Day 547: Plumbing the Bathroom & Kitchen Renovation

So I'm in the middle of writing a big update post to let you know what's been going on since the last note on Day 514 when I start talking all about the bathroom upstairs. Then I realize that you likely have no idea what I'm talking about because that half (well, two-sevenths) written post on the new bathroom layout and our updated plumbing was never finished. So, without further ado, here is that long overdue post about our new plumbing system. Before I get into all of the drain-waste-vent details I'm sure you're dying to hear about, let's have a look at what changes we're making in the bathroom. You'll recall the old bathroom with:

a toilet cramped at the end of the tub and...

a small vanity built to accommodate the balcony door.

We decided that the balcony door has to go because a) the leaking balcony is not long for this world, b) I have no carnal desire to step outside for a breezy breath of fresh air after a bath, and c) trying to create a comfortable tiny bathroom layout with two door swings gives me headaches. We also wanted to have a proper vanity and more storage. With all of those considerations in mind, here is what we came up with.

I had reservations about putting the toilet right in front of the door but this actually makes a lot of sense. People worry that if the door swings open, the first thing that greets the intruder is you sitting on a toilet. On the contrary, if you're sitting on the toilet and the door creaks, your arm will swing out to close it up before Peeping Tom gets to see even your toes. Also, it's a tiny bathroom (6'11" x 6'7") so this is the best we could do without dramatic action like extending out over the balcony. Actually, extending the bathroom onto the balcony was an idea we considered ever so briefly before realizing that adding a second story onto an extension built for one storey was more reno than we wanted to tackle for this house. Maybe next time?

In the previous post, I left you with a shot of the completely gutted bathroom ready for new plumbing. With that blank slate, here are the tasks we brought in the plumber to do:

• Install drains, supply lines, and vents for the relocated bathroom fixtures.
• Install a proper vent through the roof and connect the new DWV system to that breath of fresh air. In addition to venting the new drains upstairs, we also needed to add a vent for the kitchen sink (currently unvented) and wanted to connect the cheater vent air admittance valve (AAV) from the basement to the real vent. (If you need a refresher on what the vent part of DWV is all about, apparently I spent my birthday last year writing up an explanation on Day 152, when I also described what the deal is with the AAV.)
• Replace the old cast iron stack. This wasn't a task we had initially planned to do but since the stack was fully accessible and we were already putting in a bunch of new drain lines that would need to tie in to the stack, we figured it would make sense to replace the whole thing now.

The plumber was quite concerned about drilling through studs and joists; it seemed like he's had trouble with building inspectors in the past and, structurally speaking, it's probably a good thing he's not brazenly putting holes all over the manor's skeleton. As a result, he wanted to run as many pipes as possible under the joists, including the p-trap for the vanity sink. With assurances that they would keep things as tight to the joists as possible, here is what they came up with.

Shiny new drains, vents, and supply lines for the upstairs bathroom.

To give you a real sense of the change, here is a look at the same corner before and after the plumber and his apprentice son did their work.

Old and new. To orient you, this is the back corner of the kitchen to the left of the sink/window wall looking up at the ceiling.

I won't get into the details of every single pipe because we both have better ways to spend our time but I did want to mention a few specific things.

PEX Supply Lines

The plumber who put in the temporary vanity sink used a couple small lines of PEX pipe to make the connection. The plastic-y taste of the water was immediately noticeable, although it did fade a bit after a couple weeks. When we got our quote for the new plumbing, we were told that copper would be more expensive because of the labour required. It would have been nice to stick with copper because that's what we put in downstairs but we ultimately opted for the PEX lines. These new pipes look the same as the plastic-flavoured-water-producing other temporary lines so we're a bit concerned but I don't know enough about plumbing to know whether this is high or low quality PEX. In the end, it's turned out to be a good thing we've got PEX because it looks like the chase through which the lines are conveyed from the basement will need to be rebuilt. This would have been a real pain with copper pipes but, because the PEX is relatively flexible, I think we'll be able to get away with just shifting the lines over a bit to accommodate the larger chase.

Cast Iron Stack Vent

After the stack was dismantled, we were able to take a look at the stack vent (aka the part of the vent that extends up through the roof). Surprisingly, there is no cap at the top of this vent. That is to say that it's just a pipe old cast pipe that's open to the air. Apparently this is normal practice and the plumber said he's never heard of animals falling into open stacks - a thought that conjures up horrendous images of a most disgusting death. The plumber deemed it to be in solid shape and, trying to avoid the need to climb on our steep roof to make a giant hole for a new roof vent, devised a system to tie all of the vents in the house to the existing stack vent.

A strangely desaturated photo of the stack vent with new vent pipe connections. 

Bathtub Drain

You may notice in a couple of the photos above that bright orange cap that screams, "unfinished drain pipe here!" So apparently bath drains can't be fully roughed-in until there's a bathtub in place. Who knew? Don't answer that. We had thought we'd be able to finish the bathroom rough-in work in the kitchen ceiling without having to do much else in the bathroom until we were ready to move on from kitchen to bathroom. This one seemingly small task of a bathtub train has been the trigger in a series of events that had me throwing together house exterior renderings in an airport so we could order windows that would work with a future colour scheme for the outside. Nothing like a little scope creep to get your project rolling.