I recently completed a bathroom project in a home office. It is a half bath with a urinal. The room is standard sheetrock construction with wood wainsocot over the lower 1/2 of the walls and hardwood floors. The problem is that the bathroom always smells like a sewer pipe is open. The plumbing was done by my regular plumber. We have tried replacing the wax seal, doubling it up, removing the urinal and covering the waste pipe, plugging the sink and overflow, and nothing helps. I am at a loss to try to fix the problem. It would seem that even if there was a problem with the plumbing inside the wall cavities it would not create a smell in the room. There is no problem with leaks or the plumbing vents.
Anyone have a suggestion?
Replies
Any chance someone cracked the soil stack or vent with a framing nail, drywall nail or screw, while nailing up that wainscotting, chair rail, medicine cabinet,....er whatever?
Is this 1st floor, 2nd floor, attic, basement?
I would think there is a possibility that a nail or something could have cracked a vent or drain pipe. However I don't think the smell would get into the room through the walls. How to check? I know, I know, remove fixtures and cap, cut the waste pipe and fill with water to the roof vent, check the level. Any easier ways?
I have capped the waste pipe from the urinal and that didn't fix it, so I don't think that's it. No smell from the sink drains or toilet. Not from the toilet tank either. I can't pinpoint a source by smell.
The bathroom is on the second floor. It is a half bath and the fart fan vents into a large attic, so not much chance of sewer vent back drafting through the fan.
"How to check? I know, I know, remove fixtures and cap, cut
the waste pipe and fill with water to the roof vent, check the level. Any easier ways?"
One way would be to lower a light and camera down the pipe and watch on a monitor. Depending on the size of the offender, you just might see it. These units are fairly pricey, but I know a cuple of guys around here with that have them; one plumber and one chimney guy. Rental? Never checked here, but unlikely. If you're in a larger city,........maybe.
Hope you're not venting into the attic space if you have a shower installed.
Ya don't have a dead cat in the wall, do ya? <g>
Knowledge is power, but only if applied in a timely fashion.
Bill,
Get your plumber to do a smoke test. Sometimes toilets won't leak water but will leak air at the wax ring, some have casting defects that allow sewer gas to vent into the room. I have a homemade rig with metal pipe and a blower and use commercial smoke bombs. Hook up to the clean out and let her rip. Lottsa fun, lottsa smoke.
Smoking down the bayou,
KK
Smoke test, now that sounds like a good idea. Easy and can't hurt anything. I just need to find smoke bomb.
A couple of M-80's will substitute just fine.
Please video tape this process, as I'm sure everyone here is as interested in seeing the results of this type test, as I am.
A good heart embiggins even the smallest person.
Quittin' Time
We could put you in the "driver's seat". I cansee it all now. Light the M-80, flush it down, and then sit on the throne to make sure nothing spalshes on the walls.
ps wear your jock strap AND CUP.
Excellence is its own reward!
Hey HEY hey !!
I wasn't the one asking advice here.
Yer gonna make me have to reconsider my very generous policy of giving just as excelent advice here...
Just think of all the people who could possibly be deprived of my chivalrous, and dare I say, exemplary and even premium constructive advice...
A good heart embiggins even the smallest person.
Quittin' Time
Sorry. I was only sharing the vision. Not the goal.
maybe we can settle for a smoke bomb or three.
Excellence is its own reward!
Stick your face in the sink and see what the overflow holes smell like. Squirt some bleach in there and maybe it will go away for awhile.
Joe H
Plumbing code requires a floor drain for a urinal. If there is one, there should be a trap primer, a device that keeps the trap full of water at all times.
Another thing to do is seal the tile grout so moisture and water does not seep in under the tile.
If it was pressure tested and shows no leak maybe an Exhaust fan vent too close to the roof stack vent.......backdrafting?
Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
Quittin' Time
Suggestions from other posters so far have been god ideas.
In addition, there is the possiblility that the urinal is not flushing sufficiently. Try exercising the handle three or four times for each use. If that clears the air, then have the urinal adjusted.
Bill,
A crack or small hole in a DVW pipe in an enclosed cavity can stink up a room.
I just went through a simular ordeal as you. Reset the toilet, bleach here and there,sealed off the vent and tried not even using that bathroom, the smell kept coming back.
As you already know, it is hard to track down a sewer stick source once the room is filled. I was able to air out the room good, and then when the stink just started coming back, I narrowed it down to an area, then I noticed the odor was stronger at an electrical outlet. I determined it was in the wall cavity ( a wall between the toilet and whirlpool. I cut out some drywall and found where a nail used for the whirpool framing had knocked a hole about the size of a dime in the DVW going up the cavity to the roof vent.
cuyahoga:
The smell you described in your bathroom was it also musty smell.
We have a new home and the bathroom stinks and now has moved to the family room, den, hallway and kitchen.
We have slab on grade and the smell originated a year ago in the bathroom. I too noticed the smell coming from the electrical outlets. Especially the one near the clean out pipe located in the supporting wall. The smell was disgusting. The builder cut a hole in the wood around the pipe and sealed it with cement and ran black aquostic caulking along the crack in the concrete. Since then the smell has worsened in the other rooms around this bathroom.
If you have any advise it would greatly be appreciated. We are getting worried that this problem will never be solved. The main floor is almost to a point where we can't live in it anymore.
Debbie
debbie, you might want to post your problem into a fresh thread (start a new message). This thread is a couple years old (although it seems as though the cast of characters remains the same).jt8
Opportunity doesn't knock. You knock, opportunity answers. -- American Proverb
Hey I was looking for those M-80s.
I'm thinking if you can use a test cap on the vent and pressurize it with air from a compressor. Lower pressure so you don't blow out all the traps but step up the pressure. then if you need to go more you can start blocking of the drains with blow up test plugs.