Drain Embedded in Concrete Slab in Condo Complex

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jdsilver

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Update if you're interested. We demolished the concrete base. The exposed wood subfloor in the previous photos were key in figuring out that the concrete was only about 1.5 inches thick (and therefore, not post-stressed.
Using a hammer drill and roto-hammer, we drilled a few holes and used a pick hammer + sledge to break it up by hand. Pretty easy. Ended up uncovering the wood subfloor and the access hole to the drain, as Terry's previous photo showed.

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jdsilver

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Story continues: the drain still needed to be switched to a 2" for a shower. The vent pipe was inside the wall about 1.5 feet so we couldn't access it from the bathroom. We had to go to the other side and open a hole in the floor in the closet to get to the pipe union. Still not able to reach it, we called a plumber who switched it out for us (he was nimble enough to get his arms in there and change it out).

Here are the holes dug into the closet on the other side of the wall. You can see that since the condo's framing is metal, there are access-holes to reach the piping. Not the most conveniently placed, but placed well-enough to get a professional plumber's arms through.
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jdsilver

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And for $650 he got the pipe switched out from a 1.5" to a 2" and it only took him and his buddy an hour. I probably could've shopped around for someone a little cheaper (since all the demolition work was already done) but the previous guy quoted us $1400. So $650 sounded incredibly reasonable by comparison. Now we can patch that hole and finally start pre-sloping.
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JohnfrWhipple

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That concrete is a fire separator and surely required for your local code. Make sure you document the fix.
 
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hj

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quote;The entire floor shakes when one lets loose.

IT also shakes when one is hit by a concrete hole saw, even if it does not "let loose". I would be interested in HOW he changed from 1 1/2" to 2" in an hour, (especially since the 1 1/2" was a copper drain), unless the branch line was already 2". Slopewise, it is usually NOT a good idea to put the drain at one end of the shower stall, because it makes a very steep angle to go from the drain up to the "floor level" in that short a space.
 
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jdsilver

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quote;The entire floor shakes when one lets loose.

IT also shakes when one is hit by a concrete hole saw, even if it does not "let loose". I would be interested in HOW he changed from 1 1/2" to 2" in an hour, (especially since the 1 1/2" was a copper drain), unless the branch line was already 2". Slopewise, it is usually NOT a good idea to put the drain at one end of the shower stall, because it makes a very steep angle to go from the drain up to the "floor level" in that short a space.


Ah yes, I didn't mention it above but the branch line was 2" at the vent pipe union. The hard part was reaching that union since it was about a foot into the wall and blocked by a bunch of metal framing. He merely had to switch the 1'5" pipe out to 2" at the vent pipe. Reaching it while not being able to see anything was the hard part.
 
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