Help with my tub drain leak.

[Blaise]

Hi all. This is my first post. I purchased my first home a few years ago and it's starting to fall apart on me . The house has never been updated. A few weeks ago my tub drain started leaking through my dinning room ceiling. I opened a part of the ceiling up and saw that the leak is a hole in the lead train pipe. I plugged it with some rubber and some hose ties. Then this week 3 more holes 10 in away popped up and started leaking, I plugged them also. Now I need to replace it before it gets worse. My tub drain pipe goes down and under my tub for about 8ft then goes into my main cast iron drain that sits below my toilet then goes down my dinning room wall to the basement then out to the street.

In back of my tub in my 2nd floor hallway I have a small door to access my tub plumbing. I checked everything over and it seems to be very old. The tub has a drum trap. I've tried opening it months ago to clear a clog but couldn't budge it. Even with a little heat. So I'm figuring I should replace the lead pipe all the way up to my tub and replace the drum trap with a p trap. I've done some small plumbing before ( replaced water heater and sinks and faucets around the house) don't really have the means to bring someone in your do the work right now. My questions are about the direction of the pipes and the slope that I need to put on the pipe as it goes under my tub and over to the opposite wall. I also can't see a vent anywhere. I'm not sure what I can do about that. Thanks.

 

[CountryBumkin]

I would replace all of the old pipe from tub to stack with PVC. You can cut the old pipe at the tee where it enters the stack and use a coupler to attach the new PVC. Of course that means cutting open more of your ceiling.

Once you have access to the full run of pipe, I don't think it would be too hard to remove the old and use the same holes (or path) to run the new pipe. IMO, it's better to do it al now then piece by piece over time. In fact, depending on what you have access to with the ceiling opened up, you may want to replace all the bathroom drain piping.
I'm not a pro - maybe someone else has a better idea.
Good luck

 

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[Cacher_Chick]

It must be an old house if it has lead drain piping.

Replacing failty components is an obvious solution to stopping the leak.

 

[Blaise]

Thanks guys. Yea I never seen solid lead pipes until I got this house. The main water line into the house is still lead. The 8ft run of drain pipe doesn't go through and beams or anything so I was thinking of piecing two pieces together and fish them through my dinning room ceiling? This way I wouldn't have to tear an hole line out of my ceiling. The lead pipe is threaded into the cast iron drain, so I'm hoping I can cut the pipe and screw that fitting out and screw in a pvc one and go from there.

 

[CountryBumkin]

I doubt you will be able to unscrew it. Might be easier/better to just the cut the pipe off about 6" short of the stack then use that short stub piece to attach the coupler to.