John Lansing
@pipedreaming.bsky.social
Plumbing, building codes, engineering design guides, water and nutrient cycle, architecture, embodied carbon, development, cities, and the international variations of them all
Sold out seats for the @thewaroncars.bsky.social book launch tour in Vancouver @uytaelee.bsky.social @brooklynspoke.bsky.social @sgoodyear.bsky.social
November 9, 2025 at 3:29 AM
Sold out seats for the @thewaroncars.bsky.social book launch tour in Vancouver @uytaelee.bsky.social @brooklynspoke.bsky.social @sgoodyear.bsky.social
Now arriving at Costco Station. Doors to your left.
November 9, 2025 at 1:04 AM
Now arriving at Costco Station. Doors to your left.
Checking out the latest plumbing products in the Canadian construction market at CIPHEX West in Vancouver.
November 6, 2025 at 6:36 PM
Checking out the latest plumbing products in the Canadian construction market at CIPHEX West in Vancouver.
What’s also bad is when a mechanical engineer decides to combine exhaust ducts from multiple bathrooms and the path of least resistance is your bathroom. Same with the kitchen exhaust. Not a typical installation practice but this discussion comes up a lot in design for some one-off unit floor plans.
My new downstairs neighbours are using the bathroom ventilation much more than the previous ones, and now I have a constant low humming noise in the house.
I really hate these cardboard houses. This continent should learn how to build properly.
I really hate these cardboard houses. This continent should learn how to build properly.
November 6, 2025 at 4:50 PM
What’s also bad is when a mechanical engineer decides to combine exhaust ducts from multiple bathrooms and the path of least resistance is your bathroom. Same with the kitchen exhaust. Not a typical installation practice but this discussion comes up a lot in design for some one-off unit floor plans.
Vancouver is like a fictional city that somehow actually exists. It’s no wonder all the movies are shot here.
November 5, 2025 at 3:57 AM
Vancouver is like a fictional city that somehow actually exists. It’s no wonder all the movies are shot here.
Typical sanitary drainage configuration for larger aisle-layout bathrooms in California vs what would be designed/installed in Europe. The one to the left requires double the amount of piping and labor while also having 8 penetrations through the floor rather than 4, each requiring fire-stopping.
November 4, 2025 at 11:03 PM
Typical sanitary drainage configuration for larger aisle-layout bathrooms in California vs what would be designed/installed in Europe. The one to the left requires double the amount of piping and labor while also having 8 penetrations through the floor rather than 4, each requiring fire-stopping.
Interiors contractors (装修队) demonstrating the design and installation of an apartment bathroom in China. You can see there’s a dedicated connection to the WC stack and another for the wash drainage stack, which passes through a common trap (中央排水汇集器).
November 4, 2025 at 9:04 PM
Interiors contractors (装修队) demonstrating the design and installation of an apartment bathroom in China. You can see there’s a dedicated connection to the WC stack and another for the wash drainage stack, which passes through a common trap (中央排水汇集器).
Reposted by John Lansing
As @tedgrunewald.bsky.social noted, the Vitrolite in the White House bathroom was irreplaceable. As @pipedreaming.bsky.social noted, the Flushometer toilet had a lot more flush than the Kohler that replaced it. I complain about the marble floor and lack of grab bars, which make it a deathtrap.
The White House bathroom renovation is a horrifying mess
It's a cheap and ugly deathtrap of a bathroom.
lloydalter.substack.com
November 3, 2025 at 12:53 PM
As @tedgrunewald.bsky.social noted, the Vitrolite in the White House bathroom was irreplaceable. As @pipedreaming.bsky.social noted, the Flushometer toilet had a lot more flush than the Kohler that replaced it. I complain about the marble floor and lack of grab bars, which make it a deathtrap.
The Quebec Construction Code allows unvented drains for sinks in some circumstances, but requires an incredibly deep trap seal (4 inches/100 mm) for such an installation. Not only is this 2x the depth of what is required in most European countries but it’s also less sanitary.
November 3, 2025 at 5:17 AM
The Quebec Construction Code allows unvented drains for sinks in some circumstances, but requires an incredibly deep trap seal (4 inches/100 mm) for such an installation. Not only is this 2x the depth of what is required in most European countries but it’s also less sanitary.
If you walk into the plumbing section of a Canadian Tire, you’d think you were in the US. The allowable materials, products, and methods in the National Plumbing Code of Canada are nearly identical to what you’ll find in the IPC/UPC.
November 3, 2025 at 2:21 AM
If you walk into the plumbing section of a Canadian Tire, you’d think you were in the US. The allowable materials, products, and methods in the National Plumbing Code of Canada are nearly identical to what you’ll find in the IPC/UPC.
Reposted by John Lansing
When it rains a lot I go to the St. George Rainway to watch water going in and out of things.
So, here’s a thread for those of you similarly enthralled…
@greenestcity.bsky.social @cityofvancouver.bsky.social
So, here’s a thread for those of you similarly enthralled…
@greenestcity.bsky.social @cityofvancouver.bsky.social
November 1, 2025 at 10:20 PM
When it rains a lot I go to the St. George Rainway to watch water going in and out of things.
So, here’s a thread for those of you similarly enthralled…
@greenestcity.bsky.social @cityofvancouver.bsky.social
So, here’s a thread for those of you similarly enthralled…
@greenestcity.bsky.social @cityofvancouver.bsky.social
“We” did not land on the moon. You guys left without me and I’m still mad about it.
Not sure who needs to hear this but we landed on the moon
November 1, 2025 at 2:25 AM
“We” did not land on the moon. You guys left without me and I’m still mad about it.
To make the Lincoln bathroom more "appropriate for the Lincoln era", he appears to have tossed the vintage flushometer valve water closet and replaced it with a generic lower mid-range toilet available at Home Depot (Kohler Highline).
October 31, 2025 at 7:32 PM
To make the Lincoln bathroom more "appropriate for the Lincoln era", he appears to have tossed the vintage flushometer valve water closet and replaced it with a generic lower mid-range toilet available at Home Depot (Kohler Highline).
The Thames River was one of the victims of the Industrial Revolution and its fate was sealed for a century when the 1844 Metropolitan Buildings Act required sewer connections at each building, discharging raw sewage directly into the Thames.
October 20, 2025 at 5:46 AM
The Thames River was one of the victims of the Industrial Revolution and its fate was sealed for a century when the 1844 Metropolitan Buildings Act required sewer connections at each building, discharging raw sewage directly into the Thames.
Here’s a great example of a pressure imbalance mystery in a sanitary drainage system.
How to Diagnose Plumbing Drain Problems | Ask This Old House
YouTube video by This Old House
m.youtube.com
October 19, 2025 at 5:49 AM
Here’s a great example of a pressure imbalance mystery in a sanitary drainage system.
Very important to keep the door closed to the half bathroom if you have a squatting WC and small pets.
October 19, 2025 at 4:39 AM
Very important to keep the door closed to the half bathroom if you have a squatting WC and small pets.
Spain has some of the most restrictive limits on single stack drainage in Europe (only for <7 floor buildings), which would appear to anyone in the US as the most advanced, game-changing plumbing concept. A 4 inch (100 mm) single stack can be used in the rest of Europe for ~20 stories!
I have a theory about why Barcelona has such a housing crisis. 2019 vs. 2024: www.google.com/maps/place/C...
October 17, 2025 at 5:25 PM
Spain has some of the most restrictive limits on single stack drainage in Europe (only for <7 floor buildings), which would appear to anyone in the US as the most advanced, game-changing plumbing concept. A 4 inch (100 mm) single stack can be used in the rest of Europe for ~20 stories!
It would be cool to see some cities and states coordinating a restart of Operation Breakthrough or something similar.
October 16, 2025 at 3:44 AM
It would be cool to see some cities and states coordinating a restart of Operation Breakthrough or something similar.
“Precedent has been our guide, and as a result, we have become unbendingly orthodox to such an extent that originality is now viewed with suspicion, and initiative and its counterpart progress have suffered proportionately.” W. M. Wild 1934 on the transition from two-pipe to one-pipe in the UK
The transition from one-pipe to two-pipe in the UK came with the middle ground fallacy we often see in building code development today. To use a one-pipe system, you would be required to use deeper 3-inch traps since two-pipe systems had a shallower trap seal depth, despite proof of 2-inch working.
![2
DRAINAGE PIPEWORK IN DWELLINGS
Such conditions led to use of the "two-pipe system" in which basins and baths discharged outside the building into a vertical pipe leading to a gully trap which also served the sinks, and W.C.'s were served by a separate stack also outside the building. The emphasis placed on pipes being outside the building can be seen in the by-laws of the period such as those issued in Leeds in 1878(3).
"The person erecting any new building shall...not allow any inlet to any drain to be made within any building, except such inlet as may be necessary from... any water closet, and he shall cause the waste pipe(s)...to be furnished with a siphon trap(s) and to be taken through an external wall…..and discharge in the open air....
Besides the traps at the appliances and the gully trap, the inter-
ceptor was also introduced to provide a third seal between building and sewer.
At the same time it began to be realized that the water seals in the building could be sucked out by discharge through the pipework, and hence anti siphonage piping was installed in all but the smallest buildings to ensure that a proper seal was retained. The London County Council by-laws made in 1900(s) required that where more than one W.C. was connected to a soil pipe each W.C. should be ventilated by a pipe not less than 2 in. diameter fixed between 3 in. and 12 in. from the trap, and traps of waste appliances were required to be vented if there was a chance of seal loss. An example of what these requirements led to in terms of soil, waste and vent piping is shown in Fig. 2. As a result of these precautions and of improvement in quality of
pipes and methods of construction, unhygienic conditions in buildings became the exception rather than the rule.
Development of trapping and anti-siphonage precautions followed similar lines in America but there an extra factor was important, the climatic conditions…[text continues beyond alt text character limit ☹️]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:zrfppf44vjnvtplygmvbk5we/bafkreiapatrdw4hz234bgngnrwfnfzqz7kdlfiljg7chozeu5jxru5fw3u@jpeg)
October 16, 2025 at 1:26 AM
“Precedent has been our guide, and as a result, we have become unbendingly orthodox to such an extent that originality is now viewed with suspicion, and initiative and its counterpart progress have suffered proportionately.” W. M. Wild 1934 on the transition from two-pipe to one-pipe in the UK
Anyone have a copy of the 1991 or 1994 UPC? There’s text that was added into the UPC prohibiting the single stack specifically in one of these editions and I can’t find them online. What’s particularly wild is any configuration not listed is not permitted, so someone really went overboard here.
October 14, 2025 at 2:11 AM
Anyone have a copy of the 1991 or 1994 UPC? There’s text that was added into the UPC prohibiting the single stack specifically in one of these editions and I can’t find them online. What’s particularly wild is any configuration not listed is not permitted, so someone really went overboard here.
This reminds me of the recycled water treatment building in the Nye suburb of Aarhus, Denmark.
October 12, 2025 at 9:04 PM
This reminds me of the recycled water treatment building in the Nye suburb of Aarhus, Denmark.
Just realized today marks one year since I started this account. 🎂
Hi all 👋 looks like I found where all the action is at
October 12, 2025 at 8:01 PM
Just realized today marks one year since I started this account. 🎂
Current mood in Portland
October 12, 2025 at 6:07 PM
Current mood in Portland
Reposted by John Lansing
The Italian-style standalone bidets are the worst of the bidets, but are infinitely more civilized than not having one at all. And they (plus the window requirement) make the bathroom big enough that you can often chop one old-school Italian bathroom into two:
October 11, 2025 at 10:28 PM
The Italian-style standalone bidets are the worst of the bidets, but are infinitely more civilized than not having one at all. And they (plus the window requirement) make the bathroom big enough that you can often chop one old-school Italian bathroom into two: