INSULATION
MOBILE HOME PLUMBING
  GENERAL PLUMBING
  MOBILE HOME SUPPLY PIPING
  DRAIN WASTE VENT
  MOBILE HOME FUEL SUPPLY
  MOBILE HOME WATER HEATER DEFECTS
  FIXTURE DEFECTS
MOBILE INTERIOR DEFECTS

• Mobile Home Inspections - Daniel Friedman & Steven T. Vermilye
• Trailer vs Mobile Home vs Modular vs Panelized Construction an explanation of terms and how to identify these structures.
• "Modular Home Construction, special defects and inspection methods" Dan Friedman, NY Metro ASHI Seminar, Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza, White Plains NY, October 4, 1996
• "Modular Home Construction, special defects and inspection methods" Dan Friedman, NY Metro ASHI Seminar, Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza, White Plains NY, October 4, 1996
• MOBILE HOME INSPECTIONS
• Trailer vs Mobile Home vs Modular vs Panelized Construction an explanation of terms and how to identify these structures.
• Trailer vs Mobile Home vs Modular vs Panelized Construction an explanation of terms and how to identify these structures.
• "Modular Home Construction, special defects and inspection methods" Dan Friedman, NY Metro ASHI Seminar, Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza, White Plains NY, October 4, 1996
• New York State: "Manufactured Homes: an installation guide for the code enforcement official," undated. [Div. of Code Enforcement & Admin. - 518-474-4073, George E. Clark, Jr., Director] - this is a guide tool, not an enforcement code or standard.
• HUD State Administrative Agency (for 36 states) (NY: 518-474-4073) - for complaints
• Manufactured Housing Institute, 2101 Wilson Blvd. Ste. 610, Arlington VA 22201 703-558-0400 www.mfghome.org
• NYMHA, 35 Commerce Ave., Albany NY 12206-2015 518-435-9859 800-721-HOME (they want the Star Program to provide for separate assessment of manufactured homes)
• Consumer Reports: www.consumerreports.org - special report 2/98
• Mobile Home Inspection Checklist, Florida, Town of Lady Lake Building Department
• ABS Plastic Drain/Waste/Vent (DWV) pipe failures: reported for Centaur, Phoenix, Polaris, Gable, and Spartan pipe mfgs. for pipe made betweeen 1985 and 1988. CPSC Hot Line: 800-638-8270 or ABS Drain Leaks/Failures-Class Action Settlement COX settlement through Shell Oil set up by a contractor involved in the settlementPolubutylene Plumbing Failures: Spencer Class settlement. 10% of replacement cost/damages, only for acetal (plastic)fittingsPolybutylene plumbing info at U. ArizonaPolybutylene piping lawsuit settlement websitePolybutylene plumbing lawsuit proposed settlement-old site
• Polybutylene Plumbing Failures, Lots of Info about, but slow-loading busy site

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