Bronze or Brass for Fresh Water side

[ericoh88]

I am going to add a swing gate check valve to the freshwater hose.

The hardware stores here have brass check valve and do not carry bronze.

The question is can one use brass on fresh water system ?

Appreciate your suggestion here. Thanks.

[ssanzone]

yes you can use brass but, i think we all generally agree that bronze is the ideal choice.

you should be matching metals thou... meaning you should not be threading bronze into brass or stainless into aluminum etc.

all residential plumbing is copper and brass.

-steve

[ericoh88]

Steve,

thanks for the tip.

[Cheechako]

Brass is fine for your fresh water.

[sailorchic34]

Ditto. Brass is fine for fresh water.

[rw58ph]

For domesric fresh water I use regular plumbing fits bought at the local hardward store. However make sure the thread is the same type. Do not fix the two types of thread. Marine is mostly pipe.

The answer is the galvanic rating of each metal. All boaters should have a galvanic table to refer to. The best is to use metals with about the same galvanic rating, Copper, Bronze. brass have about the same rating, even some stainless steel. On a rating of 1 to 100, magnesium is 1, zinc is 4, aluminum is 10 to 20, mild steel is 30 to 40, SS is 50 to 80, Copper, Brass, Bronze is 45 to 60. Silver is 90, gold is 95, graphite is 97. The bigger the difference of the galvanic rating, the more the metal with the metal with the smaller galvanic rating will be scarified/use. That is why Magnesium/Zinc is use to protect most metals. So when you are dealing with metals refer to the galvanic rating.