How to get rid of rotten egg smell in bathroom
Why does my Bathroom Smell like Rotten Eggs, Sewer, the Trap Primer Needs Replacement
hello and welcome to another episode of
Ken's training today's training is going
to be on a
restroom floor drain trap primer the
call came through today's a Monday call
came through on a Friday after we had
gone home hey the bathroom area smells
like a sewer came in on on Monday and
the bathroom didn't smell but the first
thing I wanted to check was the floor
drain I checked it with my flashlight
I'll show you that in a second and sure
enough the trap at the bottom of the
floor drain is dry indicating that the
trap primer which is this small plumbing
device that's about this big and what it
does is is it interconnects into the
cold water line as someone flushes a
toilet or something like this it's it
does a little spurt of water like this
every time someone does something and it
just constantly bleeds the small amount
of water into the into the floor drain
p-trap in an effort to prevent soil
gases from backing up mind you this only
happens when the sore gas system has a
positive pressure right now the trap I
haven't been primed it manually I've
just left it alone and there's no sore
gases in here because the source system
right now is either at a atmospheric
pressure or below atmospheric pressure
so it's not in positive pressure so is
so that's it and then I'll show you the
steps that we need to to fix and
troubleshoot this all right here's the
floor drain in the restroom now you're
looking through a grate so it can be
difficult to see so what I do is I take
my flashlight I put it through that just
lay it there on top and then while I'm
looking down it what I'll do is a la see
if I can't get you the best angle what
you want to do is you want to see the
exact bottom of the of the trapping on
let me just I'm just trying to show you
this as best I can it might take a
second for me to get the best angle I
don't see here
right there possibly now I keep going
out of focus
anyways that that you know when you're
looking at it in person up through the
camera it's dry so next thing you want
to do is you want to locate where the
trap primer is located so what you do is
you look along your wall here and you're
looking for access hands so I go over
here to this to the next stall middle
stall there's two panels here to access
panels so I already opened them up this
one over here is housing for a shutoff
valve so if there's a problem use that
blue handle valve and you shut off the
water to these toilets over here is
where the access panel should have been
located for the trap primer but when you
look in here you'll see that the only
thing I'm looking at there is a two inch
sewer pipe or vent pipe there's no trap
primer right here so what it did was is
I got my inspection mirror and I started
looking around and I and put my
flashlight in here it's going to be a
little hard to do with all three hands
here
so what I did was as I looked around
here to try to find where the trap
primer is so this is the way that I
found it so when I was using that method
I did find it and I'll show you where
it's located
it is located right in this stall right
behind that blue tape now using the
inspection mirror I could see that there
was a piece of wood on this side where
so goes ceramic tile there's a two inch
or an inch inch and a half thick block
of wood like a two by six and then they
put on the other side of that
primer so what I have to do is I need to
go into the wall that's on the other
side of the wall here and I'll show you
that right now to show you what that
looks like it's in an electrical room
alright so here I am in the electrical
room and just utilizing a tape measure
we have determined that right where that
blue tape is that right there right on
the other side of that drywall is where
the trap primer is approximately located
you see this is a not a good situation I
have all these conduits that I got to
deal with I'm not going to be able to
turn my wrenches very much but I am
committed because this is where it's
located that is the part that has failed
this is where I need to gain access to
when next thing is to break open this
wall see what we can find
okay so I open up the first access hole
and now you can actually see the trap
primer located right there you see a
bunch of calcium deposits located here
at the top as if it's been I don't know
in a poor condition for a long time
there is a shutoff valve with the blue
handle right here and there is a union
right there where I could potentially
break this thing apart going to be tough
to get wrenches on this whole thing no
matter what I do even turning the wrench
is because of this limited access you
can also see that 2x6 block of wood I
had talked about earlier there it is
right there this is the prevailing
reason well there's a couple of reasons
also I didn't have to disturb the
ceramic tile so coming on this side
makes much more logical sense and going
on the other side all I've got is
drywall no ceramic but because of that
block of wood it would have been silly
to go on the other side anyways but on
this side of the wall I do have a whole
bunch of conduits so I don't even know
if it's going to be possible but my
first step is going to be to shut that
water off with the blue handle and then
break this thing apart and then see if I
can't remove this assembly and clean it
out if I can fix it great if not I'll
have to replace it with some type of a
replacement
that's what I'm going to be working on
right now and I'll see if I can't break
that apart with a couple of wrenches if
not off to use a small tubing cutter the
micro tubing cutter they actually cut
that half-inch copper right there line
in order to get this thing apart so I
can start spinning it out so that's what
I'm working on now okay I got the trap
primer out of the wall here it is right
here it says that it's a model PPP track
primer model P - - and anyways there it
is right there you got severe
calcium-magnesium on the top looking at
it straight up and down okay like that
see a bunch of frustation in there it's
possible that if this is just going to
have to be replaced up cleaning up take
it apart clean it up see what I can do
otherwise I'll just have to get another
another one of those trapped primers and
it might have one in inventory
downstairs one other problem that I
experienced was is that even though I
had this blue valve half-inch valve shut
off the
it was leaking pretty bad and it started
leaking down and flooding out this area
pretty bad so I had to go inside the
woman's restroom and shut off the valve
upstream of this one and and so even
though the valve upstream of this one is
shut off you can still see that this one
here is dripping so another problem that
we're experiencing we're trying to
capture that with the bucket down there
right now but you know just part of the
plumbing problems that you come across
so while the restroom is out of service
because I've got the toilets off we'll
work on this right now it's okay we are
underneath the sink here's the trap
primer and I we took it apart cleaned
out there's a strainer right in this
section I cleaned out that strainer I
tried to adjust the needle seat the
valve here which which is like operating
an internal plunger and then I just
connected a 3/8 inch to 1/2 inch metal
flexible line so I could do a test out
here without going in the wall so when
you open the valve this is how much
water comes out I tried to adjust it
here it's just it is not allowing me to
adjust I've played around with it I've
been playing with this few minutes here
trying to get it to get a better
adjustment here but no matter what I do
just keep doing that so it looks like
this part is just not going to work for
us at all we're going to get a
replacement try so here we are back here
we have our brand new
trap primer which is right here it's a
my fam
and it was about $45 a turbine pipe and
supply the overall size is almost
identical to the one I removed it's
slightly shorter but I'm not going to be
installing it with the Union the way
that they had it what I've got what I've
already done is I've already cut out
where the union was located and what I'm
going to do is I'm going to put this
flared poly tubing on here are like that
with the hose clamp one here at the top
and one one here at the bottom so I've
cut out a small section of pipe this
here was the inside the wall was the
Union right there so basically I already
cut this section out so I'm going to put
in a new cut polyvinyl from here to here
and just connect it with hose clamps I
already got that on there with brand new
teflon tape that's ready that's that's
fresh teflon tape here ready to screw in
when I screw it in I'll try to have it
so that the nameplate is facing me so
it's easy to read if I can and I like to
clear the clear vinyl because this way
when it's in operation I can hopefully
see the water discharging out of it so
the next shot you'll see is actually
installed
alright here's the final product inside
the wall I've got the valve opened I had
a couple of leaks that were leaking
right around right around that joint
right there but pretty much got those
leaks solved up now we've got it all the
water turned on and now I'm going to
show you the operation of how this works
I've got my assistant inside flushing
the toilet now you'll notice that every
time he flushes the toilet it's going to
disperse through that clear tubing right
there a small amount of liquid right
there did you see that that's going to
the trap in the floor and that so that
means that every time someone uses the
toilet just a small amount of that
liquid right there water is just going
to keep that trap primed and that's just
how it operates so there you go I just
wanted to give you a demonstration show
you the final product there it is right
there
okay all that's left here is to patch up
the wall but whenever I make a plumbing
repair what I what I like to do is I
like to leave the the the wall open for
at least 24 hours and then we'll come
back here tomorrow we'll check down
inside here to make sure that everything
is dry and that and also we'll check the
piping is to make sure that there's no
leaks that we have to to address because
I certainly don't want to button up the
wall right away with potentially a water
leak and back of there and this is just
an electrical room closet so we'll just
simply wait okay so I just want to
explain that and and that's it thank you
you
