We had a home built for us this past summer. I had a gentleman checking our furnace in Dec, and he also inspected a few other items, one of those being the attic where he saw the venting tubes, and stated to me he didn't know how this house passed the plumbing inspection.. he saw two 3"pipes extending through the roof, those 3" pipes however did not run to the building drain, they instead stopped half way(in the attic)where they were then tied in to 2" pipes. Those two inch pipes extended out to the kitchen sink, the laundry room, and three bathrooms on the main floor. We also have a bathroom in the basement. Further investigation revealed that in fact, a plumbing inspection was never done on this house even though a certificate of occupancy was issued. The building code office came out, and said from what they could see things look OK... though they could not see pitch of the pipes and pipes underneath the subfloor in the basement bathroom, along with whatever else pipes in behind the drywall.
Our basement bathroom started emitting a foul sewer odor... I called a contractor who came out and unplugged our vent pipes on the roof, both were clogged with snow.. the odor disappeared for a couple of days but then returned... I went to Home Depot to get some sealant, thinking maybe this would help.. putting the sealant around the base of the toilet... after talking with an employee at the store and relating a little history of my home, he told me that the vents should not clog up. If in fact they are there is a venting problem.
I really need some help here. I truly believe because we do not have a main vent stack running undiminished in size and as directly as possible from the building drain to the open air above the roof we are having our current problem with the basement bathroom and will probably procure more as time goes on.
We have a rather large home, 2400 square feet on the main floor and we also have a full basement, which we use and it is heated. I don't know if that is needed in determining a solution to my problem but hopefully it helps.
The building code office related things are fine from what they can see. I disagree. I think they are saying that because ultimately they screwed up. They issued a certificate of occupancy without checking that all necessary inspections had been completed. The builder is also at fault, his excuse for not calling to schedule a plumbing inspection was that he thought the plumber had done it. The building code office told me that the owner was responsible for ensuring all inspections were done.
So, in closing, I would appreciate some feedback on this. I'm trying my best to tackle this alone, my husband is deployed to Iraq and not due back until Nov. He is aware of all that is going on but bottom line, I've got to handle everything.
Thank you for your time.
Most respectfully,
Stephanie