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There is several feet of cast iron. I got a bad feeling when he started by quoting me a price to replace all my plumbing for $18k+. edit: Done as best as I could do it and it doesn't leak. Worth the $7 and half hour it cost me. I discovered my shower drain is leaking around the tub drain though so there's another project. It's all threaded iron pipe with an old canister trap so hopefully there is an easy way to tie ABS into it and back into cast iron. wormil fucked around with this message at 00:30 on Apr 10, 2012 |
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Apr 9, 2012 22:07
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Cross-posting from Fix It Fast... I have a single-handle shower that doesn't get heat worth a drat - I suspect the control valve cartridge in there is set to limit the temperature to an abnormally low level, so I'm going to try and open up the shower handle assembly to adjust the cartridge. (The HWT is new, and the other showers in the house get excellent heat; it's just this one shower that doesn't get hot enough). However, I can't find a shutoff valve to the shower; there's no removable plate on either side of the wall behind the shower like in my previous apartment. I've been through the crawlspace underneath it and I've traced the lines all the way back to the hot water tank with nary a valve in sight until I get to the tank. So, if I'm shutting off the water, should I shut it off after the tank, or at the point where it enters my house? If I take off the shower handle & escutcheon, will I likely find a couple of local shutoff valves? And am I completely out to lunch as to how to fix my shower heat issue?
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Apr 10, 2012 00:28
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Hi folks Hopefully someone has an idea of what to do in this situation  This is a bathroom I'm remodeling. The previous owners were clowns who must have hacked apart the cast iron toilet flange and then stuck a piece of 3" plastic dangling down 4" cast iron :no: So, what's my best option here to make this right? Is it feasible to cut off the cast iron pipe before the hub then use a coupler and continue with ABS? Not much room in there (in between the butchered joist)
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Apr 10, 2012 03:21
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wormil posted:
Wait is this a shower or tub drain. And yes its easy to replace it sounds like. And holy gently caress those prices were insane. What was that guy smoking who quoted you . Also to replumb your entire house he wanted 18k. What the gently caress was he quoting. I understand parts would run around 3-4k roughly. But I imagine for 7k in labor (and thats estimating high) it could be done. Albino Squirrel posted:Cross-posting from Fix It Fast... shut off the main water inlet to the house and the hot water heater inlet. Open up a couple faucets and drain down the house. If you have multiple floor house and this is on the of the lower levels. Open up the top story and drain the entire house down. I'd recommend turning off your water heater. If its electric turn off breaker, if its gas turn it to pilot just incase it siphons itself. If its a delta cartridge I know they have a little plastic thing on them that limits the hot water. Its not hard to adjust and you dont have to turn off the water to the house. dwoloz posted:Hi folks Its touch to say . I can't really see if you have room to cut that hub off and adapt to ABS. And cast iron is a bitch to cut through. Can you access it from below and it off the hub to put a no hub band?
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Apr 10, 2012 04:41
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Rd Rash 1000cc posted:Wait is this a shower or tub drain. And yes its easy to replace it sounds like. And holy gently caress those prices were insane. What was that guy smoking who quoted you . Also to replumb your entire house he wanted 18k. What the gently caress was he quoting. I understand parts would run around 3-4k roughly. But I imagine for 7k in labor (and thats estimating high) it could be done. Sorry, tub drain. After thinking about it I realized I can probably just run new ABS into the newer ABS house main instead of the old cast iron. I'll just remove the threaded iron and cap the cast iron somehow. Pics: Pipe from tub drain which goes into cylinder trap (that's what the plumber called it). I tried to snake this after removing the clean out plug but couldn't get the snake past the 90 at the top. I'd guess that the pipe is clogged with the usual stuff plus rust. This is the same type iron pipe that rusted shut and through that caused all the problems in my kitchen last year. When I replumb in ABS, should I use some sort of bottle trap?  Where the drain connects into the old cast iron. 
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Apr 10, 2012 17:37
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wormil posted:Sorry, tub drain. After thinking about it I realized I can probably just run new ABS into the newer ABS house main instead of the old cast iron. I'll just remove the threaded iron and cap the cast iron somehow. Pics: Use a normal P-trap, I don't know exactly why they use to use bottle traps. I will have to research that. But a normal p trap will work just fine. I can only assume they had no way to bend pipe back in the day to make a p trap. P trap's are used more so since you can snake through them. Are you going to do a waste and over flow on the tub?
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Apr 11, 2012 04:51
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Rd Rash 1000cc posted:Use a normal P-trap, I don't know exactly why they use to use bottle traps. I will have to research that. But a normal p trap will work just fine. I can only assume they had no way to bend pipe back in the day to make a p trap. P trap's are used more so since you can snake through them. Thanks and yes.
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Apr 11, 2012 08:30
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Albino Squirrel posted:Cross-posting from Fix It Fast... Does the handle pull out to turn on and then left/right for hot and cold? Or does it just start to turn counter-clockwise and get hotter the further you go? A typical rotational limit stop will have something like a 7 degree variance for each notch you go either hot (counter clockwise) or cold (clockwise) that you go go. You might have integral stops, which are tiny gate valves underneath your decorative plate, but you might not. If you just shut the water off at your water heater, the hot water will be off but the cold will still be on. Therefore you should shut it off where it comes into your building. However you can check to see if you have integral stops underneath your handle/cover plate without risking blowing water all over hell and back. I'd suggest removing the handle of your shower and posting a picture of the cartridge underneath so that we can help identify exactly what it is. Shouldn't be too hard to fix, though. Good luck!
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Apr 11, 2012 20:10
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What's the genreal opinion on metal (brass or copper) to CPVC connections? I had a sillcock with a female threaded copper to pvc adapter where the adapter failed (finished basement). So I've pulled that out and am going to replace the sillcock with a frostfree one and simplify the shutoff valve before fixing the drywall, since it was awkward before. However, I still have to get between copper (or brass if I go direct to the sillcock) and cpvc. I don't want to use another one of those adapters, which leaves me with either male cpvc into female copper threads or a sharkbite. Maybe there's another option, but those two seem like the best. Anyone have a vote one way or the other? Cost isn't a consideration, just long term efficacy since it will be buried behind drywall.
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Apr 12, 2012 21:58
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jackyl posted:What's the genreal opinion on metal (brass or copper) to CPVC connections? I had a sillcock with a female threaded copper to pvc adapter where the adapter failed (finished basement). So I've pulled that out and am going to replace the sillcock with a frostfree one and simplify the shutoff valve before fixing the drywall, since it was awkward before. Rip out as much of that cpvc as you can. I bet it was a plastic thread male adapter. Personally you don't have many options. Either sharkbite or cpvc. I'd go with a shark bite over cpvc in my opinion. Make sure you sand the pipe and put faucet lube on the pipe and O ring of the SB. Also make sure to put the SB stiffener in the pipe. You will most likely have to remove it from the SB fitting when you buy it.
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Apr 13, 2012 03:03
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Rd Rash 1000cc posted:Rip out as much of that cpvc as you can. I bet it was a plastic thread male adapter. Personally you don't have many options. Either sharkbite or cpvc. It was a transition that had a copper female thread with a washer over a cpvc piece with a lip. The washer apparently dry rotted while I had the water off for and the valve open for the winter. I could probably have just replaced the washer, but I said gently caress it, I have the drywall open, let's make sure this never happens again. Thanks for the advice. I was leaning toward sharkbite, but just wanted another opinion before I pulled the trigger. I will get faucet lube - is this what you meant? And as far as the stiffener goes, I'll figure that out when I get the SB. I've put them on a couple of friends' houses for water powered backup sump pumps before, but never taken anything out of them. I will definitely look for that. Thanks again!
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Apr 13, 2012 13:02
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jackyl posted:It was a transition that had a copper female thread with a washer over a cpvc piece with a lip. The washer apparently dry rotted while I had the water off for and the valve open for the winter. I could probably have just replaced the washer, but I said gently caress it, I have the drywall open, let's make sure this never happens again. That kind of grease is what he meant, and hey double bonus it's edible too if anything terrible ever happens! Not to derail but they actually make CPVC male adapters where the threads are metal and not plastic for this exact purpose. If they are readily available that would be an option too just for the fact that they don't rely on any kind of rubber washer, and a SB fitting does have a small o-ring in it that will eventually wear out. It could be a really long time before that happens, though. Good luck.
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Apr 13, 2012 16:31
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Ya that is one type of grease you can use. As long as its potable you should be fine.
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Apr 14, 2012 00:45
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Thank you both! It is done and I am just giving it a couple hours before pressurizing the sillcock. I ended up with a Sharkbite 90 that had a female adapter on one side and the SB fitting on the other. It seemed to work perfectly, so I appreciate the advise!
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Apr 15, 2012 19:05
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jackyl posted:Thank you both! It is done and I am just giving it a couple hours before pressurizing the sillcock. I ended up with a Sharkbite 90 that had a female adapter on one side and the SB fitting on the other. It seemed to work perfectly, so I appreciate the advise! You don't need to wait for hours to test it if you didnt use any cpvc.
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Apr 15, 2012 21:57
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Rd Rash 1000cc posted:You don't need to wait for hours to test it if you didnt use any cpvc. Yeah, I seriously considered Pex for the section I put in, but there's a lot more cpvc beyond the small section of drywall I have ripped out, so I did use it. It worked fine though once pressurized. I know at some point I'm going to end up ripping all the cpvc out and putting in pex, but am holding off on that til I'm forced to. I suppose I could release the SB and put in another just so one part of the house has its cpvc gone. Our house is around 11 years old, and I wasn't sure on how long cpvc is good, but I figured at least 20 years, right?
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Apr 15, 2012 23:06
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jackyl posted:Yeah, I seriously considered Pex for the section I put in, but there's a lot more cpvc beyond the small section of drywall I have ripped out, so I did use it. You should have used pex IMO. I've seen cpvc fail from apartments build in '97 or so. I would rip it out as much as possible. Use Pex-A if you can though. It's the Uponor Pex.
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Apr 16, 2012 02:22
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Rd Rash 1000cc posted:You should have used pex IMO. I've seen cpvc fail from apartments build in '97 or so. I would rip it out as much as possible. Use Pex-A if you can though. It's the Uponor Pex. I can still do that before putting the drywall back. It would require taking a bit more drywall out to get the shutoff valve (cpvc) replaced and go the distance to the main though. Maybe it would be worth it.
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Apr 16, 2012 12:41
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jackyl posted:I can still do that before putting the drywall back. It would require taking a bit more drywall out to get the shutoff valve (cpvc) replaced and go the distance to the main though. Maybe it would be worth it. I guess for now let it be. It's really up to you though.
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Apr 16, 2012 14:39
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Oh wow, I didn't even know we had a plumbing thread! Perfect place to find an answer to a question I have from Ask/Tell... So I have this pipe in my basement that seems to be a vent line hooked up to the floor.  In talking to my dad, it seems to be set up for an eventual sink that sits next to an eventual toilet (the bigger pipe). When I removed the small side pipe and put my finger in it, I can feel cold air descending downward, so signs point to it definitely being a vent line. The problem is that the basement is unfinished, and this pipe is really in the way. Since there is no toilet and no sink here, is the pipe's function as a vent line currently extraneous? Since we're not finishing it any time soon, I'd like to simply cut the pipe and cap it at the floor, and then cap it up on the ceiling until such a time when a bathroom is installed, but I'm wanting to make sure that it's completely benign in its current state before doing anything.
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Apr 16, 2012 21:43
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Hazed_blue posted:Oh wow, I didn't even know we had a plumbing thread! Perfect place to find an answer to a question I have from Ask/Tell... It shouldnt be hooked up to anything else so you can cap it. But don't cap it to low or you wont be able to hook back up too it. 1.5 inches off the floor is the minimum needed for a coupling.
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Apr 17, 2012 02:17
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I just found your post in ask/tell and it looks like you traced it up at least one floor. If so, that's good news for you if it doesn't tie in to any other drains, so there's no way any waste can come down it. The bad news is even if you did trace it up, it will be exposed to rain / snow where it comes out of your roof, so you'd have to seal it there too... And I don't know if that's against code or not, but I can easily see where it would be since someone might come along later and try to use that stack. Now, there's also a question about where the drain goes under the floor and if it is being used for any other drainage (probably not, since you only get a few feet between drain and vent) because if so, again you can't take it off. Are you ever going to finish your basement? I'd recommend leaving it there regardless of whether its in the way or not, because a bathroom basement both adds value and it very useful. Edit: just saw a real plumber's response.. Is it okay to cap off the bottom of the stack even though it is (presumably) coming out of the roof? Won't that just fill with water eventually?
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Apr 17, 2012 02:18
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jackyl posted:I just found your post in ask/tell and it looks like you traced it up at least one floor. If so, that's good news for you if it doesn't tie in to any other drains, so there's no way any waste can come down it. The bad news is even if you did trace it up, it will be exposed to rain / snow where it comes out of your roof, so you'd have to seal it there too... And I don't know if that's against code or not, but I can easily see where it would be since someone might come along later and try to use that stack. You can always A: Cap/cover the top part on the roof to be able to cap it inside or B: Just cut and glue cap both top and bottom pipes while leaving enough pipe exposed on both sides to put in a new piece of ABS when you're ready but yes, if you don't cover the top it can very well accumulate water if it's capped off. Also that's not too much trouble as all I can see there is a reducing sanitary tee fitting with a pipe sticking out the side and a vent/cleanout tee with a threaded plug in it below that. If it were me I'd leave it in but cut that horizontal pipe back to 1 and a half inches sticking out of the SAN tee (top tee) and just stick a cap on the end of it. It won't be that hard or expensive to splice in new ABS, but gently caress man that's a cool conversation starter. el samuel fucked around with this message at 05:09 on Apr 17, 2012 |
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Apr 17, 2012 05:06
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The drain shouldnt be used by anything else unless the plumber who installed it was a moron. But I agree with others and say leave it. Even frame the bathroom in, it will cut down on space but it will make sure no one kicks it and snaps it. For code you need 15" on each side of the toilet from center of drain. Lav's usually need a 30 inch space but you can play with this since you have the trap arm exposed .
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Apr 17, 2012 05:18
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Right, I don't want to do anything that would permanently ruin the setup; we're renting the place, but our landlord wants to do some other external improvements before moving on to the basement. We're currently using the space as a photography studio/rec room, and the reason I wanted to temporarily cap the pipe was so that the kids don't bang into it. When we move out or proceed with finishing the basement, I could pop the pipe back in. I honestly don't know if the pipe has a fitting/cap on the top, but it will be raining for several days this week, so I guess I could find out just how much water may or may not make its way in. edit: it would make a good conversation starter though, good point 
Hazed_blue fucked around with this message at 05:48 on Apr 17, 2012 |
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Apr 17, 2012 05:40
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Hazed_blue posted:Right, I don't want to do anything that would permanently ruin the setup; we're renting the place, but our landlord wants to do some other external improvements before moving on to the basement. We're currently using the space as a photography studio/rec room, and the reason I wanted to temporarily cap the pipe was so that the kids don't bang into it. When we move out or proceed with finishing the basement, I could pop the pipe back in. well its up to you but personally I wouldnt do it.
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Apr 18, 2012 01:58
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Is there a trick to getting pex to relax from its coiled shape? I'm working with 3/4 and find it rather difficult; constantly having to fight it in to place since it wants to go back to its coiled shape
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Apr 25, 2012 04:48
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dwoloz posted:Is there a trick to getting pex to relax from its coiled shape? Unspool it outside, let it chill in the heat while its stretched out. It helps a lot on higher grade pex (pex-a)
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Apr 25, 2012 06:42
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Rd Rash 1000cc posted:let it chill in the heat "Chill in the heat"? I think Rd Rash means "let it sit out in the sunshine"...
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Apr 25, 2012 20:19
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kid sinister posted:"Chill in the heat"? I think Rd Rash means "let it sit out in the sunshine"... Ya sorry I was typing and trying to talk on the phone. Yes I meant let it sit outside in the warm weather. Pull it as straight as you can.
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Apr 26, 2012 02:47
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dwoloz posted:Is there a trick to getting pex to relax from its coiled shape? You could also try a heatgun if you're working with shorter pieces. Once it's nice and warm you can bend it the opposite direction. It does to re-coil as it cools so you might have to do it a few times. Or just buy the 10' straight pieces.
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Apr 26, 2012 18:29
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Pex A wont recoil when it cools. Its uponor pex.
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Apr 27, 2012 00:34
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So I had a bit of fun with a trencher. Putting in a bamboo barrier, I stupidly cut the pvc pipe from the house leading to the sprinkler control box.  The pvc is 1" SCH20 out of the T-joint. I have a coupler and a length of SCH40 to connect it to the T. Problem is there is still some of the old pvc in cemented inside and I could use some advice on how to proceed. Do I cut out the t-joint and replace it? If so, how do I make up the length on the other two connections?
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Apr 29, 2012 03:43
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Cut out the T, use couplers on the other 2 branches. Use some new 1" to make up for any lost length on the other branches.
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Apr 29, 2012 04:08
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That's correct, there isn't any salvaging that tee man. Regular Schedule 40 fittings will accommodate either sch 20 or 40 pipe. Make sure to dry-fit everything before you re-glue to be absolutely positive of your cuts/lengths. Good luck.
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Apr 29, 2012 04:36
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You could use a ram bit and save the tee but the bit itself (if you can find one in town for that size would be way more money then just couplings and a new tee. I just noticed also this thread has been stickied in DIY. Thanks to the mod who did it.
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Apr 29, 2012 09:01
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dwoloz posted:Hi folks They do make a rubber transition that would permit installing 4" PVC into that bell. I've had one installed in my house since 1998. Big box hardware sells them, as well as plumbing supply shops. You would have to clean out the inside of the bell first. If you can't, then using a cast cutter & snapping off the bell would be your best option. PainterofCrap fucked around with this message at 16:59 on May 1, 2012 |
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May 1, 2012 16:56
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The pressure relief drain on my water heater is dripping outside my house. When I first noticed it there were several drips per second. I went in to look at the unit and could hear what sounded like some pressure being released. I pressed down on the valve on top of the unit and the sound decreased and the drips mostly stopped but after a few hours it was dripping about once per second again. The tank and house are about 6 years old. The outside water spigots have backflow prevention but I don't know about the water heater. I never knew what an expansion tank was until I started researching this, but I don't recall seeing one around the water heater. Does this sound like a failing pressure relief valve or too much pressure in the tank?
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May 1, 2012 19:38
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Cpt.Wacky posted:The pressure relief drain on my water heater is dripping outside my house. When I first noticed it there were several drips per second. I went in to look at the unit and could hear what sounded like some pressure being released. I pressed down on the valve on top of the unit and the sound decreased and the drips mostly stopped but after a few hours it was dripping about once per second again. I would take a guess at saying it's not seating properly. Have you tried opening it to where it would flush some water through the line and then closing it?
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May 1, 2012 23:04
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It's burgin' time! 
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I heart bacon posted:I would take a guess at saying it's not seating properly. Have you tried opening it to where it would flush some water through the line and then closing it? That's not the problem. I am willing to bet you should replace the T/p and then add an expansion tank . If you just do the t/p it will do it again.
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May 2, 2012 02:04
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