THE SOIL PIPE
CHAPTER 6 OF PLUMBING DESIGN AND ESTIMATE
SOIL PIPE
Soil Pipe – any pipe that receives and conveys discharges of water closet, with
or without the discharge coming from other fixtures to the house drain or
house sewer.
The word soil is affixed to pipe installation that carries human waste coming
from water closet.
Soil Stack – soil pipe that is installed vertically.
Soil Branch – soil pipe installed horizontally
SOIL PIPE
SOIL PIPE
The National Plumbing Code on Soil Pipe Provides:
1. That, at least one of the vertical stacks in the plumbing system must extend
to full size through the roof for the following purposes:
a. To ventilate and dispose off the sewer gas above the roof
b. To prevent siphoning of the water trap seal by force of suction
c. To prevent the possibility of back pressure which may force the water seal
off the fixture trap.
SOIL PIPE
2. Any structure with a house drain installed, must have at least one soil stack
or stack vent, extended full size above the roof not less than 30 cm long and
should not be less than 75mm (3”) diameter on the size of the drain whichever
is smaller.
SOIL PIPE
3. As a general rule, vent stack must be extended and terminate through the
roof of the building. When the roof is to be used other than protection from
weather, the vent stack should be extended no less than 2.0 meters above
the roof.
INSTALLATION REQUIREMENTS
Soil Pipe Roughing in – where the plan layout of the entire building installation
must be prepared. It includes, location of fixtures, size of partitions, location of
doors and windows as well as the lowered ceiling that will conceal the soil and
waste branches.
Relocation of soil or vent stack requires good judgement to accommodate
the runs of associated vent, waste and water pipes in a more practical way.
THE PLUMBING CODE ON SOIL PIPE
1. The soil pipe shall be properly concealed or embedded in columns, walls
or partitions installed prior to the construction of the building.
2. The entire installations in building such as location of fixtures, thickness of
the partitions, location of doors and windows, drop ceiling, electrical layout
and outlets and their relations with each other shall be considered in the
preplanning stages prior to the rough in work.
3. The soil branch that will directly receive waste from water closet shall be
short and direct as practicable.
4. Soil pipe joints shall be tight and free from liquid or gas leak. Installation
workmanship shall be strictly in accordance with the standard practice of
the trade involved.
THE PLUMBING CODE ON SOIL PIPE
5. Soil pipes not embedded in concrete wall, columns or partitions shall be
anchored rigidly by means of metal hangers.
6. That changes from vertical to horizontal directions shall be done by using
a. ¼ bend
b. Long sweep ¼ bend
c. Two 1/8 bend
d. Combination y and 1/8 bend
SIZE OF SOIL PIPE
There is no definite formula ever formulated to determine the size of soil pipe
for a particular installation. This is maybe because of the variable conditions
relative to its service.
It would be more difficult for a plumber to ascertain how often and what time
a plumbing fixture might be used. And to determine the size of the soil pipe on
the basis of maximum discharge of all fixtures connected to it in a minute or
an hour interval would be nobody’s guess.
It would be certain that all fixtures connected to the plumbing system, would
never be used or flush simultaneously at one point in time. And it would be
more impossible for the soil pipe to be carrying a maximum load from all
fixtures connected to it in one single moment.
THE FIXTURE UNIT
In the absence of definite formula to use in finding the size of soil pipe, the
Uniform Plumbing Code Committee formulated the Fixture Unit data as the
maximum waste discharges per minute interval of a particular fixture. Indeed,
the code provides that, the fixture unit be the standard values in determining
the size of all plumbing installations. Used the fixture unit provided from table 5-
1.
Find the size of the soil stack to serve:
2 units water closet
2 showers
2 lavatories
1 residential sink
THE SOIL BRANCH
The Soil Branch is a soil pipe installed horizontally with lateral or vertical
connections that receives the discharges of water closet with or without
additional plumbing fixtures.
General Conditions in installing Soil Branch
1. The Soil Branch being concealed in floors, partitions or lowered ceiling
should be accessibly provided with sufficient number of cleanouts.
2. Cleanouts should be installed wherever changes of soil branch directions
are made.
3. Cleanout should be the same in diameter as the soil branch
4. Cleanout should be located at the farthest end of the branch away from
the vertical soil pipe.
