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John Lansing

@pipedreaming.bsky.social

1.9K followers 550 following 1.7K posts

Plumbing, building codes, engineering design guides, water and nutrient cycle, architecture, embodied carbon, development, cities, and the international variations of them all

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 6h

The standalone bidet is such a fascinating fixture. It’s like a sanitary utility sink.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 11h

Yes, this is standard.

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 12h

I relate. We can blame US plumbing manufacturers for failing to introduce the European washdown WCs to comply with the 1992 EPAct, resulting in the worst flushing WCs ever produced. They would not abandon the siphonic-type WCs but thankfully they ended up figuring out how to make better ones.

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 12h

It’s funny that this is odd yet putting an electrical outlet under the kitchen sink for a mini wood chipper is perfectly normal in the US and even considered an absolute must in many cases.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 12h

The slowness of the big brands like Toto, Kohler, and American Standard to offer a decent range of these really opened the door to Brondell and Tushy capture this market. Brondell has always been good but they keep getting better.

Reposted by John Lansing

Stephen Jacob Smith @stephenjacobsmith.com · 13h

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:

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 12h

As much as I like the bidet seats with hot water, the hot water tank on the back of the seats are really bulky and I’m nearly certain that a majority of the energy used is just heat loss. I’d like to see more models eliminate the tank and just use cold water (which will likely be ~60°F).

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 12h

I think these are the most logical and cost effective solution and also really easy to retrofit.

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 13h

Sanitary drainage systems with bidets are functionally different yet they are designed the same.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 13h

Based on current plumbing codes both in the US and abroad, it wouldn’t impact design at all, but should it? Less TP could allow for drains at shallower gradients, which could recoup losses from added electrical outlets and a second water supply stop at each WC.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 13h

Wads of toilet paper are one of the primary sources of blockages in sanitary drainage systems, so a system installed with bidets would likely lessen the risk of blockages. How would this impact design?

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 13h

This is an easy/low cost add during the building design phase but is almost never included except for very high end housing. The cutoff is generally around +$10 million for condos.

Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 14h

the real constraint is you need to have an electrical outlet near a toilet, which is unusual imo

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 14h

“It looks like the lid mechanism has failed, please hold while we dispatch a specialist technician.”

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 14h

This issue along with the fact that bidets require larger bathrooms, are reasons the bidet/WC fixtures are much more common in new construction in many regions.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

I found many examples of partition-less urinals in the UK but none as exaggerated as this installation in Glasgow.

Three urinals installed in close proximity to each other with one placed perpendicular to the other

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

Oh yes, but nothing beats the sound of the impact at the stack base.

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

Their 1961 publication shown above is also available for download here.

nvlpubs.nist.gov

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

Wyly and Eaton’s formulas for terminal velocity and flow capacity in sanitary drainage stacks form the basis of plumbing codes used on every continent today. Hard to overestimate the impact of NISTs work on plumbing internationally.

Formulas showing the equations for terminal length. Image from ‘NBS Monograph 31- Capacities of Stacks in Sanitary Drainage Systems for Buildings’ published in 1961 by the National Bureau of Standards

Formulas and graphs showing maximum flow capacity based on 1/4 and 1/3 filling of the stack. Image from ‘NBS Monograph 31- Capacities of Stacks in Sanitary Drainage Systems for Buildings’ published in 1961 by the National Bureau of Standards

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

I wish I knew the details. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) published it so I wonder if they have these records still. The single stack didn’t make it into any of the model codes until the 2010s.

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

Yes!!!

John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

The ASA A40.8 was the national plumbing code that never was. The code committee dissolved before a second edition could be produced due to lack of consensus in the 1960s.
This code was even developed under the guidance of Robert Wyly at NIST, whose work created the foundation for drainage theory.

Cover of the “National Plunbing Code - Minimum Requirements for Plumbing”

FOREWORD
The need for a generally accepted standard code of minimum requirements for plumbing has been recognized in the country for some considerable time. From time to time various organizations in this field have published recommended code requirements and some of these have had considerable influence on local codes.
An early and comprehensive effort in this direction was made by the Subcommittee on Plumbing of the Building Code Committee of the U.S.Department of Commerce. The work of this committee resulted in the publication in 1924 of BH2 "Recom-mended Minimum Requirements for Plumbing in Dwellings and Similar Buildings"
. This was followed by several revisions of
which the last,
entitled BH13 *Recommended Minimum Re-
quirements for Plumbing." was issued in 1932. The National Association of Master Plumbers published its "Standard Plumbing Code" in 1933 and the latest revision of this was made in
1942. In 1940 the Subcommittee of -Plumbing
of the Central
Housing Committee on Research, • Design, and Construction issued a report BMS66 "Plumbing Manual" the provisions of which formed the basis for regulation of wartime plumbing. In addition many states have enacted laws regulating the design and installation of plumbing equipment. Cities also have municipal ordinances and rules goveming this type of equipment and its installation.
The Sectional Committee on Minimum Requirements for
Plumbing
and Standardization of Plumbing Equipment, A40,
was organized under the procedure of the American Standards Association in August, 1928. Therefore, in 1934, when the Subcommittee on Plumbing of the Building Code Committee of the U.S.Department of Commerce was discontinued, the ASA added the task of setting up minimum requirements for plumbing to the scope of Sectional Committee A40.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

Wyoming uses the IPC and Nebraska uses the UPC. Not sure why it was reflected this way here.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

This map is from 2019 and from IAPMO if I’m not mistaken. It shows a more detailed breakdown of code adoption by locality. I think Maryland has fully dropped the NSPC in favor of the IPC since.

Breakdown by county of plumbing code adoption

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 1d

Both IAPMO and ICC publish code adoption maps that conflict with each other. Maine is a more straightforward error but states like Texas are more complicated than shown here, which use IPC and UPC depending on the locality.

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John Lansing @pipedreaming.bsky.social · 2d

Mt Adams