What is a Wye in Plumbing?

A wye is a plumbing fitting that has two or more “Y” shaped branches. It is used to change the direction of water flow in a pipe system. This can help with drainage and prevent backflow, depending on how it is installed.

Types of Wyes

There are three types of wyes. They are the Y branch, double-y (Double Wye), and full size or regular wye.

The first is a “Y” shaped fitting with two branches that come off the main trunk line to change direction. This can be used when you need to go around an obstacle like a wall in your bathroom. The second type of wye has three arms at right angles from each other.

It allows more water flow than just one arm would provide which makes it ideal for higher pressure applications such as draining downspouts away from buildings on hillsides.

The third type of wye simply has another vertical section added so it looks like what most people recognize as a typical plumbing pipe T connection where both pipes coming off the wye are at a 90-degree angle to each other.

How to Install a Wye?

Here are the steps to install a wye in your plumbing system:

Step 1

Cut the pipe at a 45-degree angle and then cut it off to remove any burrs. Use sandpaper or a deburring tool for this step if necessary.

Step 2

Orient all of your pipes vertically (up and down) like they would be running through the wall, not across as you might expect them to run normally in most drain systems.

This is important because when we use our wye fitting, we will rotate one side 180 degrees around its axis so that both ends point out horizontally from each other rather than up and down as standard plumbing pipes do.

Step 3

Measure how long your vertical section needs to be with some scrap pieces of the pipe first before cutting into anything important!

Step 4

You can now insert your wye fitting and connect your pipes to it. Then use two 90 degree elbows on each side of the wye to finish up the installation process.

That’s it! You now know what a wye is and how to install one. Thanks for reading this article. You might be also interested in reading our post about plumbing trim and cross connection in plumbing.