Digging concrete out for soil pipe

[Jblakes]

Morning all,

This isn’t technically a old property question, but we do live in a old house.

We are install a downstairs toilet in the utility and need to deep a trench out for the soil pipe to fit in and do out to the outside drain, this is outside the door in the utility. Can somebody advice the best method to do this?

I have a heavy duty disc cutter machine which I thought about getting some decent discs (probably diamond tipped) and go nuts on the floor. Would that work or is there a better method?

Kind regards

James

 

[Zebra]

Yes, that's a good plan. You could use a chasing machine where you have some depth control rather than freehand, but a big angle grinder with a diamond disk might give you more flexibility if you're confident. A chasing machine won't give you much depth. You want to be sure there aren't any pipes or cables underneath though! Sometimes they're sneaky and hidden where you wouldn't expect them. Once you get as far as you can with the cutting you'll need a SDS hammer drill with a chisel bit.

 

[Jblakes]

Cheers, got one of them too. Guess i've got a busy weekend now then.

Abit off the point but we are debating if to put a shower in the downstairs toilet too, we have one bathroom upstairs with bath and separate shower, we can't decide if having one downstairs would be worth it when our two kids are older and we are fighting over the bathroom. Has anybody done this? Due to the location of our main bedroom we can't put en-suite in without major cost and disruption.

 

[a twig]

My 2p is absolutely worth having a second shower if it fits - trying to get 4 people through a single bathroom in the morning is a nightmare particularly as teenage years arrive

 

[fernicarry]

How is your hot water heated? If its by combi then it will struggle to heat the water fast enough to run two showers at the same time. Also the flow rate from the water main may not be enough for two decent showers.

 

[Stevers]

If you have loft tanks, the downstairs shower will have better pressure than the upstairs one and no need for a noisy pump.

 

[a twig]

How is your hot water heated? If its by combi then it will struggle to heat the water fast enough to run two showers at the same time. Also the flow rate from the water main may not be enough for two decent showers.

We found that as long as you have a decent flow (from a tank or from the water main) electric showers are the easiest way to a second shower that can run at the same time as the first, plus it means you only need to run a single cold water feed to your new shower.

 

[Jblakes]

we have a combi, upstairs in main bathroom we are having a mains fed shower and i guess if we go ahead we will be installing a electric one downstairs. I am looking at the future when we are all fighting for a the bathroom in the morning for work/ school. I can only assume its a nightmare.

 

[Lacan07]

Morning all,

This isn’t technically a old property question, but we do live in a old house.

We are install a downstairs toilet in the utility and need to deep a trench out for the soil pipe to fit in and do out to the outside drain, this is outside the door in the utility. Can somebody advice the best method to do this?

I have a heavy duty disc cutter machine which I thought about getting some decent discs (probably diamond tipped) and go nuts on the floor. Would that work or is there a better method?

Kind regards

James

You can cut the walls of your channel with your grinder or use an SDS drill with pointy chisel and 'bullet hole' your lines. Once you've got the concrete layer out it will most likely be foundation and earth.