Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
handyweasel

Old house, no fixture vents, but no problems?

HandyWeasel
10 years ago

Hello! First time posting here. I'm helping out with some renovations on an old New England farm house. We're currently taking out water damaged drywall and putting new flooring in the bathroom, but I noticed none of the fixtures are vented.

There is one vent pipe going up what used to be the exterior of the house, and looks as if it connects to the main pipe to the septic system underground. (The green line in the diagram is just a guess. Gray line shows foundation.)

There aren't any problems with odors or gurgling toilets. The toilet is normally sluggish to flush, but a 5 gallon bucket of water poured in the bowl goes down just fine, so I'm thinking the rim is clogged from the very hard well water.

There is a capped off drain in the crawlspace, under the washing machine, but tiled over. The washer currently drains by a hose that gets stuck into the bathtub.

So my questions are -

- Is there any reason to worry about lack of fixture vents, given that it all seems to work? (The layout would make venting very difficult.)

- Is there any reason to suspect it would be a serious problem (aside from code) to add a standpipe for the washing machine at that capped drain, without a vent? Because the bathtub thing has got to stop.

Comments (2)