My son and I have decided to build out a bathroom in our basement. With some advice of others we're doing pretty good but now we've gotten to fitting the toilet and shower drains to what our design it. All along we thought we had PVC drains but they turn out to be Cast Iron.

Both have a pipe sticking out of the cement. We've removed the cement and found joints for both. The toilet is a 90 degree angle to a pipe and the shower is just a vertical drop into another pipe (looks like a trap). Both seem to be held in with a rubber like substance. Both pipes need to be moved.

What do you suggest? Can we just pull the old pipe out of the joint and replace with one the shape and length we need? Can we change to PVC pipe and how do we do that?

Thanks

Brad

They sell these gigantic rubber couplers with metal pipe clamp (screw tight with screw driver) in all sizes at home depot. It says on the side of it that you can couple ABS with metal using this rubber coupler. I have just installed one in my old house.. didn't seem to be a problem. But, its in my basement so I am not too worried if there IS a problem.

Removing metal pipe can be difficult because it is usually threaded at the joints. But, if it is LEAD then it is really easy to cut through :)

Knucklez

Thanks for the reply. Seems to be cast iron - the house was built in 1980. I pushed on the pipe last night with my foot. Seemed to have some wiggle around the connections.

Any one experience having a compression type fitting? I'm really hoping that these are just held in with a rubber gasket :)

Both pipes I want to move seem to be made from something other than cast iron - they look like PVC from the outside (kind of a shinny black finish). They don't have the rough texture of cast iron. Don't know if that helps or not.

"Both pipes I want to move seem to be made from something other than cast iron - they look like PVC from the outside (kind of a shinny black finish). They don't have the rough texture of cast iron."

You're in luck. You are already converted to plastic. Those black pipes are ABS.
While you may use rubber (Fernco) couplings we don't us them because they aren't a ridged coupling and can bell under weight at the joint creating a trap.
We use No-Hub Couplings(see image) because they support the joint and while the chances are a rubber coupling won't bell this will be under cement. Why take a chance? Good luck, Tom

Thanks for the reply - let me try to explain myself better - wish I was a better artist..

From the street it appears to be cast iron pipe. Just near the end where the bathroom is there is a Y adapter (looks more like a lower case "r") off to the right is where the shower hook up is (about 5 feet away) that runs flat to a trap and ends with a flair in the cast iron pointing straight up from the trap. Out of the flair is a metal pipe (not cast iron) it looks like black PVC but has a metallic sound when tapped with a screw driver. Around the base of this black pipe, in the space between the pipe and the bell on the cast iron pipe appears to be a rubber spacer/gasket. It only sticks out of the cast iron about 1/4 inch and is about 1/4 inch thick.

Back to the "Y" that looks more like an "r" about a foot from there is another cast iron bell (horizontal) from it is another black metal pipe that has a 90 degree elbow to it so it points straight up (about 3" in diameter") this one is attached in the same manner as the other black pipe.

Question - how difficult is it to get these two black pipes separated from the cast iron? Can they be replaced with PVC? If not can they be cut to fit - for the toilet I'm thinking if I moved the angle as far towards the "r" as possible the toilet would be far enough from the wall and if I can use one of those off set floor adaptors to attach the toilet to the floor it would move it enough in the other direction to put it almost exactly where I want it.

For the shower I thought two 90 degree bends would allow me to put the shower drain anyplace I need it.

Would that work or is it time to call in a professional?

Thanks,

Brad

Well, we figured it out last night and it wasn't all that bad.

The toilet was the easiest (if you can say that) the rubber sleave was a pain to over come but using the "High Lift" from my son's Scout made it easy to remove the 90 degree pipe.

The shower got us started - my son just grabbed it and started wiggling it and pulling on it until it broke off in his hands. We then took a saws all and cut the inside of the pipe in two places. Knocked those out (stuck to the rubber) and then pulled the hole thing out of the trap (we had crammed some cloth down the hole to keep from filling it with junk.

Now to adapt to plastic and move forward.

Thanks for the help.

Hey Brad,

"Just near the end where the bathroom is there is a Y adapter (looks more like a lower case "r")"
This is called a "combo", ( combination wye and eighth bend).

" Around the base of this black pipe, in the space between the pipe and the bell on the cast iron pipe appears to be a rubber spacer/gasket. It only sticks out of the cast iron about 1/4 inch and is about 1/4 inch thick."
What you have is a Duel-Tite Gasket, (see image) and this is where you convert to plastic. How it works is you bevel and burr the ends of the PVC and coat the instde of the gasket and the outside of the pipe with Duel-Tite Lubricant or a heavy grease and lever the pipe in with a Johnson Bar or shovel. You have just converted to PVC. Good luck, Tom

Thanks for the "technical" terms. I'll put them to good use.

Possibly, one last question. All of the Duel-Tite Gaskets we've found have been to convert to the white Sch 40 PVC. Someone told us not to use that in the ground or in the cement. Others have said it's OK.

What do you say? Do we need to stay with the black pipe or can we use the white?

Thanks,

Brad

Hey Brad,

"All of the Duel-Tite Gaskets we've found have been to convert to the white Sch 40 PVC. Someone told us not to use that in the ground or in the cement."
This is false. We have used Duel-Tite Gaskets in our new construction back in the 70's in the ground, under the slab, with absolutely no problems. The gasket will accept either PVC or ABS. Back in the 60's we used ABS butfrom the middle 70's on we switched to PVC because it was more ridged and gave us less bells,(traps) in our under ground dainage. Regards, Tom