Keep in mind that I have already dug up the side of my house to find the break described below.
I have a long sweep cast iron 90 that is broken. The bell end is attached to the sanitary vent. A few inches above the bell, on the sanitary vent, the shower drain tees in. There is some sort of black plastic gasket inside the bell connecting the bell and the vent.
The lower part of the 90 goes into a cast iron reducer, which in turn, goes into a cast iron Y. All cast iron parts are connected with the black plastic gasket as described above.
A plumber looked at it and told me it would cost around $800. He said he would have to cut the 90 in the middle, pull the bell off the sanitary vent, pull the reducer out of the Y and replace with PVC. This makes sense to me but I am skeptical about the price. How difficult would it be to yank the bell off the vent and the reducer out of the Y?
Please see the pictures and offer any other suggestions or a better way to do this.
I don't have any plumbing experience.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Cut off the bell on the horizontal pipe (not the bell that the elbow is inserted into, but the next one because the next one has a long length of pipe). Use a Fernco (rubber with clamps) coupling to attach PVC or ABS pipe. Cut the elbow close to the bell, and remove the bell. It looks like a rubber "doughnut" type seal, so you can burn out the rubber, but it will smell horrible. You may be able to remove the bell by hitting it with a hammer all around the edges, forcing it down. The bell may also crack off. If that does not work, slice all the sides off the bell with a Sawzall or reciprocating saw. You will have segments of the bell and a clean pipe, ready for a Fernco. Just attach a PVC or ABS elbow in the middle.

Hmmm... I don't like the advice suggested by castironmaster at all!

If you don't have ANY plumbing experience then this is probably not the place to start exploring things. If you make a major mistake and have to get a plumber in this could get even more expensive, so at this time I would suggest that you get a couple more quotes from other reputable (licensed/insured) plumbers and then make your decision after that.

If you do decide this is something you want to tackle, we are glad to walk you through this but it will not be an easy job, for sure!

Post back with your thoughts, OK?

Mark

PS: If castironmaster knew anything about the neoprene gasket in the bell of the fitting he would know that all the grab of the seal is inside the depth of the bell of the fitting where heat would not melt anything. In this case, a long lever tool is all that is needed to pry the fitting loose from the neoprene gasket. Further, cutting the bell of the 4"x2" wye is a bad idea as well as it not only unnecessary, but matching a fernco clamp up to the thicker bell would be almost impossible.

Gentlemen,

This post is 4 1/2 years old. If quitssteel hasn't fixed it by now, he ain't gonna.