Starting a Plumbing Project on my Own...

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Terry

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I saw multiple licensed plumbers and licensed electricians working all summer on my neighbors houses.
Guess what?
They all failed inspections for plumbing and electrical!
All 3 of my neighbors, each had a different contractor, so that's 3 plumbers that failed, 3 electricians that failed. 6 licensed pros had to make multiple trips back to remedy things and they were pissed.
Yes it was all minor issues, but still surprised me to see and hear about all the red tags.

That may have had something to do with converting older than the hills plumbing over to the new and current codes.
With that much being redone, they really want to see it brought up to date.

What I don't understand, is why that area hasn't been converted over to wetlands.
Since this will need to be rebuilt, why keep building there?
Where I live in the State of Washington, they don't issue building permits for flood plain property. If it floods, you can't build there.
 

Houptee

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You have a valid argument about the flood plain development, but the issue is my street, until sandy, had only flooded once before in the 1992 Noreaster it was 17" on the street, it never went inside anyone's homes before, except for a few that were built flat on the ground.

This storm it was 43-45" deep on the street, never in the history of our town did we have flooding like this.

The home I own is 100 yrs old, it was my great grandparents house.
We paid for flood insurance for 20+ years approx $1400 a year, and had a 250k max policy.
We got 62k settlement! Estimates from 3 contractors were 85-97k.
Fema's answer to the money gap is "apply for a SBA loan"!

Why do we need a loan when we paid for flood insurance so we would be insured??

FEMA rules are if the cost to repair the house is 50% of the tax assessed value then you also must elevate the house to above the BFE base flood elevation. My town says BFE +3 extra feet. I am in the process now of getting the permits to lift the house 4 ft higher.

It is a huge mess but these areas that got hit are very old and highly developed areas in NY NJ CT with very high property values, so if the govt says everyone get out what happens to all the property owners equity, and mortgages, and 2nd mortgages, etc etc who is going to write that debt off or buy you out? And where do you go to live?
 

moparfreak

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Currently, it looks like the venting for the laundry tray has not been done right. Or maybe I just need a different angle on the photo.

No, it's not the picture angles, you caught it, there's simply no vent on that utility tub. That's just how it was built since day 1 in '63 (just bought it from my Dad, was built by my grandparents when the neigborhood went up). The larger copper run is the current kitchen sink, the smaller copper run is from the now demo'd laundry room utility sink which the washer discharged into.

I guess one of my primary questions to get started is can this drain line be used to support all fixtures to be in the kitchen/bathroom/laundry? It would be sink x2, dishwasher x2, washing machine discharge, bathroom toilet & sink, and garage utility sink. Currently it's only got 3 fixtures (kitchen sink, laundry utility sink, basement utility sink).

These links are all quite helpful, thank you!
 

WJcandee

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As a general rule, my understanding is that if you have a toilet on the line, you need a 3" drain, and you can put up to 3 toilets on that 3" drain. You need to go to 4" where a fourth toilet enters the line. You say you have one toilet. If that larger copper run is 3", you are fine. If it isn't, you aren't. But I don't know your local code, which may vary.

(BTW, if it were I, and I were planning on using this as a learning experience, I might nevertheless see if I could hire someone like Cacher Chick to either do a plumbing plan for me or review a plan I drew up. I don't know if she'd do it, but she IS in the Land of Cheese and is by all accounts awesome. Just a thought, as it might be money well spent...)
 
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hj

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quote; Simple. I would provide guidance based on my own experiences on how to lay out the basics of what the engine needs to do, relate it to its target application and the duty cycle it would see, (road loads, gearing, etc.) and start backing out of that its torque output requirements which leads to displacement calculations, as well as guidance on how to make critical decisions such as induction, bore-to-stroke, mains, rod R/L ratio, fueling strategy, etc. I've got dozens of spreadsheets and calculations I'd be happy to share as well as a comprehensive resource list to I guess things are just different here. I've dedicated my career to it, love it and always enjoy the opportunity to teach it.

And you would do all that by means of E-mails over the Internet. Then, you have to assume that they will interpret what you write properly. You have the patience of a saint my friend, plus an awful lot of spare time.

Quote; but still surprised me to see and hear about all the red tags.

When I was working for a company, one of the other plumbers asked me why my jobs always passed inspection the first time. I told him that I always made sure I had an obvious violation that the inspector would see immediately, then while he did the rest of the inspection I made the "repair" and that satisfied his need to find "something wrong", but since it was fixed he gave the approval.

quote; see if I could hire someone like Cacher Chick to either do a plumbing plan

That goes back to the "interpreting what you see" rule. I have had MANY customers who used a drawing to install their own plumbing, and had to completely remove it ans start over to do it right, even though their installation was installed EXACTLY the way they thought the drawing showed it. One friend use a "correct" drawing from the city to install his new addition. When I went there to make a connection to his existing plumbing, I told him that if an inspector had seen what he installed, he would not be able to write his multiple red tags for five minutes because he would be laughing so hard. It was time to start over, and discard everything he had assembled. But, looking at what he installed and the city's drawing, I could see that he had "interpreted" it incorrectly, but it looked the same to him.
 
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Terry

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The 4" cast gives you options on the drain.
A vent can be added to the laundry tray.
Is the new toiilet being plumbed to the 4" cast? If so, it needs to enter the 4" below the landry tray. Or, add a vent on the trap arm for the laundry tray before it enters the 4" cast.
 

moparfreak

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The copper is 2.5" so that won't be sufficient for the added toilet. As far as the utility sink, it's not in compliance to have right underneath the electrical panel for the house. The code compliance guy at sale didn't make a big deal of it since it's existing stuff but with all of the work being done on the house for plumbing and electrical I'll probably just save the hassle it might cause and pull it all out, make a little bit extra space to work with in that area anyways. The drain for it enters pretty low on that bottom cast fitting so I wouldn't have much room to put the toilet drain under it.

What size drain is appropriate for a kitchen sink with disposal on it? The one that's there is 2.5".

Thanks for all of the advice.
Adam
 

Terry

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In plumbing, pipes are measured by their ID

A kitchen sink needs 2" for waste, and can have a 1.5" vent and 1.5" trap and trap arm. There must be a 2" cleanout under the sink.
The laundry tray is the same as for the kitchen.
The toilet needs a 3" or 4" waste line.
 

moparfreak

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Well the bitter cold has stalled the foundation work and allowed me some time to sketch out the plumbing plan. The resources here have been very helpful and I believe that this plan should adhere to the rules but I am novice so I'm sure there are still adjustments to be made, whether it's for practical reasons or code reasons.

Does this plan look sound? The orange circles are vents that go upward and join in the attic. 2" vents for all fixtures. Plan to use existing 4" CI drain in the basement and remove the 2' copper for 3" PVC and have all fixtures run to this, get rid of the utility sink which is incorrect anyways as Terry pointed out above. For supply I plan to set up a cold and hot manifold and run to each fixture separately from there. Is there anything fundamentally wrong with this approach? Any advice is much appreciated!
Drain 1.jpgDrain 2.jpgDrain 3.jpgCold Supply.jpgHot Supply.jpg

Thanks,
Adam
 

41Fever

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Since everyone has abandoned your thread I will give you my 2 cents:
1. You can't lay a tee on its back as shown in view A.
2. Your 3" clean out in views C&D is
a: not needed or
b:undersized if your snaking a 4" line
3. Good luck locating that 2X1-1/4 TEE in View A
4. And as long as your putting those clean outs ABOVE your traps put them ABOVE the countertop so
REAL plumber doesn't have to clean out a cabinet to snake the line
I can empathize with your flooding after Sandy. We had homes here with water into their ATTICS in June 2011. We also had "licensed plumbers" show up to "help" in our recovery efforts...many did a fine job while others just low balled bids, did shoddy work, and took the money and ran.
 

41Fever

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Since everyone has abandoned your thread I will give you my 2 cents:
1. You can't lay a tee on its back as shown in view A.
2. Your 3" clean out in views C&D is
a: not needed
b:undersized if your snaking a 4" line
3. Good luck locating that 2X1-1/4 TEE in View A
4. And as long as your putting those clean outs ABOVE your traps put them ABOVE the countertop so that a
REAL plumber doesn't have to clean out a cabinet to snake the line and won't get wet opening the plug!
I can empathize with your flooding after Sandy. We had homes here with water into their ATTICS in June 2011. We had "licensed plumbers" from around the country show up to "help" in our recovery efforts...many did a fine job and set up shop here, while others just low balled bids, did shoddy work, then took the money and ran as the inspectors couldn't keep up or permits were never pulled to begin with. Then the "Brick & Mortar" shops had to redo the work and the customers got to write another check.
 

Terry

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1. You can't lay a tee on its back as shown in view A.

A wye or combo on it's back is okay.

The 4" clean out is enough, you don't need to add a cleanout above it.

For the lav, a 2x1.5 santee. We mainly use 1.5" p-traps on lavs. You can reduce down to 1.25, but there isn't a compelling reason to.

I don't carry "vent" 90 fittings. I use the medium 90 instead. Less money for the Med and also one less fitting I need to carry on the van.
You can tie vents together at 42" above a floor, or go up through the attic and roof too.
2" vents for some of those is overkill. It's also okay if they are overkill. Typically I use a 1.5 vent on lavs, sinks, tubs, and showers. I use a 2" vent on the toilet, or if I'm wet venting a toilet with a lav, then I run 2" all the way.
 

moparfreak

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Thanks for your feedback. I figured a vent 90 would be less expensive than a medium 90, but I'll switch that out. The 1.25" on the lav was to make sure the trap would be kept inconspicuous and hidden behind the pedestal sink but if that's going to be hard to find I'll just go 1.5".

As far as the 3" clean-out, the 4" cast iron existing one likely hasn't been touched since the house was built in '62 so I figured an extra one nearby (even if it's an inch too small) would be a useful thing. Does there need to be a cleanout on the washing machine? I've seen some with and some without.

I reviewed the plan w/ my inspector and it checked out to be sound for the WI state code so I'll start getting materials. We finally get a few days of sun and above freezing weather here this weekend so excavation will hopefully pick back up next week and then framing once the footings are backfilled. I thought we'd get another winter like last year but I could not have been more wrong!

Thanks,
Adam
 
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