plumbing mystery going on 2 years :(

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sophroll

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hello all!

desperately looking for some help from experienced plumbers. not sure how much to include so i will just put it all out there.

- moved in to home 2 years ago

- home has 2 bathrooms upstairs and the toilets are back to back; both toilets were new purchased by us and installed when we moved in

- after using both toilets for about a month, they started acting weird; when flushed, a toilet will bubble up from the center of the bowl (big bubbles like you see when you use a water cooler). the toilet then fills very full and then drains very slowly, but all the waste doesn't go down. after draining there is only an inch or so left in the bowl altogether.

- mystery part is that both toilets will do this, but they take turns. as in one will do it for a while and then one day it will switch over and the other one will do it. although it does seem to be one more than the other mostly.

- unrelated to the problem but still useful info, about a year after moving in, we had a leak in the ceiling from a baseboard nail going through a pipe so we had to open up the ceiling and you can see all of the plumbing to the upstairs bathrooms. because of this issue the toilet was removed to repair the pipe behind it for the leak. while this toilet was removed and therefore no toilet was being used, the other toilet NEVER had any problems.

- we've had about six plumbers come look, and because the ceiling is open where all the upstairs plumbing is, they can see how our pipes look and all say pipes and config of pipes look fine

- one plumber said, "it's because you have two low flow toilets back to back" so we replaced one of the toilets (the one that acted up more, in the master) and it didn't fix anything

- one said it was the venting. we have 2 vents for a total of two toilets, 2 sinks and a shower and bathtub. they said we needed more vents and the job was quoted at $3500. happy to do this really if it will fix problem, but we live in townhomes and literally everyone else has this config in their units (you can see all the vents on the roofs of other units and they all have 2 like us). scared to spend $3500 is it's not the issue :eek:

- HELP! if you have any insight we are all ears.

thank you!
 
to me it does sound like a venting issue, but it will have to be assessed buy other plumbers, please find plumbers that can 100% guarantee what the issue is before fixing, we will never do a job that we "think" is the problem and ended up not being...

try flushing vents with a long garden hose, something you can do your self as well. but my advice, get more trustworthy and professional plumbers that will find the exact issue with a guarantee
good luck
 
Does sound like a venting problem.
if the fixture in you bathroom share a common wall the often share a common vent through the roof. That vent through the roof is often the main vent directly from the water closet with other vents connected to this one.

Might be cheaper to have a camera inspection to see if there is a vent blockage.
or maybe no vent at all

quick hand sketch of drain.jpg
 
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