On Tue, 15 Feb 2011 23:41:56 -0500, aemeijers
wrote:

On 2/15/2011 11:05 PM, wrote:
On Tue, 15 Feb 2011 22:55:49 -0500,
wrote:

Mother Nature is being sarcastic with me. I went into basement, looking
for leaks from post-blizzard thaw currently underway. Instead, I find
puddle in furnace room (full of nasty things I won't describe), and 2
rotted slits in the bottom center of soil line from toilet, one on
either side of the wye leading up to the flange. Slits are very
straight-edged, almost look like they were done with a router.

I don't have the tools or the time to try to fix this myself this week
month, and my sweating skills suck anyway. Anybody wanna SWAG how much
a plumber is gonna charge me to replace 3-4 feet of copper? Bronze wye
under toilet, and another bronze wye under vent stack a foot away with a
cleanout (blocked by a framed wall) on the back side. Will they be able
to reuse these wyes? I figure it will be half a dozen joints overall
(unless they need to get into the vertical runs), a coupling and maybe
new wyes, and maybe even lifting the toilet and replacing the flange and
starting over. Open ceiling with decent access to the pipes.

To pacify plumber, I'm gonna give him my whole plumbing punch list (half
a dozen items, small to medium), and ask for an estimate for 'later'
work. I also plan to keep saying 'cash' when I talk to him. I may
eventually have all the basement drains replaced with PVC (which should
resist my crappy well water better), but right now only looking for a
good workmanlike spot repair, so I can get furnace room dried out and
start scraping up the filth. At least I don't have to pay golden time
for the work- stuff like this is why I insisted on a house with 2
bathrooms, and the one in the addition feeds into septic line outside
the basement wall and five feet lower, so it is safe to use.

Any useful ideas or sympathy appreciated. Rest of line doesn't show any
rot, but previous owner cleaned and shellacked it 6-7 years ago. Light
tapping along bottom didn't produce any 'dead' sounds.
Your plumber will almost certainly replace it with plastic, and I
would not let him do it any other way.

I'd agree if he was replacing the entire line for me (and depending on
the quote, I may go ahead and spring for that), but how is he gonna to
tie back into the copper? I undertand how you link supply lines, by
soldering a threaded fitting on the end of the copper. But I have never
personally seen a copper to plastic waste line transition. I really
don't wanna open the wall and replace that vent stack right now,
especially since the sink drain ties into it halfway up the wall.

Other than places with bad water like this, I have no heartburn with
copper. It did last 50 years. And back home where they have decent
water, I know of many 60 year old plus installations in perfect shape.
It's called an "MJ" - a "Mechanical Joint" - and it is a heavy guage
rubber connector with a corrugated metal expansion sleave that is
clamped to both the copper and the plastic. They work a treet
transitioning to and from Cast Iron piping too.
Just make sure you get the right one for the transition you are doing.