Ellie's hall bathroom

[Gukki]

Ok, we can remove everything to the joists and rebuild the floor completely.

The darned pipes are an other matter. They don't run parallel to the joists. which I guess is why they put them over the subfloor in the first place. The pipes also T off between the floor joists to supply the vanity on the other side of the room. Below is a picture with descriptions.

My concern with building a whole proper floor for the tub is the added height of that part of the floor versus the rest of the room. The tub should not sit any higher than the rest of the bathroom floor. It's already quite a high tub at 21".

Thats why we think of just building the floor up with 3/4" plywood, just to clear the pipes and rest the tub on that. The only concern being the circa 1/2"gap that the front feet of the tub will have to span.

[bbcamp]

Ellie, replumbing that with Pex and Sharkbite fittings will be easy. Pex is very flexible, so you can feed it through holes in the joists kinda like cables. A plumber can do this in less than 1/2 a day. Then you can re-build the subfloor directly on the joists and save all that height.

[Gukki]

Hi Bob,

Well, we are in Cook County, IL where copper is CODE!. Pex is not even available in our local HD and Lowes. Anyways, the inspector would never ok it. Despite the economy, the local licensed plumbers would charge us an additional $800 at least. We on the other hand live in markedly reduced circumstances , so we NEED to keep the cost down.

[lasvegaslenny]

Ellie. running copper is not as difficult as you may think, especially when dealing with 1/2" copper.

Buy yourself a torch (the yellow one not the blue) and a those handy dandy pipe cleaners made by oatey and flux and solder and a little practice and I promise you can do the soldering yourself.

Once you have it together and nothing is leaking you know you are good to go.

There are lots of great tutorials on the net about how to solder copper pipe.

[Honeydo]

wow, you aren't kidding.......seems like some towns in cook county have their own codes but do require copper, galv, supply pipes. Wonder how long the cast guys fought the adoption of copper.

but check this out from Westchester

building sanitary sewer pipe shall be Cast Iron Pipe or Vitrified Clay Pipe.

Can you say Annuity.

edit add ( Guess the unions still using that Mrs. O' Leary leverage.)

[Gukki]

Haha Honeydo, You should see the vent stacks, all copper too. Anyhow, we will leave the pipes in place and build up flooring around it.

So, the next question I have concerns the height of the toilet flange.

We have removed the floating plywood down to the 1/4" ply subfloor which is in good shape, so we will leave that in.
The top of the toilet flange reaches 1 3/4" above that existing subfloor.
We are planning to add 3/4" plywood over that, followed by Durock, I think that's 1/4" thick? Followed by thinset (how much " will that add?) and 7/8" porcelain tile. That would leave the toilet flange about 1/4" above the tile floor.
Is that ok? Should the flange be flush with the tile?


^=========== Toilet flange=============
|???????????????????????? about 1/4" between top of tile and top of flange_________
|_____________________|||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 3/8" Tile
|_____________________]][[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[ Thinset thickness?
|_____________________//////////////////////////// Durock thickness?
|.................................^
|.................................3/4"Plywood
v_____________________v_________________________
_______________Subfloor_____________________________________________


The flange is in good condition too, We don't want to have to lower it, nor do we want to build up the floor any higher, unless we absolutely have to.

How should we proceed?

[Gukki]

Hello, hello, is anybody out there?

My dearest Husband is on his way to HD, picking up the plywood, waiting for instructions based on your expert opinion on thickness needed etc.

Thanks for prompt replies.

[cx]

Ellie, I wouldn't even consider doing that floor with anything but deck mud if I were actually trying to raise the height that much.

That said, I would never raise a floor only to accommodate the height of an existing plumbing flange. Those can be changed rather easily, depending upon type.

Originally Posted by Ellie

We have removed the floating plywood down to the 1/4" ply subfloor which is in good shape, so we will leave that in.

I would not leave any 1/4" plywood in the subfloor package. Are you sure that's what you have?

Piling up layers of plywood to gain thickness isn't my favorite method, but if you're gonna do that, so be it. Looks from your calculations like changing to half-inch CBU would get you closer to where you want to be.

Using deck mud would get you exactly where you want to be.

My opinion; worth price charged.

[jadziedzic]

The closet flange should rest on top of the finished floor - if it sticks up any it will likely hit the bottom of the toilet, which may prevent a good seal. Your best bet is to remove the old flange and riser pipe and replace them. Don't glue the riser in place until the floor is completed (just stick it part-way into the fitting below); that way you can remove the riser, cut it to the precise length, then glue the riser and closet flange.

[Houston Remodeler]

What Tony said. I do the exact same thing. A removable riser pipe is a great asset for a lot of reasons. Install it permanently when the tile is finished.

[Honeydo]

I think he's got either cast or copper DWV required by code?

As CX said about the floor overall or the 1/2 cbu, otherwise, if you have to lower it,

If copper pipe, is the flange copper or cast brass? Eitherway it could be unsweated with a MAP torch while you have things open leaving the riser in place and later reinstall same flange, if it's in good shape or a new one (about $30) could be easily reinstalled. edit add ( after final floor is installed)

Cast . that would be some DIY undertaking if you can't convert to PVC,

[Gukki]

Thanks guys.

CX: DH says it's 1/2", but it seems to me it's just a tiny bit less, which is why I called it 1/4". It feels quite solid to walk on. So if we do decide to leave it, and add 3/4" ply, in addition to screwing the sheets down, should we also use construction glue, as I think Ed had advised earlier in the thread. How much glue would we use, and would we apply/spread it all over or an S-shape?
'

Tony, Paul and Ed: The flange is cast Iron. If we really need to, we will replace it. Or, as CX said, we could put in the 1/2" Durock. That should get us very close to having the flange rest on top of the tile.
But, if the bottom of the flange should end up 1/8" to 1/4" above the finished tile, is there a possibility of shimming it with something like hard plastic shims? As long as the toilet fits over it?

[Houston Remodeler]

If its cast iron, normally they are so solid they will survive a fire. Shimming the flange isn't the issue, shimming the toilet may very well be. Do a dry fit ahead of time to be sure. Don't wanna be making that repair so late in the game. Removing the riser and replacing it with PVC early on would be the easiest way to solve the problem if it comes to that.

[Gukki]

Paul, I will take your advice and make a decision on what toilet to put in, so we can check its bottom end.

Thanks everyone!

[Honeydo]

I certainly didn't advise using construction adhesive in any context that I remember in this thread. Only use for attaching the initial subfloor to joists but that does not have anything to do with your sitaution described in this thread.
The only adhesive I would ever use between flooring panels would be a thin spread liquid glue like tite-bond in very limited applications, and I don't recall needing it or wanting it in your sitaution.

Do Not use construction (tube) adhesive in that application.