Rough In Plumbing Help

[Spinny]

Hey folks. First time poster here. I've enjoyed reading volumes of threads on here, and it has been a big help in designing my garage / man cave. A bit of background on my garage. It will be 30' x 48' x 10 ceilings. I plan to fully insulate it along with dividing it into two. Half will be a garage and the other half will be a social area. It's usage will be to hold my daughter's car along with having a place for my friends and I to watch football on the weekends and drink an adult beverage or two.

The question I'm running into is how to arrange the plumbing fixtures in the bathroom in this detached garage (I will try to post a sketch-up). The contractor will begin construction in the next couple of weeks, so I need to finalize the fixture arrangements. Their quote includes roughing in plumbing. I hope to have a toilet and a sink in the garage. How should this "roughing in" work? Should I move the fixtures more toward an inner wall? I live in Southern Indiana and we have more than our share of freezing nights during the winter. I plan to have a wood burner for heat as needed. Recommendations on a heat source for the bathroom to keep pipes from freezing? Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[tomroblee]

You will have less chance of freezing if the plumbing runs through an interior wall. An added bonus is that you could put an access panel on the back side of the wall just in case you ever do have plumbing problems.

Don't forget a good vent fan---especially if you like hard boiled eggs with your adult beverages.

Any small electric heater should be sufficient for a bathroom. I would opt for a regular electric bathroom heater just for appearance and safety sake.

As much as I love a wood fire, I would certainly consider a mini split heat pump for year round comfort and humidity control.

Don't forget that you may want to have some sort of water heater.

 

[MushCreek]

I would rough-in a shower as well, if you have the space. I use my barn shower more than you would think.

As for cold weather, I shut down my shop once it gets too cold. I have an outside, underground shut-off and drain. Once the pipes are drained, I use RV antifreeze in the toilet and other drain traps. Here in SC, I only have the water off for about 2 months in the winter.

 

[493mike]

Tom has a good answer. Consider a instantaneous electric water heater.
Mike

 

[Spinny]

Thanks for the suggestions. I think I will move them to the interior wall. I do plan to have a min-split but mostly for the warmer months.

In regards to the roughed-in plumbing - how many holes will they have in my concrete, and how does this normally get arranged outside of my slab? I'm curious to how all of this will connect to my house. Thanks again and Merry Christmas!

 

[brownbagg]

i would do a block out for the toliet, so you can adjust after the slab poured, the block out would be grouted later and be hid by the toliet base

 

[Cyberbear]

In my shop I prefabricated the sink and toilet drain and installed them before the slab was poured, being careful to take good measurements of the toilet drain that was stubbed just below the floor surface, thus allowing a flat area all around the toilet base for later setting the toilet. After the pour I simply chiseled out 1/2" of concrete and did the plumbing connection. I also installed a simple portable electric heater in the wash room that cycles off and on when the temps are freezing and don't want frozen pipes inside the building.

 

[Spinny]

Can you elaborate what this "block out" is or would look like? Also, do these drains normally get stubbed to some junction outside the poured slab when they are roughed in?

 

[readhead]

I would like to think that you already went over all of this with your contractor. Is this something you just decided to add? Has the water and sewer run already been accounted for? Where do they terminate? Not trying to be hard on you but it seems kind of late for this type of question.

 

[Richard Cranium]

I would also insulate my bathroom area from the shop, so that your heater don't have to try to heat the whole shop also. Yes on the inside wall, Yes on access panels.
A lot of the time the contractor will stub out the pipe aprox. 1 foot out side of the slab in a hole that should already be there and then put like duct tape over the ends so to not get them full of back fill.

 

[bcoke]

I would put the bathroom on the dividing wall thus having only one wall of it an outside wall.....an electric bathroom heater, point of use electric water heater, Toilet and a sink , a Urinal would not be wasted in a MAN Cave..........then a slop sink could be placed in the car garage side plumbed through the wall to the bathroom lines.......I think this will get more use than you would imagine , Merry Christmas to all GJers bobbycoke

 

[Spinny]

Thanks for the help. My wife actually made the arrangements with the contractor while I was overseas. I'm back now and hoping to finalize everything with the contractor over the next week or so. I'm not that familiar with plumbing so this is why I was hoping for help.

I like the idea of moving the bathroom to the midpoint wall. Should the water / waste plumbing drains come to the interior of the wall or a specific distance away from the wall? Sorry for the silly questions, trying to finalize the design and then make the final arrangements with the contractor.

Merry Christmas!

 

[ard]

I am terrified when I see 'finalize' repeated so often...and you havnt had one conversation yet!

When I did my barn, shop, bathroom (w shower) and kitchen, the only thing in the slab was drains.

A drain in the wall where the sink(s) would go. Located right in the middle of the 2x6 wall.

A dragon and toilet flang, precisely the distance from that wall. And a drain for. The stall shower. That one we did a box so I could finish it when we framed, did a hot mop, etc.

All other rough plumbing was copper, from above. I am not a fan of running pipe in the slab, especially if there is no need.

When you say you are 'curious' as to how this will be tied into the home, yeah... You should be. For your sake, the homes septic had better be engineered for the added bath...AND the shop had better be higher that the home...at lease 1/4 inch higher for each foot away from the home.

What specifically did your wife negotiate in terms of "rough plumbing"?? What will be the interior finish when the contractor is done? Stud wall? Insulated? Or donee sheetrock and paint?.. If the latter, you will need to have pretty predicte locations for all this. Sinks within a few inches, give or tale 12" let's say. (A cabinet can hide a drain and supply lines that have to jog left or right... But a toilet? It will set ON that toilet flange. Same with a shower. While you can box stuff and adjust a little bit., you'd beter be pretty certain within a few inches. IMO

do a google image search for 'rough plumbing" fir sinks, potties, showers...will help you quite a bit.

Merry Christmas!

 

[Cyberbear]

For me my most important concern was the proper placement of the toilet drain, which I placed myself prior to the slab pour. I was there to assure the framers put up the plumbing wall the correct distance from the toilet drain, and everything worked out well.
I eventually installed a commercial deep porcelain over cast iron sink rather than a typical residential set up. I envy the guy who gets my place when I kick the bucket.

 

[rburke65]

I would think the rough in plumbing should be done before the walls are done. Do you not need permits before all this is started? Plans? Sanitary, septic approval? I couldn't get a build permit until I had a "Down Spout Permit". The county Sanitary District wanted to know where my rain water from the roof would be going....dah.....on the ground, where it's been going for 5 billion years! No it won't ..... They didn't want it going into my septic tank. Don't know why. They want it going to a stream, lake pond, or drainage ditch and if not, I had to dig a dry well. A lot to do before hand.