Simple Bathroom Plumbing Job - Inspector Issues

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JackLambert

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Hello,

So, I have a shop that I am putting a bathroom in. Should be a just stupid-simple job, right? Well, I have an inspector that seems to be making up code rules just to bust my balls (he's openly stated that he doesn't think homeowners shouldn't ever touch plumbing, and that I should have to pay a professional (who wants $5,000 to install $500 worth of materials, which I can't afford)). Anyway, he's told me a bunch of stuff that just boggles my mind, because I see diagrams all over the internet (including here) that look like exactly what I was planning to do. But who knows, maybe I'm just dumb, and maybe my search skills for the code book are bad, so I'm hoping I can run some of the things he's telling me by you good folks, and someone can confirm (or deny) my opinion of the inspector.

First, see the attached pic - it shows the basic layout, along with the two different proposed lav sink drain scenarios, both of which I'm being told are code violations.

Option #1 (the original plan - now under concrete so I can't change it) was to have the lav sink dump into the section of vertical pipe that's below the toilet. Inspector rejected that idea a month or so ago, last time he was out, and told me (at that time) to do it like Option #2 blow. OK, I don't really think a vented lav sink on a 2" drain pipe is going to create a problem draining into a 4" pipe below the toilet (which is vented again about 18 inches past where the 2" pipe connects to it), but I can see how we might technically rule that as a code violation since it could (in theory, I guess) siphon the toilet trap above.

Option #2 Run the lav sink over and dump it into the 3" vent stack. On his most recent visit (today), he tells me he's sorry he told me to do it this way last time, but he has since read the code book again and realizes now that I can't drain into the vent stack at all, and I have to either jackhammer up the concrete and redo everything underground, or I have to cut a hole in the side of the shop and run a pipe out to the exterior and then dig down and connect that to the main line heading for the septic field.

OK, so Option #1, I could kind of maybe see the code-logic - but option #2 is illegal? Come on - the internet is littered with diagrams of plumbing systems that drain into the vent stack! Are they all wrong? Am I crazy? Or is this guy just busting my balls because he can?

Any advice would be much appreciated (particularly if someone can point out some section of the code I could go back at him with to argue either of the two proposed methods above is kosher - maybe quoting him chapter and verse will get this done with).

Thanks,
PlumbingDiagram-1.png
 
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JackLambert

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Follow up note: his issue with draining into the vent stack is NOT the long-sweep-at-bottom of vent required. (swaping out the sanT for a long sweep T was already on the list of things todo - I was going to dig up and replace with a long-sweep (that part is fairly easy to dig out and get to, as it's right by the edge of the slab).

Second follow up note: the inspector won't tell me what code I am violating, nor will he tell me the problem I am supposedly creating, he just says "that's a code violation, not my job to tell you what or why, you should have hired a plumber to do this job".
 

JackLambert

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Here's a better diagam (and simplified to show just the current beef the inspector has with my setup - leaves out the original plan that was to drain lav into pipe below toilet). In this diagram, things are correctly shown as vertical and horizontal - no guessing. :)

My plan is in black, inspectors comments and proposed setup is in red.
 

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JackLambert

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And here is my original plan, which the inspector shot down (concrete placement shown in this one). As with the one I just posted, this one correctly shows what is horizontal an what is veritcal.
 

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Reach4

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If that stack pipe has not been used as a drain, you would not even need the extra vent line of the black drawing. The fitting at the trap arm would be a 3" x 3" x 2" PVC DWV Sanitary Tee with a trap adapter in the side. You would use ABS or PVC according to your other pipes.

The transition from vertical to horizontal should be a combination 45+wye often called a combo, or just use a separate 45+wye. That would be what the inspector is complaining about I think. I am not a plumber. Idaho uses IPC.

However on your diagram 2, you are drawing what could be a 45+wye on the black diagram.

Looking at your drawing 3, I made what I labeled Dwg 4. It differs in that the wet vent from the lavatory is on the same level as the big drain. Maybe that should be 3 inch, but I am thinking 2 is OK. A is a long sweep, and B is a long sweep changing from vertical to horizontal and feeding a wye entering into the side of drain horizontally.

I have another idea. Suppose the existing big vent dry vents the toilet, and the vented lavatory adds in to a wye, maybe rolled to 45 degrees, downstream of the toilet. No wet venting involved. I don't know what would be acceptable to him. You might be better off letting him jerk you around and you be humble-sounding.
 

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JackLambert

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The connection of the 3" stack to the 4" outflow line is going to be a 45+Wye - sorry for my poor drawing skills there. So the 45+Wye issue is NOT his complaint about me connecting to the vent stack - he is now saying that I can't connect anything to that stack (which I can't understand -- isn't "wet venting" a thing? And in this case I'd only have about 18 inches of wet-vent, on a 3 inch stack, which is (I think) way oversized as a vent for a toilet+lav).
 

JackLambert

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At this point, I'm ready to go lookup the laws on what happens if I just never call him back and let the permit expire. Do they come arrest me? Do they fine me some significant amount? Do they send guys with bulldozers to knock my shop over because there's un-approved plumbing in there? It's my shop, I just wanna be able to go to the bathroom and wash my hands without having to stop work, clean up sufficiently to go inside the house, walk back to the house (particular in the winter when it's cold/snow everywhere outside), etc.

To add insult to injury, the toilet is already set (has been since Christmas), and I had the lav hooked up draining into the pipe below the toilet for about 5 months (worked great), and after his last visit when he said I couldn't do that, I capped that branch off and re-routed so it drains into the vent (also works great) for about the last month. None of the traps siphon, nothing goes glug-glug when it drains, no smells ever back up into the shop, toilet flushes very well, etc. There is 0 actual problem here.

Anyway, sorry for venting, frustration level is just high.
 

Terry

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These drawings are off the Seattle inspectors office. Either your inspector doesn't know how to plumb, or he's just upset.
I'm assuming that the 3" vent in your drawing has no waste from a floor above.

index.php
 

JackLambert

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Correct, this is all on one floor, nothing coming down from upstairs. Can you provide the link from the site you got that from? I would love to pull that up and show it to him on his next visit.

Pretty sure he's just upset - as I alluded to already, he has flat out told me that he doesn't believe homeowners should be allowed to do their own plumbing and that I really should have called a real plumber to save myself all the grief he's giving me (which I tried, but as I already noted, the real-plumber quote from the guy he recommended was almost $5,000, which is out of my price range).
 
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