diff --git a/src/Umbraco.Web/umbraco.presentation/content.cs b/src/Umbraco.Web/umbraco.presentation/content.cs
index 7b7a24e63d..00d1984d12 100644
--- a/src/Umbraco.Web/umbraco.presentation/content.cs
+++ b/src/Umbraco.Web/umbraco.presentation/content.cs
@@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ namespace umbraco
                 var profingLogger = new ProfilingLogger(
                     logger,
                     ProfilerResolver.HasCurrent ? ProfilerResolver.Current.Profiler : new LogProfiler(logger));
- 
+
                 // prepare the persister task
                 // there's always be one task keeping a ref to the runner
                 // so it's safe to just create it as a local var here
@@ -71,7 +71,7 @@ namespace umbraco
                         // once released, the cache still works but does not write to file anymore,
                         // which is OK with database server messenger but will cause data loss with
                         // another messenger...
-                        
+
                         runner.Shutdown(false, true); // wait until flushed
                         _released = true;
                     });
@@ -145,7 +145,7 @@ namespace umbraco
         }
 
         //NOTE: We CANNOT use this for a double check lock because it is a property, not a field and to do double
-        // check locking in c# you MUST have a volatile field. Even thoug this wraps a volatile field it will still 
+        // check locking in c# you MUST have a volatile field. Even thoug this wraps a volatile field it will still
         // not work as expected for a double check lock because properties are treated differently in the clr.
         public virtual bool isInitializing
         {
@@ -327,11 +327,17 @@ namespace umbraco
             // this updates the published cache to take care of the situation
             // without ContentService having to ... what exactly?
 
-            // no need to do it if the content is published without unpublished changes,
-            // though, because in that case the XML will get re-generated with the
-            // correct sort order.
-            if (c.Published)
-                return;
+            // no need to do it if
+            // - the content is published without unpublished changes (XML will be re-gen anyways)
+            // - the content has no published version (not in XML)
+            // - the sort order has not changed
+            // note that
+            // - if it is a new entity is has not published version
+            // - if Published is dirty and false it's getting unpublished and has no published version
+            //
+            if (c.Published) return;
+            if (c.HasPublishedVersion == false) return;
+            if (c.WasPropertyDirty("SortOrder") == false) return;
 
             using (var safeXml = GetSafeXmlWriter(false))
             {
@@ -419,7 +425,7 @@ namespace umbraco
             {
                 XmlNode x;
 
-                // remove from xml db cache 
+                // remove from xml db cache
                 doc.XmlRemoveFromDB();
 
                 // clear xml cache
@@ -435,7 +441,7 @@ namespace umbraco
                 {
                     var prov = (UmbracoSiteMapProvider)SiteMap.Provider;
                     prov.RemoveNode(doc.Id);
-                }                
+                }
             }
         }
 
@@ -486,7 +492,7 @@ namespace umbraco
             if (UmbracoContext.Current != null && UmbracoContext.Current.HttpContext != null && UmbracoContext.Current.HttpContext.Items.Contains(XmlContextContentItemKey))
                 UmbracoContext.Current.HttpContext.Items.Remove(XmlContextContentItemKey);
         }
-        
+
         /// <summary>
         /// Load content from database
         /// </summary>
@@ -517,7 +523,7 @@ namespace umbraco
         public void PersistXmlToFile()
         {
         }
-        
+
         internal DateTime GetCacheFileUpdateTime()
         {
             //TODO: Should there be a try/catch here in case the file is being written to while this is trying to be executed?
@@ -566,7 +572,7 @@ namespace umbraco
         private static bool UseLegacySchema
         {
             get { return UmbracoConfig.For.UmbracoSettings().Content.UseLegacyXmlSchema; }
-        }        
+        }
 
         #endregion
 
@@ -770,9 +776,9 @@ namespace umbraco
                 _releaser.Dispose();
                 _releaser = null;
             }
-            
+
         }
-                
+
         private static string ChildNodesXPath
         {
             get
@@ -866,9 +872,9 @@ namespace umbraco
             // and in addition, writing async is never fully async because
             // althouth the writer is async, xml.WriteTo() will not async
 
-            // that one almost works but... "The elements are indented as long as the element 
+            // that one almost works but... "The elements are indented as long as the element
             // does not contain mixed content. Once the WriteString or WriteWhitespace method
-            // is called to write out a mixed element content, the XmlWriter stops indenting. 
+            // is called to write out a mixed element content, the XmlWriter stops indenting.
             // The indenting resumes once the mixed content element is closed." - says MSDN
             // about XmlWriterSettings.Indent
 
@@ -1073,7 +1079,7 @@ namespace umbraco
             //TODO: This could be faster, might as well just iterate all children and filter
             // instead of selecting matching children (i.e. iterating all) and then iterating the
             // filtered items to remove, this also allocates more memory to store the list of children.
-            // Below we also then do another filtering of child nodes, if we just iterate all children we 
+            // Below we also then do another filtering of child nodes, if we just iterate all children we
             // can perform both functions more efficiently
             var dataNodes = publishedNode.SelectNodes(DataNodesXPath);
             if (dataNodes == null) throw new Exception("oops");
diff --git a/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/CMSNode.cs b/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/CMSNode.cs
index a500f492d6..3c28005cc9 100644
--- a/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/CMSNode.cs
+++ b/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/CMSNode.cs
@@ -1142,25 +1142,24 @@ order by level,sortOrder";
 
         protected virtual XmlNode GetPreviewXml(XmlDocument xd, Guid version)
         {
+            var xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
 
-            XmlDocument xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
-            using (var sqlHelper = Application.SqlHelper)
-            using (XmlReader xmlRdr = sqlHelper.ExecuteXmlReader(
-                                                       "select xml from cmsPreviewXml where nodeID = @nodeId and versionId = @versionId",
-                                      sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@nodeId", Id),
-                                      sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@versionId", version)))
-            {
-                xmlDoc.Load(xmlRdr);
-            }
+            var xmlStr = ApplicationContext.Current.DatabaseContext.Database.ExecuteScalar<string>(
+                "select xml from cmsPreviewXml where nodeID = @nodeId and versionId = @versionId",
+                new { nodeId = Id, versionId = version });
 
+            if (xmlStr.IsNullOrWhiteSpace()) return null;
+
+            xmlDoc.LoadXml(xmlStr);
+            
             return xd.ImportNode(xmlDoc.FirstChild, true);
         }
 
         protected internal virtual bool PreviewExists(Guid versionId)
         {
-            using (var sqlHelper = Application.SqlHelper)
-                return sqlHelper.ExecuteScalar<int>("SELECT COUNT(nodeId) FROM cmsPreviewXml WHERE nodeId=@nodeId and versionId = @versionId",
-                           sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@nodeId", Id), sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@versionId", versionId)) != 0;
+            return ApplicationContext.Current.DatabaseContext.Database.ExecuteScalar<int>(
+                        "SELECT COUNT(nodeId) FROM cmsPreviewXml WHERE nodeId=@nodeId and versionId = @versionId",
+                        new {nodeId = Id, versionId = versionId}) != 0;
 
         }
 
@@ -1172,15 +1171,12 @@ order by level,sortOrder";
         [MethodImpl(MethodImplOptions.Synchronized)]
         protected void SavePreviewXml(XmlNode x, Guid versionId)
         {
-            var sql = PreviewExists(versionId) ? "UPDATE cmsPreviewXml SET xml = @xml, timestamp = @timestamp WHERE nodeId=@nodeId AND versionId = @versionId"
+            string sql = PreviewExists(versionId) ? "UPDATE cmsPreviewXml SET xml = @xml, timestamp = @timestamp WHERE nodeId=@nodeId AND versionId = @versionId"
                                 : "INSERT INTO cmsPreviewXml(nodeId, versionId, timestamp, xml) VALUES (@nodeId, @versionId, @timestamp, @xml)";
 
-            using (var sqlHelper = Application.SqlHelper)
-                sqlHelper.ExecuteNonQuery(sql,
-                                      sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@nodeId", Id),
-                                      sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@versionId", versionId),
-                                      sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@timestamp", DateTime.Now),
-                                      sqlHelper.CreateParameter("@xml", x.OuterXml));
+            ApplicationContext.Current.DatabaseContext.Database.Execute(
+                sql, new {nodeId = Id, versionId = versionId, timestamp = DateTime.Now, xml = x.OuterXml});
+            
         }
 
         protected void PopulateCMSNodeFromReader(IRecordsReader dr)
diff --git a/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/web/Document.cs b/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/web/Document.cs
index f0ca2230f1..70775f5c71 100644
--- a/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/web/Document.cs
+++ b/src/umbraco.cms/businesslogic/web/Document.cs
@@ -1560,12 +1560,13 @@ namespace umbraco.cms.businesslogic.web
         private XmlNode importXml()
         {
             XmlDocument xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
-            using (var sqlHelper = Application.SqlHelper)
-            {
-                using(var xmlRdr = sqlHelper.ExecuteXmlReader(string.Format(
-                                                            "select xml from cmsContentXml where nodeID = {0}", Id)))
-                    xmlDoc.Load(xmlRdr);
-            }
+
+            var xmlStr = ApplicationContext.Current.DatabaseContext.Database.ExecuteScalar<string>(
+                "select xml from cmsContentXml where nodeID = @nodeId", new {nodeId = Id});
+
+            if (xmlStr.IsNullOrWhiteSpace()) return null;
+
+            xmlDoc.LoadXml(xmlStr);
 
             return xmlDoc.FirstChild;
         }