Drainage query

[5teves]

Hi

I'm in the process of doing my bathroom up and have a query I'm hoping you guys can help with.

The bathroom is located downstairs and I can not see any signs of a manhole or a external soil pipe. Other than two gullys outside. Which to me is quite puzzling.

Currently the toilet is sat 30cm away from the wall and I was hoping to plumb the new one close up against the wall.


The toilet connects to a clay soil pipe directly below and has nothing else connected to it.

Does anyone know how and where I can find out the layouts of the drainage.

And also is there any specific adapters pipes I should used when plumbing the new toilet.
Also what's the best tool to use for cutting in the clay.

Many thanks in advance

 

[Doggit]

You've sussed out the problem, so it's a question of how much work you're prepared to put in. You can either dig up the ground outside, and put a soil stack going into the existing drain, or you could consider a back to the wall toilet with a vanity unit http://www.bathstore.com/products/alpine-600-wc-unit-inc-dual-flush-cistern-fittings-1914.html, and then use a converter such as http://www.victorianplumbing.co.uk/...for-converting-p-trap-pans-to-s-trap-c26.aspx

 

[5teves]

Thanks Doggit.

I think it should be relatively straight forward cutting the pipe and sticking on a bend etc.

My concern is that the drainage in the house does not make sense to me.

There's a gully at the front of the house serving the kitchen.
There's a gully to the side of the house serving the bathroom sink
And there's a gully in the rear of the house serving the bath tub.

So there's definitely more drainage outside but don't know where it's leading.

The drain for the toilet has a fall going to wards the rear of the house (back garden)

Do you think local authority will have the plans?

 

[noseall]

I think it should be relatively straight forward cutting the pipe and sticking on a bend etc.

If only. You will do well to work on those pipes under the floor, given the amount of room needed, what with floor joists etc. Also consider the failure factor particularly if the clay pipe is securely mortared through the wall. Take into account disturbing the tarred rope & mortar joints on the existing pipe run. Can you get the pipe where you want it in view of the joist positions etc.

As said above, you may want to consider digging up the WC pipe outside of the building and fitting an external stub stack or an SVP if you don't already have one. this method will offer you a greater degree of freedom in terms of WC position etc. It may mean also being able to boss the other wastes into the stack etc.

Consider shower waste (if you are having one) as this will be below the floor level and will need careful thought about where the waste will travel, both inside and outside the building.

As for where stuff leads outside - invest in a shovel.

 

[5teves]

Thanks noseall. I'm a keen reader of this forrum and seen much of you input. Definitely very knowledgeable.

Definitely agree and would prefer to put a stack outside, BUT I hope to in future make a extention on the property and think it would be best done at that time. Or at the very earliest when I have a proper idea of where the drainage would need to be.

So for now I think it would be far easier to go under the joist and make some alterations to the existing one.

The crawl space is a out a meter deep and the soil pipe goes vertically down to the floor of it and then bends of horizontally towards the back garden.

So I would imagine vertically I have a lot to play with.

I here what your saying about other joints breaking or becoming weak.
The only joint I can see is in the horizontal pipe where the vertical bend ends.
I could just mortar that again. And of course I don't intend to go at it with a breaker. Maybe a reciprocating saw or grinder.

The next joist is very close to the wall so that shouldn't cause any issues either.

Does that sound ok?

 

[noseall]

A one metre deep void is... er... plenty deep! At least you will have some freedom of movement.

I'd look at getting the exact loo you are going to be using on site and tailor the vertical pipe to suit. We usually mock-up the loo somewhere in another part of a building, setting it up against a wall and with a pan connector attached. We then measure and set the pipe up to suit, particularly if the pipe is being concreted in. Take into account wall plaster thickness and ceramic tiles etc.

A lot of CC loos require the centre of the pipe to be aboot 115mm from the bare unplastered wall. But this is by no means a default setting.

 

[Hugh Jaleak]

Your Water Company, (as Sewerage provider) should have the sewer map for the area, Local Councils handed over any responsibility for sewers some years ago I believe. Whether it will have enough detail to show the individual connections up to/into every property I don't know, and would suspect not, but if it shows where the main drain runs are, then the laterals from the property are likely to head in that direction towards the main.

Angle Grinder to (carefully!) cut the pipework, and chamfer the edges of the cut before fitting any adaptor collar to take you to plastic.

 

[Nige F]

I here what your saying about other joints breaking or becoming weak.
The only joint I can see is in the horizontal pipe where the vertical bend ends.


Does that sound ok?

If it was me I'd make a box up and fill with concrete so that the clay bend is encased- then cut the vertical with an angle grinder. A vertical joint plastic/clay is less likely to leak than a horizontal one.

 

[5teves]

Hi,

Here's the update.
After making some enquiries it transpires that I actually share the manhole in my neighbours garden.

What I'm trying to do here Nige is replace as much of the clay with a plastic inside the property as I can.

The reason for this is that I have started renovating the bath and this is the only internal clay pipe in the house.

My thinking is that if I did replaced this now it would save me in the future from ripping up my floor boards etc when I do decide to replace the one outside which is basically approx 3 meters out into the neighbours manhole.

So the idea was to replace it close up to the external wall. Which would mean I would have a horizontal connection.

Does this seem like a good approach? And is the horizontal connection prone to failure?

I have to change this to help with the configuration of the toilet, it's currently out of the wall by 30 or cm. And by changing the drainage I'll could plumb in the sink with a boss connection too instead of running it out the wall in to a gully.

 

[Hugh Jaleak]

Bear in mind once the pipe from your house leaves your property, it then becomes the Water Company's responsibility, and you will need their permission before altering it in any way. Meanwhile, if you want to renew your section under the house then feel free. Horizontal joints made properly using an appropriate connector will be fine, although if you're planning on replacing all the pipework with plastic, I'd make that joint outside the building, and bring the plastic inside to renew the entire internal section. (If you weren't planning to already.)

 

[5teves]

Thanks Hugh

Yes that makes sense. At that stage, I could easily do that so the only joint I'd have inside would be at the horizontal meet vertical bend.

 

[Hugh Jaleak]

Plastic joints wont leak, (if made properly), so jobs a good un.

 

[5teves]

Just a update guys, I have successfully managed to cut and remove the section of the drainage I want to replace. The vertical section was encased with rock hard concrete! I would have thought a softish mix would have been enough but hey ho a beating with a kango done the trick!

Job for tomorrow (hopefully) is to plug in the new bits...