- Joined
- Oct 12, 2003
- Messages
- 281
I live in an upstairs condo unit. Typical HVAC/water heater in a closet setup...water heater is sitting on floor, HVAC unit is sitting suspended above water heater...ducting out through the ceiling. There is a PVC drain in the floor (stubbed up about 3 inches or so). The overflow from water heater is copper pipe and runs into this drain. The HVAC unit has a primary and secondary drain for evaporator coil.
I started noticing a musty smell coming from air vents throughout. After some investigation, I discovered that there was some blockage in the primary and secondary drain lines and some mold was present. Property management got maintenance to install new drain piping after I removed the old. I have poured bleach down this drain in the floor and that seems to have removed most of the mold/mildew smell but it seems to still be present some. Its obvious that the smell is coming from down in the drain. I don't know how long this problem has been going on but I have 6 months left in the lease and am afraid it might come back in warm weather next spring as the A/C is operational and draining.
My question is...is there something besides bleach that might be a better option to control mold/mildew in that drain? I have no idea where that drain runs. There is no obvious place where it exits the building. I would think that drain would be trapped somewhere down the line...especially if it feeds into sewer downstream. It is draining for sure, I have poured a lot of water down the line and there is no sign of it backing up or draining slow.
Another thing I had thought of...the primary/secondary condensate drain pipe and water heater drain pipe both feed into this drain pipe in the floor, but there is some space around them so the HVAC unit could draft up any smells from that pipe into the intake of the air handler since the return is the closet with filter in bottom of air handler. I would think that preventing any air drafting up from that drain pipe would be the best option there?
Also, the configuration of the condensate lines, both primary and secondary are like this...primary is a trapped line that runs vertically down to the drain in floor after the trap. The secondary is not trapped and its tied into the vertical piece of pipe going into floor drain. I'm thinking that I may be drafting odor up through that secondary condensate drain since it ties in after the trap. I have hard that a lot of units don't use the secondary drain and simply maintain the primary to prevent water damage caused by any blockage.
Thanks for any ideas on this.
John
I started noticing a musty smell coming from air vents throughout. After some investigation, I discovered that there was some blockage in the primary and secondary drain lines and some mold was present. Property management got maintenance to install new drain piping after I removed the old. I have poured bleach down this drain in the floor and that seems to have removed most of the mold/mildew smell but it seems to still be present some. Its obvious that the smell is coming from down in the drain. I don't know how long this problem has been going on but I have 6 months left in the lease and am afraid it might come back in warm weather next spring as the A/C is operational and draining.
My question is...is there something besides bleach that might be a better option to control mold/mildew in that drain? I have no idea where that drain runs. There is no obvious place where it exits the building. I would think that drain would be trapped somewhere down the line...especially if it feeds into sewer downstream. It is draining for sure, I have poured a lot of water down the line and there is no sign of it backing up or draining slow.
Another thing I had thought of...the primary/secondary condensate drain pipe and water heater drain pipe both feed into this drain pipe in the floor, but there is some space around them so the HVAC unit could draft up any smells from that pipe into the intake of the air handler since the return is the closet with filter in bottom of air handler. I would think that preventing any air drafting up from that drain pipe would be the best option there?
Also, the configuration of the condensate lines, both primary and secondary are like this...primary is a trapped line that runs vertically down to the drain in floor after the trap. The secondary is not trapped and its tied into the vertical piece of pipe going into floor drain. I'm thinking that I may be drafting odor up through that secondary condensate drain since it ties in after the trap. I have hard that a lot of units don't use the secondary drain and simply maintain the primary to prevent water damage caused by any blockage.
Thanks for any ideas on this.
John
