shower drain vs tub drain--connected to toilet????

5281 Views 2 Replies 2 Participants Last post by mandalala, Jun 24, 2009

mandalala

Discussion Starter · Jun 24, 2009

I have a very small master bathroom, floor space is less than 30 square feet. I have a nasty old whirlpool tub that I wanted to eventually take out and put in a double shower stall, which I really don't want to fool around with now because of the expense and time. I did, however, want to put some tile on the floor because there is gross linoleum in there now. (I was looking forward to the challenge, as I have never tiled anything before, and figured it would be an easy beginner's tile project because it's so small).

Anyway, my father in law, who is a retired plumber, told me that I would have to pull up all the tile when I wanted to put the shower in. Something about how the drain would have to be connected over by the toilet? This makes absolutely no sense to me. I've been googling to see if I can find an answer to this puzzle, with no luck. The way I see it, there is a drain there already, for the tub, so why couldn't the shower drain connect to that?

Any advice would be appreciated!

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ScottR

· #2 · Jun 24, 2009

There's not enough info in your post to tell you for sure, but it could be that the tub drain isn't in a usable location for a shower.

If your father-in-law is a retired pro and has seen the bathroom first hand, I'd have to defer to his assessment. His rationale for mentioning the toilet is that the toilet is probably right next to a waste/vent stack, and the shower drain would need to connect to it.

Also AFAIK in most jurisdictions you would require a 2" drain for the shower, and you may have something smaller for the tub right now.

Chances are you'd have to modify your tile job anyhow when you do the shower conversion (if not for plumbing reasons then for aesthetics), so you might want to do them at the same time.

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