Shower exhaust going into attic

[Texas Proud]

Our master bath does not have any vent...

The other two baths and the half bath have the fans... but one of them has a separate toilet room where it is located... not the bath part.... I think all are vented into the attic...


But, we never turn them on so it really doesn't matter....

 

[Rick_Head]

Codes in many places say vent them through the roof. Reality is that bathroom venting seldom is even used more than a few minutes. The attic never is affected.


More problems come from leaking roof vents than just blowing air into the attic.

Here in the frozen north, where the thermometer is below freezing from Nov. - Apr, if you vent your bathroom (with shower) directly into the attic you will have up to a couple of hundred pounds of ice in your attic by spring. Then it melts. Then... the attic is affected.

It depends on where you live.

 

[pb4uski]

How to Properly Vent a Bathroom Exhaust Fan in an Attic | Today's Homeowner

How to Install a Bathroom Vent Fan | This Old House

Note that the fan must always exhaust to the outdoors; never allow the duct to simply blow into an attic, crawlspace or other enclosed area

 

[akck]

Our house was originally vented to the soffits. What I noticed when we painted the exterior was that the old paint was peeling and cracking where the vents were. We vented through the roof when we re-roofed the house. If you have extra shingles available, a handyman could install a roof vent. I'd make certain he's done it before or at least has replaced damaged shingles before. If you have a steep sloped roof, I'd look for a roofing contractor, although, you may have trouble getting one to take the job.


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[John Galt III]

One more option! There should already be a vertical tube going through the attic and through the roof. It's the sewer vent pipe. My shower fan exhaust is connected to this vertical pipe. A pvc pipe goes horizontally from the shower fan to the vertical vent pipe. And no, there is no backdraft of odor from the sewer vent. No need to cut another hole in the roof. If I were doing it I would just route an elephant trunk from the fan to an eave and hope the exhaust went outside at least half the time.

 

[pb4uski]

I don't think utilizing the sewer vent is a good idea. Certainly not code and IMO worse than just venting into the attic.

 

[bld999]

"My shower fan exhaust is connected to this vertical pipe."

Oh, Brother...

 

[ERD50]

One more option! There should already be a vertical tube going through the attic and through the roof. It's the sewer vent pipe. My shower fan exhaust is connected to this vertical pipe. ...

Do ... not ... do ... this.

Did you know sewer gas can be explosive?

Did you know that a fan motor can create sparks?​

Do ... not ... do ... this.


Against code - for a reason. Also, 1.5" PVC versus 4" duct is a huge cross sectional delta. Way too small for an exhaust vent.

-ERD50

 

[ArkTinkerer]

Our house was originally vented to the soffits. What I noticed when we painted the exterior was that the old paint was peeling and cracking where the vents were. We vented through the roof when we re-roofed the house. If you have extra shingles available, a handyman could install a roof vent. I'd make certain he's done it before or at least has replaced damaged shingles before. If you have a steep sloped roof, I'd look for a roofing contractor, although, you may have trouble getting one to take the job.


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Good installer won't need new shingles.

I've routed mine to either the eave or gable face. Had trouble with one being longer and the steam would condense on the cold metal and run back into the exhaust fan so that is something to watch out for.

 

[MichaelB]

I think I'll follow the flex duct to the current roof vent option for now. A new vent through the roof is the better option, but I don't want to mess with the roof right now and I have HOA considerations (not part of the discussion).

The next time roof work is being done, which will probably be in a couple of years, I'll ask them to install a new vent just for the shower.

Thanks to all, tip of the hat to Samclem for the helpful detail which I one day hope to make work here.

 

[ronin]

I think I'll follow the flex duct to the current roof vent option for now.

When we remodeled our bathroom this is what we did with the old unvented situation. Pretty easy and problem solved.

 

[Telly]

One more option! There should already be a vertical tube going through the attic and through the roof. It's the sewer vent pipe. My shower fan exhaust is connected to this vertical pipe. A pvc pipe goes horizontally from the shower fan to the vertical vent pipe. And no, there is no backdraft of odor from the sewer vent.............

That is SOoooo wrong, that I wonder if your residence instead has a common bathroom fan vent stack made out of PVC pipe, that collects multiple bath vent fans, and vents them out a vent-fans-only common stack. And that you have confused the pipes with the sewer stack. Common bath fan vent stacks are, heh heh, common, in hotels.

If not, and the bath vent fan actually is connected to the sewer stack, then there must have been an incredible doofus, and no inspection made of the work. Or, a later 'handyman" or resident doofus did it.
[I put "handyman" in quotes, because there are some that belong on a chain gang]