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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j63w4qd wrote

Reply to comment by its8up in How can I add a second 1/4 inch water line to under my kitchen sink? by Apprehensive-Egg374

Thank you so so much!!

Do you think it would be possible to setup a washing machine to get hot/cold water and drain to under the kitchen sink?

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its8up t1_j646im4 wrote

It's possible, but washing machines are high water demand appliances so expect longer run time for both dishwasher and washing machine if you run them at the same time.

A major concern is draining the washing machine, as those things dump a huge amount of water. The kitchen sink drain is only 1.5" pipe, though they often go into 2" pipe at the wall. Washing machine drains usually go straight into 2" pipe and must have an air gap.

Dumping it into the sink could provide an air gap and a decent baffle tank, but this would not be an elegant solution. Putting a tee into your kitchen drain line, running a pipe through the cabinet, then installing a riser to the height of the kitchen countertop could work. Just strap the riser to the cabinet and hook the washing machine drain into it. If you install the tee after the sink J trap, you'll also need to put a J trap on your newly jackassed washing machine drain line.

Your case looks special, in that you have fancy kitchen drain line shit. Assuming that J trap has 2" threads, if you can remove that reducer tee from the J trap and install a 2" tee, then install your reducer tee on top of that, things could work quite nicely. Of course, you'd have to shorten this sink drain pipes a bit too get them hooked back up.

This could cause a building code violation, but as long as you don't get caught it's better than trips to the laundromat. You may also want to make sure you're even allowed to have a washing machine, as the first unbalanced load will rat out your washing machine ownership to all of your neighbors.

The only other thing to consider is that washing machines also dump huge amounts of lint down the drain. This is only a concern if the building has iron sewer pipe, as the rust chunks can cause lint buildup.

P.S. if/when you have to replace your kitchen sink drain pipes, do not use the thin brass nonsense. Plastic will not etch out over time, but thin brass will. If you live there long enough, you'll see exactly what I'm taking about.

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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j6538r6 wrote

Thank you!!

If the brass pipe coming from the wall brakes off, can I cut it and then deburr it, and then use this shark bite attachment?

https://www.homedepot.com/p/SharkBite-1-2-in-Push-to-Connect-PVC-IPS-x-1-2-in-MIP-Brass-Adapter-Fitting-UIP120A/206352901

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its8up t1_j67mx9e wrote

The pipe coming from the wall as drain line should be 2", and hopefully not iron pipe. .....but very often it is iron. This larger pipe is less apt to break.

As for the 1/2" galvanized supply lines, I would recommend against any shark bite type fitting going onto galvanized pipe. It's kinda rough and may not make a good seal. Also, if galvanized pipe breaks off there's still gonna be threads which can be sharp enough to damage the o-ring in a shark bite fitting.

Perhaps I am a minority, but my experience with shitty 1/4" and 3/8" shark bite type fittings biased me against that crap all together. Sure o-ring technology may have improved such that they don't crush in 6 years and leak if you sneeze on them after the o-rings are deformed. Still, I will never use shark bite type fittings if any other solution exists.

If the 1/2" pipe breaks off at the valve, you'd be much better off trying to jackass it with something threaded. The fitting I used for that purpose may have had female 5/8 flare threads. It took a lot of Teflon tape and threaded past the remaining 1/2" npt threads. Wish I could find an example part on Amazon, but didn't have any luck.

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its8up t1_j67n3q5 wrote

Wish I lived close enough to just help you with this task, but guessing you are nowhere near Jackson, MS.

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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j6akkst wrote

Thank you so much for the help! I’m from NY 😞 Would have loved the help. I’ll let you know how it goes!

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its8up t1_j6bgba7 wrote

New York?! The only place with prices as bad as California, or even worse? No wonder you don't want to hire a plumber! Good luck with the project!

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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j6bit8x wrote

Lmaooo I did bring two plumbers for quotes for the washing machine. They both asked for $4,000+ Crazy

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its8up t1_j6bsk4p wrote

Fucks sake. You mean, all this time I could have been commuting from Mississippi to New York to make a killing doing simple plumbing work? Meh. Probably too much licensing and permit requirements.

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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j6d5q2b wrote

Lmaooo you think the plumbers I called are licensed and insured?? That would cost even more.

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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j6d5xwm wrote

Many of the plumbers here, have no licenses or insurance.

Even the others, only the head of the company is a licensed and insured plumber. All their workers have no licenses.

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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j6d6f2m wrote

Plumbing and electrical is crazy here. They charge $200 just to come to your house. Then if the job is 5 minutes max (like just changing an outlet or a simple shutter valve) they’ll charge another $300 for labor. And charge you $500 total.

Keep in mind though, the boss is keeping all the money. The workers are just getting paid a low hourly wage and maybe some commission.

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its8up t1_j6dh2ae wrote

It's the same everywhere, in that a company will ride a bunch of low hourly workers on one guy's high hourly license. I get that service trucks and tools are expensive, but that guy can fuck right off. Idgaf how much profit he has after paying for all that equipment and whatnot. Would rather have a reasonable wage so I can afford my own damn equipment. I've picked up several trades out of necessity or to prevent having to deal with such vultures. Been a long time since I've had to call a mechanic, electrician, plumber, carpenter, welder, locksmith, appliance repairman, or hvac guy. The only licensing I ever bothered with was the EPA 608 license for hvac. Holy hell those hvac tools were expensive, but they paid for themselves in like 2 side jobs that I did for several thousand dollars less than the big guys quoted.

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Apprehensive-Egg374 OP t1_j6dytf8 wrote

To be honest, I’m getting tempted to just leave it all as it is, and just add in another 1/4 tee above the current 1/4 tee for the fridge and leave it all be. At the end of the day, my initial question was just “can I add a Tee on top of the Tee” and I got my answer which was a yes lol

At the end of the day, if the pipe coming out of the wall snaps, there doesn’t seem be anyway to solve the issue other than taking that pipe off. Which can then cause the pipe in the wall to snap off and cause a bigger headache. Worse, it’s possible that when I try to take off the valve, the piping in the wall is galvanized pipe and that snaps off in the wall. I don’t really have the thousands of dollars it would cost to hire a plumber to fix that issue. Given how I don’t know if the pipe in the wall is an old rusted and corroded galvanized pipe that could snap in an instant when I try to remove the old valve, I feel as though this is just to risky for me.

I don’t know. What do you think?

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its8up t1_j6f7n71 wrote

What I'd do: Add a 3/8 tee to the hot side and connect the dishwasher to a hot water source, as God intended. Add a valve to the old dishwasher cold water supply and connect the fridge to that.

There's no harm in leaving the dishwasher connected as it is and putting a tee on the cold side. However, a dishwasher issue will result in having to shut off the water. Only costs a few bucks to add a valve there.

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