Depending on your stage of construction, installing rough-in piping for a radon system can be relatively easy. The process, that consist of two parts, is placing the pipe that is place under the concrete floor of the basement and the piping that travels up your walls and through the roof.
The piping that is place under the concrete basement floor is nothing more than four inch black perforated pipe. This pipe, which is perfect for radon removal, is sometimes used around home foundations to carry water away from the footer. The piping is placed approximately one to two inches under the stone and creates a continuous loop around the basement. By now it should be obvious that this piping should be installed before the concrete is poured. The starting and stopping location will be the location where the second part of piping will go up into the walls and through the attic and roof. At the starting and stopping location a black plastic tee will be installed and used as a transition to the second part of piping.
The second section of piping is three or four inch PVC pipe which extends from the tee, which is place in the under slab loop, and travels up into the walls, attic, and through the roof. This procedure can take some time to plan, especially in a two story home. Also, a difficult part of this is drilling through all the bottom and top plates if you don’t have the correct equipment. The best tools to use is a high power angle drill with a self drawing Forsner bit. This combination will make easy work of a difficult job. One thing to consider is not actually drilling a hole in your roof for the pipe, only to dill a hole later if you find you do have a radon problem. Waiting on this portion is not going to add much expence at a later date.