bathtub drain pipe problem

Plumbing Forums

Help Support Plumbing Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Ozzie

Member
Joined
Jul 12, 2015
Messages
7
Reaction score
0
Location
,
Helping a neighbor with bathtub drain leak.
There is the standard bathtub brass drain waste with shoe, overflow and tee.
The brass rotted out in a couple places.
This coupled into a 7” vertical length of threaded 1.5” dia steel pipe, which also rusted out and broke off at the bottom thread.
Then there is a threaded cast iron trap, and a 2” nipple into a Tee fitting in the vertical vent and sewer line.

I tried a large rigid internal wrench or nipple extractor with a long wrench to remove the remaining threaded part of the 7” vertical pipe, won’t budge.
I tried a 30” pipe wrench on the cast iron trap, won’t budge.
I carefully applied heat to the trap, no difference. Wood closeby.
I applied penetrating oil, sitting for 2 days.

My backup plan would be to saw the nipple in half, then saw axially through the threads of the remaining half nipple in the Tee at the top, then partially collapse and unscrew the remaining part of the nipple.

The vent/drain is in an exterior stucco wall.
The tub is an old clawfoot that has been tiled in.
Unfortunately only about 12” of crawl space, and water supply pipes also in the way.

Anybody have any better ideas?
 
It ain't gonna be fun, it ain't gonna be easy, but you have already figured out how to fix it.

But are you sure that the top of the trap is actually threaded? Not to say that it isn't, but I don't recall ever having seen such an arrangement before.
 
dremel with abrasive reinforced blades. 20 pack
1 can of whoop ass..
determination

can_whoop_ass.jpg
 
The 7" vertical steel pipe that rusted and broke off had threads at the cast iron trap end, so pretty safe bet there are threads in the trap.
 
That is often the case, the galvanized pipe got cut off from a section that was threaded, and the threaded end is in the lead caulked joint. Doesn't mean that the joint is a thread joint. I would verify before you try to pick the threads out of there, maybe save yourself some work,.
 
Back
Top