Safe for potable water pex is the red and blue flexible tubing that s used to make gentle bends around obstructions in your attic and is perfect for adding water supply to hard to reach locations.
Pex in attic.
Up in the attic at the very furthest point you can from connect the cold water to the pex leading from the hot water heater so you can loop it back to the hot water heater.
Connect to the to the hot water supply for hot water heater.
Such as at night if the attic temp is 15 deg f.
Insulation only slows the time when it will freeze after the water is not running through the pipe.
Put a bypass before the water heater and run it into the attic.
Yes rodents will chew absoultely eveything they step on.
The surface of pex piping can become grimy over time so before insulating you should take just a few minutes to clean it off.
Sometimes they have been insulated makes very little difference to the temp on a july or august afternoon.
Foam is used most commonly and generally works well.
A wet rag should easily wipe away any visible dirt or debris.
Yes the cold water is hot in the summer very hot in fact due to the heat of the attic.
Pex is available in a variety of lengths from short 10 foot pieces for small repairs to rolls over 500 feet long which are used to install a home s entire water supply system.
Working with pex tubing install pex in attic plumbing with pex save on plumbing do it yourself plumbing run pex tubing how to unroll pex tubing.
Pex cpvc poly back in the day even copper in the attics etc.
Pex type is forgiving when it freezes as far as breakage but insulating an exposed water line does little to keep it from freezing.
It is important to insulate pex pipe in an attic particularly in cold weather areas.