Oh - one more thing. If you have more bathrooms than vents, this is not good. I don't know where you get your information concerning plumbing codes or practices, but maybe you might want to double check them.             ==================================================                Delivered by Electronic Sled dogs......WOOF!                   USENET ADDRESS: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it             ==================================================

           In article < This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it                 This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it (Phil Stone) writes... PSI suspect that the drain vent(s) in my house might be clogged PSin some way.  All the sinks drain slowly,   Do you know what material (galvanized, cast iron, PVC plastic) the waste lines are made from? You *can not* tell for sure by looking at the main waste line in the _base_ment.   The best way to tell is by looking at the trap on each fixture and seeing what kind of pipe is attached to the *larger* end of trap. This is the end that goes behind the wall.   If the pipes are made of galvanized steel and the house is over 10 years old, there is a good chance the pipes are clogged with scale and rust. This would account for the slow draining for that particular fixture. Using a hand snake will usually clean the line enough for a good drain. PSand after toilet flushes PSor during prolonged draining (showers, etc.), a snuffling sound PScan be heard from somewhere in the house.   How does the bowl flush? The water should swirl in a counter-clockwise direction as it goes down, and make a sucking or glug, glug noise when it reaches the bottom of the bowl. Then the water level in the bowl should start to rise as the tank refills.   The shower drain also might be made of galvanized steel pipe. This will be harder for you to find out since the trap for showers and baths are installed below the floor and above the ceiling below.   The snuffling sound you mentioned has got me stumped. If you can find out where it's coming from it would help. PSHow can I confirm this,   It's very rare for a vent line to be clogged on the horizontal run behind the walls. Vent clogs are usually located in the main vent stack. This stack usually runs straight down from the roof to the _base_ment, but can contain offsets along the way.   If you're lucky you can take a high powered light and look down the stack to see if anything is clogging it.   Another way to do this is to take a drop light and lower it into the stack. I CAUTION you about using this method. If you do use this method make sure that none of the fixtures in the house are in use, or will be used during this test.   The reason being is that some homes are built with what is called a Wet Vent . This is a method of using the main waste stack as the vent stack. What this means is the waste water goes into the same stack as the air for the vent system. If you lower a drop light into a system like this and someone uses ANY water...well you know what happens when water and electricity come in contact with each other! PSand if the vents are clogged, how can they be cleaned out?   Depends on what is blocking the vent. I've found a fishing pole with a heavy test line, 10oz. weight, and a sturdy hook will do the trick. <seriously             ==================================================                Delivered by Electronic Sled dogs......WOOF!                   USENET ADDRESS: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it             ==================================================

Oh - one more thing. If you have more bathrooms than vents, this is not good. I don't know where you get your information concerning plumbing codes or practices, but maybe you might want to double check them. I get them from over 15 years experience in the commercial construction trades. In that line, I was thinking of ranch _style_ houses. Examples of venting situations (all legal): 1. My mother's house is a ranch with crawl space. I've seen the plumbing.    It has one bathroom at one end, two baths at the other, and a kitchen    in the middle. It has three 2 stacks. One extends from the sink drain    of one bathroom and serves as the vent for all three fixtures. Another    extends from the sink drain of the other two baths (they both share the    same drain) and it vents all six fixtures there. The third one vents the    kitchen sink. All drain and vent plumbing is cast iron. The house was    built in 1963. Tennessee code. 2. My house was built in 1959. It had a laundry room, kitchen, full bath    and half bath. The half bath is located over 20' from the main drain    line, which is 6 cast iron. The remaining fixtures are all within a    few feet of this drain. There was one 2 vent extending from the top    of this drain line just above the point that the second floor bathroom    sink drain enters the line. In effect, the laundry room was vented through    the kitchen sink main drain, which was vented through the bathtub main    drain, which was vented through the toilet main drain, which was vented    through the bathroom sink main drain, which was the only vented fixture.    Astute readers will notice that this arrangement leaves the half bath    unvented! In addition to a snuffling noise, you could watch the water    in the toilet bowl make the noise if you ran the water in the sink next    to it. The room has its own vent now. This was New Jersey code. 3. My brother's house has a laundry room, kitchen, full bath and half bath.    The rooms are stacked . All fixtures are within ten feet of the main    drain, which they all share. The 3 vent line extends upwards from the    top of this drain stack and vents all fixtures. This house was built in    the 30s. The half-bath toilet has been known to produce a snuffling    noise when other fixtures drain. This was New Jersey code. I could go on, since I've done the framing for a few plumbing jobs, but enough. You will notice that neither of the first two houses are particularly old, and NONE of the three have anything like separate vents for each fixture.