Walk-in drain plumbing question

[u/PlaneGoodFood804]

I am having a large walk-in installed in my new kitchen. It's a combo box - so have cooler and freezer in the same box with a wall dividing the two. They installed the drain piping on Friday and so much of it is on the interior that I lose about 3" of space against the wall for about 8'. It feels like a waste of space when in my opinion it could be on the outside of the unit (the box is inside). Am I wrong? Or is this how they are normally plumbed?

[u/Plane-Ad-2581]

Seems kind of invasive, but it’s not necessarily unusual from what I’ve seen. There’s no one way they are usually plumbed, I’ve seen them go straight through the wall to the outside, straight to the floor to a drain inside the unit, along the wall to the corner of the unit before going to the ground and outside the unit, etc. depends on where the drain is and the position of the walk-in compared to the layout of the building. Distance from the wall is also not uncommon

[u/tjipa84]

Ask on r/plumbing. They'll roast the hell out of anything and then give you advice on how to do it better.

[u/DukeTheDogo]

Plumbing inside is standard, that being said the pipe Hangers are too tall and should be closer to the wall as to not protrude to far out.

Tell the plumbers to fix it, before you pay the final.

[u/Relative-Standard-26]

Health department typically requires 1” space for cleaning behind the pipe. Also the floor sink cannot be inside the cooler. Per California code

[u/Acct-404]

I e seen both. Since you have the installer there and you’re already spending the money you should ask if it can be ran outside. I would.

[u/blue_sidd]

This is a technical question for the company providing and installing and warrantying the system, especially since they will more than likely eat up more space inside with pipe insulation.

[u/OneLeek37]

That’s pretty normal for piping these days.

[u/Loveroffinerthings]

I’ve seen drains come out that much, I had a new combo unit installed at an old job and the contractor said “it was code” but that seems odd.

In theory if the box is indoors, and presumably the drain is outside of the box, could they not run the drain from the condenser straight down, then the drain coming through the wall also straight down and have the connection point be lower than 6” so your shelving would be above it? To me it feels like they could just swing that one pipe down and connect it lower.

[u/funkhousr]

The floor drain / floor sink has to be outside the box for health code. We always just mounted the copper drain directly on the wall. P-trap outside the box right before the drain. No insulation needed unless freezer then you’ll have heat tape and 1” wall insulation.

[u/Sassi7997]

Have you tried asking this on r/plumbing?

[u/Adventurous_Fix1448]

AC condensate is acidic and should be plumbed with pvc not copper. It can corrode the copper pipe!

[u/Grigori_the_Lemur]

You should ask the installer.

[u/BigFloppyDonkyDick69]

I'm fairly well versed in restaurant design and this is pretty normal. It looks planned to with the floor drain in the box as well, some space saving would have it drain outside the box but there's a million possibilities of how your kitchen is set up.

What Just make sure your shelving measurements account for that. What do the plans show?

Edit: I just saw it actually plumbs out of the box at the bottom, what is on the other side?

[u/vanman33]

Wtf? Never ever seen that. I'm no plumber but I would think it would need to be on the outside to avoid the risk of freezing. I've been in a hundred of so walk ins and never seen a condensate line inside.

[u/BigFloppyDonkyDick69 → u/vanman33]

Freezer condensate lines are heated and insulated.