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  1. #1
    Post whore
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    Arrow Bathroom venting into attic..

    Question:

    My bathroom vent only vents into my attic.. I'd like to fix it (after owning the house for 12 years).. But, I don't know how to do it.. Yes, yes... I know, cut a hole in the roof and place a cover on it.. Or is that how it's done?

    1) Should I cut a hole in the roof and place some sort of store bought vent up there?
    2) If so, does it matter on which side of the roof it's on? My neighbor was saying homes (like mine) typically have vents on one side only and as the wind blows it creates a vacuum and pulls out the moisture..
    3) Is a roof mounted vent ok or should I run a long hose to a vent on the under side of my overhang?
    4) Can I have too many vents in the roof and could this be the straw that breaks the camels back?

    Help?

    Also, if you can drum up a photo to explain how you feel it should be done would be helpful for me to visualize what I need to do..

  2. #2
    BCM Cruiser
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    Bathroom venting is different than attic venting. http://www.homedepot.com/p/Broan-Roo...9#.Ud4Vu6zd_z8

    Watch some youtube videos about this job, you don't just cut a hole in shingles and slap it on top. Its not a ton harder than that, but they need to be installed properly not to leak water. One problem I created when I vented mine was ice dams last year. Plan on keeping the area near the vent snow-free. I am not sure of another way to prevent it.

  3. #3
    Ol' School awsomeears's Avatar
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    You know I have drilled plenty of holes for dryer vents at work, at my house they both vent into the attic and I'm going to leave it. I have a newer roof with proper Vents all over, it vents fine with no MOLD or spots around the vent.

    Now if your attic you can clearly see MOLD and black spots or just anything Funky looking I'd vent it out, other then that my thought is your screwing with shingles and you will have more issues with ice damming or leaks then just leaving it.

    Just my 0.02 cents

    Now if you do do it, you need a sharp 4" hole saw, drill a nice hole, take a flat bar facing down on the shingles and FIND the nails and slowly work them up and out. You want to slide the roof cap flush with the shingles from left to right and you don't want to hit any nails. So when it rains everything just runs down hill, almost like a fish scales they over lap and over lap.
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  4. #4
    BCM Cruiser
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    ^ after having the ice dam last winter, I am inclined to agree.

  5. #5
    If you don't know what your doing, hire someone to do it, or have a friend help. Irregardless of what others have said, you should NEVER be venting into the attic, you need to vent outside. Roof vents or not your asking for problems venting to the attic...

  6. #6
    The man in the box Jukebox Hero Champion My House Is Bigger Than Your House Champion Smaugs Treasure Champion Lash's Avatar
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    I agree with this guy^

  7. #7
    In all my researching HVAC and venting stuff, the major thing you want to correct is using the attic space as a place to dump air to or pull air from for the conditioned spaces of the house. You NEVER want to vent moist air into an attic space, regardless of venting. That is a cardinal sin of sorts that used to be common practice. Same thing with pulling makeup air into the cold-air handler. Again, something that was regularly done, but is something that is viewed as unacceptable on new builds. Now, makeup combustion air being stolen from the attic space isn't looked upon as poorly, but you have to have a Hoyme damper or something else to prevent the exchange of conditioned air with attic-space air.

    But, again, you never want moist conditioned air to vent into the attic-space. If you can, run a flexible vent hose (or better yet a solid pipe) from those vent points to a soffit vent if possible. Now, the run length may be longer than what your vent fans are rated for, so do the math and replace those fans with appropriately sized ones to vent properly.

    Now, I will say the difference in regards to bathroom vents is if you are talking a full bath (shower/bathtub) or half-bath (toilet/sink only). Half-baths are allowed to be vented into attic spaces if you *need* to do it, but ideally they should be soffit or outside direct-vented as well. Personally two of my half-baths are vented, but I can't figure out where they vent to. Hopefully when I climb into the attic space this weekend I will be able to find a vent point somewhere, but ideally I hope I find some hoses up there that vent to the soffits like both of my full baths do.

  8. #8
    Grandpa Grocery Getter 2.0 wrath's Avatar
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    Why can't you run the vent to a gable end of the house? It's been years since I've been to your brother's house but it seems like it would be easy to run a vent to the gable. I don't like roof penetrations (every hole is one more spot for water to get in). Plus, heated air vents tend to have ice dams around them in the winter.

    Run solid galvanized vent pipe and tape the joints. You can use plastic hangers or plumber's tape to hang it if it is quite some distance.
    Buy made in the United States. Otherwise your job might be next. Unless you already wear black shoes and a visor with golden arches on it to work in which case your fellow american has already failed you.

  9. #9
    Post whore
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    Awesomeears, your dryer vents into your attic? That's not safe at all. Dryer lint it SUPER flammable and its a great way to burn your house down. Another bad thing is your dryer produces moisture and then mold, again very bad. With venting placement it really doesn't matter which side but most will be placed on the side not viewable from the street. One thing when buying the vent covers, don't buy those that birds can nest in. I live by the airport and just had that airport sound program done and they used those crappy vents and now everyone has birds nesting. I will wait to vacate them because I don't want to kill the baby birds.

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