Friday, August 19, 2005

Special Request

Can anyone tell me if it's possible/likely to use an abrasive saw blade in a skill saw to cut cast iron soil pipe? In this application, it's a standing run of plumbing that needs to be cut into, not new materials.

Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated.

5 comments:

Gary said...

Try it! Hope you have several hours to kill! Plug in the TV so you don't get bored.
You can rent a cast iron pipe cutter which looks like a pair of handles with a bicycle chain attached to do the job. You can also use a sledge hammer but then you would have to replace the entire stack because you will pop all the seals.

SmilingJudy said...

Rent the pipe cutter as Gary suggested. You'll have a cut in about 5 minutes as opposed to 5 hours with a saw.

Deb said...

it actually took only about 15 minutes to cut our cast iron stack with a sawzall, where as when we did use the plumbing cutter it took much, much longer.

Anonymous said...

I've used a hacksaw to cut through a 3" cast iron drain pipe. I was adding the washing machine drain to the kitchen sink drain before it ran into the stack. It really didn't take too long, just a lot of effort and bloody knuckles ( the pipe ran close to the concrete foundation) and it helped that the pipe was corroded on the inside.

Greg said...

I cut a lot of CI pipe with a sawzall. Its not too bad. Get a good bi-metal blade with as many teeth as you can find. Set the sawzall on the low speed setting. A 4-inch pipe takes about 10 minutes and an 1.5-inch pipe took me 5 or 6 minutes.