Freestanding Tub Drain

[kallanreed]

I’d been noticing a mystery puddle on the floor near our freestanding tub occasionally after it’s used. Finally saw some water underneath the silicone that holds the tub to the floor. Previous owners were DIY types, but not really DI correctly Y (as I’ve been learning).

In the crawlspace the drain tailpiece comes through a 1 1/2” hole in the floor into an ABS slip joint into the trap. Looks like a bathroom sink. The tailpiece was liquid nailed into the hole in the floor. Oh boy.

I loosened the slip joint, noticed the drain line from the trap runs uphill (a problem for after this problem), and went back into the bathroom. My wife and I were able to lift the tub straight up and off. A fair amount of water was puddled underneath.

I’m not exactly sure what was leaking, but I’m strongly leaning towards the tailpiece.

For good measure I removed the whole drain assembly and cleaned everything. I put some silicone down (under the silicone gaskets against the tub body) and then re-attached the drain assembly. The grey caps have black rubber washers so I took those and cleaned them then put a little of silicone grease on them and hand tightened them really well.

I’m feeling pretty good about everything except that tailpiece. Is that an appropriate connection to use here? It seems like a bad idea to use a screw on fitting under a tub.

I feel like there’s a few ways to go here.
1. “Never again” approach: Clean the screw connector and washer. Use a little silicone grease on the washer and tighten down. Use silicone caulk and seal the nut onto the drain assembly. Hope it’s never going to leak again.
2. “Plan for failure”: put it back together and cut a bigger hole in the subfloor so I can get at the fitting in the future if needed. As a minor bonus, the larger hole would have let the leak drip into the crawlspace instead of messing up the bathroom floor.
3. “Use the right fitting”: not sure what that would be, but that sink style tailpiece just seems wrong. Is there anything more permanent? It’s not likely I’ll need to remove a bathtub trap.

Thoughts?

 

[Terry]

Normally I expect to see a rubber washer between the tub and the drain. That makes the seal at that point.
Recent codes don't allow us to use slip joints on tub drains in areas that aren't accessible. And yet much of the new stuff depends on slip joints.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[kallanreed]

Normally I expect to see a rubber washer between the tub and the drain. That makes the seal at that point.
Recent codes don't allow us to use slip joints on tub drains in areas that aren't accessible. And yet much of the new stuff depends on slip joints.

There is a silicone rubber gasket on both sides of the drain where it meets the tub. They are cloudy-clear so kind of hard to see in the picture. I “helped” them with some clear silicone caulk, after reading some other threads where those gaskets had small leaks.

The slip joint itself is below the floor and easily accessible in the crawlspace. The part that’s not accessible is the tailpiece nut and washer. I’m starting to lean toward cutting a larger hole in the floor (maybe like 4”) which should be enough to reach up in there if necessary. The tub will hide the hole.

 

[Terry]

The bigger hole may be a good idea.

 

[Tuttles Revenge]

Hopefully that leak isn't coming from the overflow, that looks like a difficult replacement. Been there done that.

Converted one to ABS rather than slip joint... but only because the location of the tub needed to move after it had already been installed.. And had to get creative because of the odd proprietary design of the tub parts.