Pulled leaky toilet, found standing water in 90deg street elbow?

[Ha6P4]

House built Nov 1969, construction grade 2 Fair, concrete foundation grade 3 Good, original plumbing grade 3 Good, iron pipe except master bath toilet is ABS.
Poorly remodeled.
Main line drains west from kitchen to adjacent guest bath and master bath to cleanout Tee under carport.

I noticed a wet ring around master bath toilet base, which was not caulked. Pulled toilet and found the 4"x3" ABS hub closet flange to be uneven, only screwed down on one side with mismatched non-stainless screws, grouted in place, right slot is cracked. The hub is fit directly to a ABS 90deg elbow socket, but the cement residue is white. There is standing water in the elbow:

Standing water in elbow is approximately level with shower basin.
90deg elbow is oriented SE, against main line draining west:

The hub flange is serviceable but cracked, and I'd like to learn how to replace it. I figure I can grind off the surface grout with a concrete & thinset surface prep wheel, cut the flange with a 4" hole saw (piloting on the flat ID of the flange), then chisel or grind off the flange. I have a jigsaw and angle grinder if there are better methods.

But why is there standing water in the elbow? It must be angled upward before draining into the main line. I'm probably selling the house and can't demo and excavate the bathrooms, but how would this be fixed?

 

[Terry]

Standing water means either a blockage, or it is missing grade. Pipes are normally graded at 2%, or 1/4" per foot.
You can either secure the flange with concrete anchors, or place a metal repair flange over it and anchor that. You are mainly making sure that the closet bolts don't move.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Ha6P4]

Standing water means either a blockage, or it is missing grade. Pipes are normally graded at 2%, or 1/4" per foot.
You can either secure the flange with concrete anchors, or place a metal repair flange over it and anchor that. You are mainly making sure that the closet bolts don't move.

Thanks Terry
Bottom end of elbow appears to fit over old iron pipe:

The flange is cracked where one of the closet bolts fits. Since I have an adjacent spare bathroom and I'm not pressed for time, I planned to remove the cracked flange and replace it, rather than using a repair flange.
I know this isn't typical for a repair on the clock, but is there any reason not to?

 

[Reach4]

Your standing water problem appears to continue downstream.

 

[Weekend Handyman]

I know this isn't typical for a repair on the clock, but is there any reason not to?

I am not a plumber. If it were my house, I would take the least invasive approach that will address the issue. I would not want to mess it up and end up needing to break up the floor ... basically, don't mess with the bull if you don't want the horns.

 

[Weekend Handyman]

I am not a plumber.

The other thing I would do is determine why you had the water on the floor (failed wax seal, blockage, etc.).

What happens if you pour some water down?

 

[Jeff H Young]

ha6p4 don't know if you've lived here since 69 new? or moved in last week and have never had a decent flush or working system? no idea what any of your talk about construction grade 2 foundation grade 3 stuff means ? grade 3 must be horrible 3rd world work? I'd try to clear that line if you can't run water down and get level to drop you need to camera. then I'd figure out how that plastic is joined to the castiron. Looks like inferior work but not sure but looks like something hokey your probably leaking under slab

 

[Ha6P4]

Your standing water problem appears to continue downstream.

Indeed. Water depth makes me think it is a partial blockage, not missing grade.

 

[Ha6P4]

I am not a plumber. If it were my house, I would take the least invasive approach that will address the issue. I would not want to mess it up and end up needing to break up the floor ... basically, don't mess with the bull if you don't want the horns.

Good advice, but it doesn't seem likely that removing the flange could necessitate breaking up the floor. There are plenty of ABS repair/adapter flanges.

 

[Ha6P4]

I am not a plumber.

The other thing I would do is determine why you had the water on the floor (failed wax seal, blockage, etc.).

What happens if you pour some water down?

One of the closet bolt channels on the flange is cracked. The toilet has been knocked, so I suspect a good knock unseated the wax seal.

I sprayed supply water directly down the drain. The water level remains the same.

 

[Ha6P4]

ha6p4 don't know if you've lived here since 69 new? or moved in last week and have never had a decent flush or working system? no idea what any of your talk about construction grade 2 foundation grade 3 stuff means ? grade 3 must be horrible 3rd world work? I'd try to clear that line if you can't run water down and get level to drop you need to camera. then I'd figure out how that plastic is joined to the castiron. Looks like inferior work but not sure but looks like something hokey your probably leaking under slab

Moved in August 2019.
Grades are original inspection grades for context:
4 Excellent
3 Good
2 Fair
1 Minimum

Yes, the ABS elbow appears fit outside the cast iron pipe, rather than properly coupled. But fixing this would require breaking up the floor, which I can't do.

 

[Jeff H Young]

pok so a little over 2 years and no problem only a little water on the floor. Id adress the standing water hopefully the cast iron to plastic joint is sound and the standing water clears itself But Id adress them now at least the standing water.
so put a new wax ring after and reset w/c

 

[Weekend Handyman]

pok so a little over 2 years and no problem only a little water on the floor. Id adress the standing water hopefully the cast iron to plastic joint is sound and the standing water clears itself But Id adress them now at least the standing water.
so put a new wax ring after and reset w/c

Just for my learning ...

If he was to leave the standing water, would the OP be risking?

If the standing water is due to slope, is there any solution other than ripping up the floor?

 

[Jeff H Young]

I would expexct that if water is standing he will have back ups occur while toilet is out is the time to adress atempt to run snake, could be a toy or something went down. so ripping up floor not nessesarily required . the joint in castiron is very questionable i guess he can leave it alone . its probebly abs jammed over the castiron and then ? tapped up ? glued on or silicone ? just guessing and guess would be it either leaks some or doesent but my guess is its poor workmanship. So if a floor isnt worth finding out . I understand its quite a mess to dig that up . ignore it and if nessesary , problems occure he can stop using bathroom until a better time comes to fix it

 

[Ha6P4]

pok so a little over 2 years and no problem only a little water on the floor. Id adress the standing water hopefully the cast iron to plastic joint is sound and the standing water clears itself But Id adress them now at least the standing water.
so put a new wax ring after and reset w/c

Upon spraying down supply water, standing water didn't clear itself

 

[Ha6P4]

I would expexct that if water is standing he will have back ups occur while toilet is out is the time to adress atempt to run snake, could be a toy or something went down. so ripping up floor not nessesarily required . the joint in castiron is very questionable i guess he can leave it alone . its probebly abs jammed over the castiron and then ? tapped up ? glued on or silicone ? just guessing and guess would be it either leaks some or doesent but my guess is its poor workmanship. So if a floor isnt worth finding out . I understand its quite a mess to dig that up . ignore it and if nessesary , problems occure he can stop using bathroom until a better time comes to fix it

Toilet has never backed up.
I have a small 1/4" cable PowerClear auger, but is it even worth running something so small down a large pipe?
Since there can only be a couple feet to the main line, is there any large diameter hand tool that can reach?

 

[Reach4]

At least the standing water did not go higher when you added new water.

 

[Jeff H Young]

yea at least the water didnt rise . but why is water there ? you could camera try to blast it with a hose but thats going to push it further.
Ive never walked away from something like that so I cant really say whether youll get away with it or not

 

[Jeff H Young]

am i correct in assuming youve never had a stoppage? just alittle seepage around base of w/c?

 

[wwhitney]

On the ABS/cast iron joint, I don't think the pictures necessarily show any problem. They match what I would expect to see with a properly installed underground rubber coupling (which has no stop) if there's a slight gap between the pipes. E.g. if one pipe end isn't quite square, and the pipes make contact at the top, but have a small gap at the bottom.

Or another explanation for seeing the end of the cast iron pipe would be if the cast iron for some reason has a slightly smaller than nominal inner diameter. That would also lead to a small amount of standing water, although much less than there is.

On the standing water, reverse slope would explain what you see, but is not the only explanation. There are plenty of inexpensive short inspection cameras, and if you could look just another foot or two downstream it would help. Either you'd see the apparent depth of the standing water go down to 0, which would mean you have reverse slope. Or you'd see the water continue and increase in depth (as the pipe slopes away), which would suggest a downstream blockage.

If there were a way to put a tiny level on the top of the inside of the ABS pipe, that would show whether you have reverse slope or not. But I can't come up with a practical way to do that.

[I guess if you could get an inflatable plug on a tether down into the cast iron, you could fill the ABS with water to just below the top of the pipe. Then maybe you could tell if the remaining air gap is biggest at the upstream end (proper slope) or at the downstream end (reverse slope).]

Cheers, Wayne