12,34,1-inch Pex Expansion Tool ProPEX Expander Kit meets ASTM F1960 for PEX-A Pipe suits Uponor Propex Wirsbo

This was a great value for plumbing a kitchen and bath. Not sure when I'll use it again, but saved me money overall by doing it myself. Plus I could work on my own schedule vs renting something, and I can probably re-sell it for 60% of cost now if I want. As for functionality, as people said, 1/2 inch pipe is fairly easy to expand. 3/4 takes some muscle. Hint: don't over-work the expansion. Use the minimum number of pumps it takes to slide on fitting. Otherwise the pipe can possibly not shrink back down fully and make a good seal. Also, colder temperature can make compound this problem.

If you have weak arms or a lot of clamps to compress, consider an electric drill attachment or single-purpose electric model. Otherwise, for occasional use on a dozen or fewer rings, this works really well. Just be sure to completely expand the tube and compression ring, and don't wait too long after removing the tool to complete the fitting. Otherwise, you will be wasting a lot of fittings.

First off, for the price, this evens the playing field of accessibility to pex-a with the likes of crimped pex-b, which is what I found under my house in the crawlspace when we bought it. I installed a 2 stage whole house water filter into our plumbing using this tool. I am a relatively fit and strong 30 year old man for reference, and I had no issue expanding 1/2" or 3/4" tubing so long as I gripped the ends of the handles when I applied pressure. This worked beautifully for preassembling the filters where I could sit and use them with good form. However, when it came time to get into my crawlspace and make final connections, I had to pre-expand the pipe and rush under the house in order to comfortably make this tool work easily. When I later went to adjust other connections and expand a pipe in the crawlspace, I quickly discovered the Achilles heel of this tool: trying to perform the strained repetitive movements while twisted up in a 18" crawlspace with barely enough clearance to extend the handles so as to insert the cone into the pipe, can be terribly frustrating and at times impossible. I was able to button up my system after much swearing and sweating, but I just ordered a used m12 off eBay to finish the job. In a vacuum, this tool gets the job done, but if you need to make expansion connections in cramped quarters, I wouldn't really say this is a viable option. Plenty of homeowners could totally hire a plumber to install accessible stubs for them to diy stuff like home filters with this tool, though, so I honestly think it's a great tool if you can work it into your situation. Just be aware it has serious drawbacks if you are limited in strength or operating space.

I wanted to add ball valve shutoffs on either side of my whole house filter (down in my crawl space). My trunk line is 3/4" Pex A. Since I only had a few fittings, I didn't want to spend hundreds of dollars on a battery powered expander. This is a nice kit. So far, I only made 4 joints. It requires a lot of pressure to squeeze the handles from full open to full closed. I found it easier to only spread the handles about half way. It takes twice as many pumps of the handles, but it was much easier. Make sure that you rotate the head to prevent damaging the inside of the pipe. Highly recommend.

Works great

This tool works great, I would recommend researching pex before using it, so you know you get the right pex type for this tool. This tool make pex work easy without buying a $400 power tool. Great for dyi and small projects. Would and have recommend this to my friends.

First of all, this tool works perfectly fine. There is nothing wrong with it, and the price is right. The problem is that I still recommend you not buy it unless: 1) You are hercules. 2) You are only going to use 1/2" pex. 3) You only have a few fittings to do. 4) You have a willing helper and cheater bars. It is extremely hard to expand 3/4" pex with this, and I cannot imaging trying to do so with 1" pex. Also, although you can use the cheap Menards PowerPex tubing with expansion fittings, it is technically Pex B and only rated for expansion use when used with an electric expander, probably because it is extremely hard to get a consistent expansion with this tool. Longer handles would be helpful (or the use of cheater bars) when using bigger pex pipe. 1/2" fittings are doable, but still hard work, and left my elbows aching. For 3/4" Pex I had to find a hard surface (floor or wall) to lean one handle against while I pushed the other, and that makes it hard to keep your expansion head at the proper 90 degree angle. I personally did a bunch of work with this, ended up with hurting elbows and lots of frustration. When I discovered that all the Menards Pex I had just installed wasn't technically approved for all the work I had just done, I was extremely frustrated. I finally just ordered a DeWalt expander and...wow! Pex was fun again. I want all my friends to pex their house so I can come do fittings. Rent a powered expansion tool if you can, or buy one and then re-sell it when you're finished if you're doing a bigger job.

i bought to use on 1/2, 3/4, and 1” pex a, im not a weak man and it took a great deal of effort to use with 1”. so much so that more than a couple of joints in a crawlspace would not be do-able. it does get the job done but not good for 1”

Good product, delivered on time.

EXACTLY WHAT I NEED

Perfect inexpensive tool