AskCodeMan

Jerry,
Pretty basic question so this one should be easy.
Will reducing the size of a pipe from the Gas meter, to the house, thereby reduce the overall fuel volume to that house?
Thanks Jerry
Marc

Hi Marc,

Yes, but that short section may not reduce it below what is actually required for the gas appliances ... or it might is all the gas appliances are on full at the same time.

If that was reduced down to even smaller, say 3/8 pipe, it would restrict the flow of gas even more.

I would recommend pointing that out and explain that a gas contractor would need to to a design calculation to determine how much affect that reduction has, or the gas contractor may simply recommend replacing that with the same size pipe as the pipe upstream and downstream of it and say it is not worth the time and cost to do a design calculation (they would need to determine, as best possible, how many feet of what size pipe is installed and what appliances are tapped off where in the system, which may not be as easy as it sounds - replacing that piece of pipe is easy).

Fantastic, thanks Jerry.
Ya know, I would have thought it would have been a bigger pipe being that the house was 3500 sq ft with all gas appliances- 2 furnaces, 100 gal water heater, dryer, etc...
Thanks again.