The working drawings for your home have specific plans for plumbing, HVAC, and electrical systems, all of these being the rough systems of your house. Another meeting with your contractor can go a long way in clarifying the schedule as well as the materials used by the subs.
Plumbing — all those steel, copper, and plastic pipes that route water into, through, and out of your home — is actually composed of three separate but interrelated systems: the water supply, the sewer system, and the vent system. The supply brings water to different places in your home, and the sewage system takes it away. The vent system is necessary so that the water can move in a steady flow without bubbles or spurts.
Items Needed for Installing the Rough Systems
Here is a brief checklist of common plumbing fixtures that you need for your home:
- Bathtubs and faucets
- Exterior water spigots
- Garbage disposal
- Refrigerator or icemaker
- Sauna or steamroom
- Septic tank, if applicable
- Shower fixtures
- Sinks and faucets — bathroom, kitchen, utility, wet bar
- Toilets, toilet seats, and bidets
- Water heater
- Water softener or conditioner.
In most cases, you can have water piped into your home from a public utility (the water company) or from a well on your property. Your plumbing sub installs the infrastructure necessary to distribute this water supply from its primary source to every place within your home where you need it.
Although galvanized steel pipe was once the material of choice for plumbing homes, most people today choose copper tubing. Copper tubing is durable, readily available, easy to work with, and relatively compact. On the other hand, even though copper tubing can cost twice as much as steel pipe, the labor savings have made steel virtually obsolete.
Generally, before you turn on your water supply, the plumbing sub conducts a test to check for leaks or blockages in your water pipes, first using air pressure and then using water. This test checks the time and water volume it takes to fill the system.
Gravity powers your sewer and waste systems, so your lowest sink, toilet, and drain must be higher than the sewer line that leaves your home. When properly installed, your sewer line efficiently delivers waste from your home to the city hookup or possibly to a septic tank on
your property. Your primary choices for sewer materials are cast iron or poly vinyl chloride (PVC) pipe. Although PVC is cheaper and easier to work with, it has a tendency to be noisy when water flows through it. If you decide to use PVC, take care to position the pipe in walls isolated from bedrooms and media rooms where the sound could be annoying. The drainpipes have occasional openings to the outside of the house, called cleanouts. These openings have removable caps so that you can snake out difficult clogs and roots in the future.
The vent system allows your home’s plumbing system to breathe. Without this venting system, the plumbing would be ineffective due to problems like siphoning and backpressure, which can stop the water flow. In addition to installing the water systems, either your plumber or your HVAC sub installs pipes for the natural gas or propane system if you have gas service to your property.
The ductwork for your HVAC creates passageways for air delivery and return throughout your home. The ducts are usually made of two materials, cut and fit at the build site. The two materials are:
- Insulated fiberglass: Fiberglass ducting is becoming more popular because you can cut it with a knife, and it has greater insulation, making for lower installation cost and quieter airflow.
- Sheet metal: Sheet metal ducting can develop noise over time because of temperature changes causing the metal to expand and contract. Sheet metal is becoming less popular because it’s more expensive and harder to work with.
In addition to ducting for the climate system, you need to install power ventilation ducts for bathroom and kitchen exhaust fans. These ducts require electricity as well as ventilation to the outside.
Your electrical sub reviews the electrical plan in the working drawings with you and your contractor to see if you need to make changes. Your local building code specifies the gauge and type of wiring that you have to use. You can discuss with your contractor and electrician which materials give you the best protection regarding age, corrosion, and fire. Your electrical sub runs cable or conduit throughout the house in different loops, or circuits. These circuits distribute the electrical load and tie back into protective circuit breakers at the main panel. Your electrical sub can install subpanels for your convenience. He needs to mark each of these circuits on the service panel so that you can identify which breaker goes to which outlet.
You should choose the best experts when installing the rough systems, as you don’t want these to break very soon.