Plumbing code essentials: Relief vents in multiple-story buildings

The 2018 Code Essentials series are available as valuable companions to the 2018 International Building, Residential, Fire, Energy Conservation, Existing Building and Plumbing Codes. Aimed at all user levels — including first-time users, veteran code users and other professionals such as architects, designers and contractors — these guides use a straight-forward, focused approach to explore code requirements with non-code language, allowing readers to gain confidence in their understanding of the material and build a solid foundation for learning and applying the code’s requirements.

2018 Plumbing Code Essentials

Relief vents are required for drainage stacks serving more than 10 branch intervals. The relief vent must be connected to the drainage stack at each tenth branch interval counting down from the top floor. The lower end of the relief vent connects through a wye fitting to the drainage stack below the horizontal branch serving the floor and connects with a wye fitting to the vent stack at a point not less than 3 feet above the floor. The relief vent shall be the same size as the drainage stack to which it connects.

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