Finding the Best Pathways for the Piping

Finding the Best Pathways for the Piping - DIY Shower and Kitchen Remodel Tips

Remodeling a kitchen or bathroom, or installing a new one, is a major job that requires major planning. Before you turn the first screw or hammer the first nail, you must make basic decisions about the sizes and styles of fixtures and appliances, clearances, floor and wall coverings lighting, ventilation and more.

The location of existing plumbing in the distance it can be moved, or whether it can be moved at all, will often dictate the layout of a remodeled kitchen or bathroom, and may limit your choice of locations for a new one.

In most homes, plumbing fixtures are clustered around a vertical core of supply pipes and drainpipes. A bathroom is often located above or below the kitchen, or over a basement utility room. Each plumbing fixture in these rooms must be supplied with hot and cold water from parallel lines that run through the core.

Each fixture has a drain trap that prevents sewer gases from entering the house. And each has a vent pipe that exhausts waste gases through a chimney like stack and it scared to the drains, preventing water from being siphoned out of the traps. Vertical pipes are usually concealed inside a framed structure called a wet wall, substantially thicker than an ordinary wall.

The presence of plumbing fixtures along a wall, or along a corresponding wall in the room directly opposite or above, indicates pipes within the wall that must be moved. If the plumbing ends at the existing fixtures, it can be removed and capped. Supply pipes and small branch drains passing through the wall to fixtures above can usually be rerouted. But large drains and soil stacks usually must be left in place and concealed.

Once you know where you can best place the new services, make a floor plan of the room, indicating the locations and dimensions for wall, doors, windows, and plumbing and electrical outlets. Follow the plan as closely as you can in every step of the remodeling process, from running plumbing and electrical lines to arranging fixtures and appliances.

Maximum distance from fixture trap to vent stack:

Pipe size - 3" Distance - 10' (example of sizes)

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