Bathroom smell

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27 Jan 2021
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Ireland
Hey ya guys,

So long story short. I'm in a very high risk group for covid. Which means I've been in isolation since the start. Which also means I can't if at all possible get a guy in.

And a few days ago my main bathroom started stinking with that old familiar smell... Seems to be sewer gas leaking in somewhere. I assumed the traps were the issue. So cleaned and sealed with plugs, and overflows with duct tape. But nope, still there. It's a 15yr old ground floor apartment in a 3 story building, so 2 apartments above me using the same waste stack. I don't know the vent stack setup in these buildings.

The toilet waste is rear outlet, and not exactly ideal! The waste pipe comes in to apartment at an upward angle. As can be seen in the photos.

No sign at all of water leak. When I bought the place nearly 2yrs ago, there was a smell. But my engineer put it down to likely being unused traps. Which may well have been true at the time as the previous tenant didn't use that bathroom much. But there's been no smell since.

I have mouldable rubber that I'm tempted to try but any ideas or temporary fixes would be great until I can get someone in. Bearing in mind I'm not in a position to reinstall the whole toilet. And this whole situation is very high risk. I'm running the extractor fan a good amount but I'm not sure that's best or if I'm just drawing more in.

Thanks





IMG_20210127_124010198~2.jpg IMG_20210127_124327738~2.jpg IMG_20210127_123821767~2.jpg
 
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Can you place your sniffer around the back of the pan where those joints are. Doesn`t look great there.
 
I'm after trying there now and can't notice it any more there than anywhere else. I also took the side off the bath just in case of a dead mouse, or leak. And I can't say it's any worse there either. Though the plumbing is anything but tidy. Including a half concreted 4" waste from the service duct, coming in to a 90degree, down in to the floor.

I'm airing it out at the moment and I'll try again. I might try amalgamating tape around the pan seals.
 
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The problem with those rubber bung things is that unless they go in more or less straight they will distort. When they distort, and yours look very iffy especially at the bottom, they will let in smells. As a temporary measure cling film or amalgamating tape as suggested but that is only a very temporary solution even assuming that works. You actually have two rubber bungs that could distort. The white one has a rubber seal that might not be sealing and then you have the black ribbed seal going into the brown pipe that looks very poor.
 
The pan connector looks to be out of line rising to meet the brown pipe .If shorten the , what looks like brown underground pipe, closer to the wall you use a longer or even angle pan connector which would give a better line .
 
Ask your neighbours above if they can check for leaks around their toilets!
Might be running down stack inside riser boxing and wafting odours into your dwelling.
 
Thanks for the replies and suggestions.

As I mentioned above. I decided to try amalgamating tape. I pushed the rubber in to waste pipe a little at the top, put a wide cable tie on the rubber bung. And wrapped every connection and joint in amalgamating tape. Using Teflon tape under it in a few areas just as a kinda gap filler.

I still think I can smell it, tho not that strong. Given how much I wrapped it. I'm suspicious as to whether it was the problem at all.

I disconnected the sink trap, both in case there was a bad seal, and to smell it and see if it was the same smell. Tho there was a reasonable backflow of air. The smell wasn't the same.

The possibility of a leak above running down the stack wasn't one I'd thought of. And I'll definitely look in to that. I'm attaching a layout of the bathroom/building, brown being 4inch waste I can see, green being from the sink. I can access the service duct which has what I assume to be the main waste stack, and there's no smell in there. Unless there's another stack in the wall cavity behind the WC, instead of a tie in.

I'm still kinda clueless as to the what the cause is. Unless a mouse has died in the ceiling or wall. My instinct is saying it's sewer gas or similar. But people have been caught out before.

I might try spraying any visible joints with soapy water to see if I can see any bubbles. But sewer gas is so potent that it might just be too tiny to notice any.

For health reasons I'm genuinely hoping it's a dead mouse rather than gas. It'd be just my luck to get covid while in isolation, from a fecking drain

Any other input or suggestions is very welcome.
 

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No boxing no, unless they put a durgo in the wall or ceiling. Which I pray to feck they didn't.

Do you know would durgos be used in a new build 2005 ish? Cause I am curious how the plumbing is vented. It's a 3 story, Ireland, tho a lot of the builders and materials were UK. So spec should be UK Irish 2000-2008ish, assuming it's not a complete bodge :LOL::eek:
 

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