Toilet Flange Questions

[Dan M.]

I discovered my toilet was leaking through the floor into the crawlspace and have removed the toilet and part(?) of the toilet flange. I have attached a picture that shows I have removed an outer, very corroded, metal ring that was nailed to the floor but there remains a plastic piece that reads "4x3 Ring Must Be Attached To Floor". I am assuming that this inner plastic piece is also part of the flange but I want verification before I work on it. The piece extends down as you can see in the closeup picture and I lifted on it and it seems to be pretty secure to the soil pipe. I am not sure if it is glued to the pipe or threaded in or what. Is it an adapter that is part of the pipe?

My other question is about the subfloor which is what the old flange sat on. It is pretty wet and I question how well screws will hold in it. Replacing wood would greatly complicate this. Thanks for any help!

 

[Cacher_Chick]

If the wood subfloor is no longer solid, it is going to be a smelly rotten mess, no matter what you do to fix the drain.

The metal ring was an integral part of the plastic flange. If the subfloor was solid, you could fit a 2-piece repair flange under the lip of the plastic flange and screw it down.

If you cannot fix the floor, cut a piece of 3/4" plywood to fit tightly around the waste pipe in the crawl space, and use construction adhesive and screws to secure it to the bottom of the subfloor. This will stiffen the area under the toilet and provide solid wood for longer screws o hold down the repair ring from above. It is surely not as good as fixing the floor, but will do in a pinch.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Dan M.]

If the wood subfloor is no longer solid, it is going to be a smelly rotten mess, no matter what you do to fix the drain.

The metal ring was an integral part of the plastic flange. If the subfloor was solid, you could fit a 2-piece repair flange under the lip of the plastic flange and screw it down.

If you cannot fix the floor, cut a piece of 3/4" plywood to fit tightly around the waste pipe in the crawl space, and use construction adhesive and screws to secure it to the bottom of the subfloor. This will stiffen the area under the toilet and provide solid wood for longer screws o hold down the repair ring from above. It is surely not as good as fixing the floor, but will do in a pinch.

Since the center piece is part of the original flange why would the center piece be difficult to remove? Are some threaded or would they have glued it to the pipe?

 

[Reach4]

Since the center piece is part of the original flange why would the center piece be difficult to remove? Are some threaded or would they have glued it to the pipe?

It is glued. However it looks like the pipe is PVC and the flange remainder is ABS.


Sioux Chief 888-gpg closet flange has a 4 inch long tail that will fit inside of a 3 inch PVC pipe. http://www.siouxchief.com/docs/defa...inage/closet-flanges---brochure.pdf?sfvrsn=12 says it has a stainless ring, but some documentation on that site says the ring is PVC. Doing this search on an auction site shows a stainless ring: pushtite closet flange 888

That unit has the advantage of not having to be glued to the pipe, so it would be easily removed later if desired.

 

[Terry]

Those are ABS fittings that are glued.

You can go in the crawl and cut out what you have, and then using a coupling, glue in new stuff.

They also make a split repair ring; not my first choice.
Or a flat metal repair ring that goes over what you have. The spacing is farther out where it can catch good wood.
You need a way to secure the new closet bolts to the floor. I toilet that moves winds up breaking the wax seal.

If you reuse any of that old wood, you might want to consider painting it with Zerolac. That seals the wood and the smells.

 

[Reach4]

Those are ABS fittings that are glued.

Is ABS pipe white on the inside, or is that white in the photo some deposit such as calcium?

 

[Dan M.]

Is ABS pipe white on the inside, or is that white in the photo some deposit such as calcium?

The soil pipe is black. I guess the white you see must be excess glue that ran down the inside or calcium as you suggest.

Thanks for the great help! I will take another look at the subfloor from the crawlspace to see if cutting out the wet wood from below is something I want to get into. Otherwise I'll take cacher_chick's suggestion and add some additional wood from below. I can't afford to break any tile since I have no extras.

 

[Dan M.]

I have now cut the rotten subfloor away from below and made a new plywood insert and added support so that the floor is very solid. I used a PVC flange with a SS ring and a flexible coupling between the new PVC pipe below the flange and the existing ABS pipe. Everything looked good and I installed the Drake toilet with a Danco Perfect Seal. It is a rubber seal but has wax inside. However, the toilet isn't flushing properly. I notice that the flapper immediate reseats itself on this toilet sop i held the handle down until the tank completely drained. Sometime the bowl is empty and flushing causing a violent flush, spraying some water out of the toilet. If I flush a second time the bowl fills high without actually flushing.

I noticed a couple issues while I spent hours in the crawl space working on the floor. 1) there is no vent lint between the toilet and the horizontal waste pipe. Since the pipe from the second floor toilet ties in the the horizontal waste line next to the first floor toilet, I suspect it is a wet vent (correct?) but this means the downstairs toilet needs to vent through the horizontal line to get to the wet vent. 2) The horizontal line does not have continuous downward slope. I could see liquid in the line when looking down through the toilet flange on the first floor.

I'm wondering if the new low flow toilet could be more sensitive to these issues than the old high flow toilet. I have now called a plumber to assess the situation but I'd be curious what you folks think. I'm wondering if an air admittance valve would help for the toilet (if this is within code). If the horizontal pipe is the problem then it seems like the whole pipe will need to be cut and sufficiently shortened to allow drainage. I debated about the Danco seal vs. wax rings so I'm also wondering if that could be an issue, although it doesn't appear to be leaking.

 

[Cacher_Chick]

I am not familiar with the Danco brand, but if it is the wax with the rubber horn, it can cause a problem if everything is not kept perfectly centered when the bowl is set, as the rubber horn can restrict the opening in the flange.

 

[Reach4]

Danco Perfect Seal. It is a rubber seal but has wax inside.

Here is a link that describes that Danco: http://www.danco.com/Products/Toilet-Parts/Toilet-Seals/Perfect-Seal/Perfect-Seal™-Blue-10718

have now called a plumber to assess the situation

What did the plumber think? Bad toilet?

I notice that the flapper immediate reseats itself on this toilet sop i held the handle down until the tank completely drained.

I don't think that could happen with a good toilet.

What happens if you dump a 5 gallon bucket of water into the toilet bowl as high and fast as you can without overflowing?

 

[Jadnashua]

Pop the cover and verify that the hose is properly positioned and draining into the overflow tube. If it came dislodged, the bowl will NOT refill properly, and it is typical that alternating flushes are required. The first doesn't flush well, but refills the bowl. The second works 'normally'. Modern low-flow toilet almost universally do not empty the tank when you flush...the height of the water helps with pressure and volume like a water tower does. The flapper is designed to shut off while there is still water in the tank.

No toilet will work properly if there is standing water in the drain line.

 

[Dan M.]

Getting a plumber on Thanksgiving week was a lost cause. He's supposed to arrive tomorrow. Here's an update: 1) I called Toto and they had me remove the toilet and fill it with water to determine if a faulty toilet was causing the water level to drain too low. When I did this the water stayed at a much higher normal level so the toilet seems OK. This has to mean there is a vacuum drawing the water out. 2) When the upstairs toilet flushes there is obviously pressure in the waste line because some little gas bubbles perc through the small amount of water in the new toilet. Additionally, when I have duct tape across the opening I can tell there is pressure on the other side. 3) When I tried to flush the new toilet the water level either rose too high in the toilet and didn't flush, as would happen with a clog, or it flushed but sprayed water out of the toilet. Yikes! That seems like a vent problem from what I've seen. I've attached a drawing of my horizontal waste line with the drain lines that tie into it. None of the downstairs drain lines have any visible vent lines which means, if they vent, the drain from the upstairs bath is a wet vent and all the downstairs lines must vent through the horizontal line in order to vent to the roof, which seems like a poor design, especially if the horizontal line has liquid/solids in it. 4) I also attempted to quantify the slope of the horizontal line. From point A to B on the drawing the pipe rises almost 2". This would roughly mean that the line is about half full.

Regarding the question about dumping a bucket of water in the toilet, which was also suggested on the Toto web site, the water all went down but not as fast as I could dump it. The site stated this indicates a vent problem too.