Neighbour's cigarette smell through my bathroom vent

[EllieStan]

We live on the top floor of a building (6 apts) that's around 60 years old. This is our 3rd year in this apartment. I noticed weird exhaust smells in my bathroom before (like bad food odor or cigarette odor), but it didn't happen that often, until a few weeks ago. Sometimes, the smell is so strong it makes me nauseous.

At first, we didn't know where that smell was coming from. There was a big hole in our bathroom cabinet (for the plumbing pipes), so we blocked it. The smell happened again. There are 2 cabinet ''doors'' on the wall (to grant access to the air vent system), so we taped plastic all over the holes to prevent the smell. When we finished covering all the places we thought the smell could come from, I told my landlord about the problem (last week), because I had done everything possible on my end. He seemed not to know what to do, but told me he'd investigate the origin of the smell.

I started a journal in the meantime. So far, I have noted bad smells in my bathroom 4 times out of these past 7 days. Now, it just happened again. I was in the bathroom and I heard the neighbour's fan. I held my hand in front of the air vent grid, and I felt air coming in! Guessing the air vent was the culprit, I stayed around for a few minutes, and unsurprisingly, the cigarette smell started to envade my bathroom.

Now what? I fear it's going to take a while for my landlord to do something about it. The odor only happens in the bathroom, but I have to keep the door closed at all times or else the smell is strong enough to envade the whole apartment. The is no window in the bathroom. The air vent is the only way we can keep some sort of air circulation.

The grid looks like this: http://www.broan.com/common/productimagehandler.ashx?id=cc6bc762-3756-4001-bf14-947ecc294acc&type=large

Is it safe to block the air vent?

This is just another thing to add to our long list of noise and smell disturbance from the same neighbours. We already decided we'll be moving out in 2016. I'm looking for a temporary solution until the landlord does something, or until we move out.

Thanks!

[CowboyAndIndian]

That seems to be an exhaust vent (Broan makes those).

Looks like the output of your vent and the output of the neighbors vent tie in together and are then exhausted out.

Each exhaust vent should have a flapper(my term for it, dont know what it is called), which is basically a one way valve.
See the attached image and see the piece sticking out of the exhaust part.

Could be this vents flapper is missing or stuck in the open position then when your neighbor turns on the vent, a portion of his exhaust comes into your bath room.

If this is the case, replacing your exhaust vent which has the flapper should solve the problem.

[EllieStan]

This is what it looks like (it's off)


And then without the grid. If you can't read the label : it's upside-down. Is this normal?


When the air vent/exhaust is on, and I put a piece of toilet paper in front of the grid, it sticks to the grid: so the fan is definitely doing its job pulling the air OUT of my bathroom when it's working.

When I took this picture, I couldn't hear my neighbour's fan working. But I still felt cool air against my palm (coming IN).

Is there a piece missing? Where should the ''flapper'' be?

[jba302]

It would be inside the pipe on the other side of the motor. If the cover is ferrous you could get a magnetic vent cover and stick it on there as a cheap solution.

[EllieStan]

I had never heard about magnetic vent covers. Thanks! It sounds like a decent solution (and more aesthetical than duct tape!) until the landlord can take a look at how both exhausts are installed.

[EllieStan]

Ah. It's plastic or aluminum. Not magnetic. :(

[Beaker]

You could just leave your fan running all the time. That should push any odors out the other way. Not going to be great for you heating/cooling efficiency, though.

[EllieStan]

I can't, the lights need to be on in order for this to work. And making it work doesn't suppress the bad smell. I tried everything from letting it on for a whole hour to spraying any kind of smell suppressor, to lighting a match or candles. It just cover the smell for a few minutes, but the smell keeps coming in.

[jba302]

Ah. It's plastic or aluminum. Not magnetic. :(

You could glue some magnets inside the vent cover. Or get some thin magnetic strips from a craft store. Still a fairly cheap option if the landlord isn't getting his shit in gear.

[Beaker]

And making it work doesn't suppress the bad smell.

Wait, so running the fan doesn't prevent the smell? If that's the case, you might be barking up the wrong tree here.

If running the fan just doesn't get rid of the smell once you've already got it, then that's a different matter.

[AZDude]

Easy solution would be to just tack a towel over the top of the vent until you think of something better. Used to live in an apartment with a "smoking bench" outside one of the windows. The smoke would seep in through the windows. Ended up putting a towel on the window sill to soak up any odor coming through. Worked great. Just dont ever sniff the towel and be sure to change it out/wash it once in awhile.

[EllieStan]

Okay, sorry if it's been days, I wanted to give you an update.

I kept a journal of everytime I happened to smell something weird in my bathroom. On October 6 I worked from home, and it became obvious part of the smell came from the vent/exhaust, because I could feel cool air against my palm whenever the neighbour's fan or shower went on. It was quickly followed by a cigarette smell and shampoo smell! However, making my own fan work DIDN'T help suppress the smell.

The morning after, on Oct. 7, I talked to my landlord. We were in the parking at the same time in the morning and I asked him if he would be home at 6 because I now suspected the weird smell was coming from my air vent.

When I came home that evening, he wasn't home yet. It soon started smelling like fresh varnish/paint in my bathroom! I kid you not, the smell was so strong I started feeling nauseated and I had to close the bathroom door and put a towel on the floor, because the smell was starting to spread in the hallway! I called my landlord and asked him if he was on his way, because I had a perfect example of bad smell going on. He was at a hockey game with his son and told me he would be there by 8. Unfortunately, at 8pm the smell had prettu much faded, but my landlord did smell it when he entered the bathroom. He told me all the bathroom exhausts were connected into the same metal ''chimney''. And when he opened the small door we had taped and put his hand in there, it was windy. I mean, it's supposed to work this way I guess, the air goes up and it exists through the roof, but it's not supposed to spread in my bathroom!

He said he would look both air vents/exhausts and put insulating wool (this is a litteral translation, I don't know the right word in English). I also asked him about the ''flapper'' like one of you suggested. He said he didn't know, and that he would check for this as well. He told me he would come back sometime this week, but he still hasn't.

I kept recording every event in a journal because the smells (cigarette, food) happen almost on a daily basis now, and this weekend, I even realized it also came from under our sink. There's a hole in the wall (under the pipes) and it's windy. Although we put a towel to block the hole, it's still an issue.

So for now, the landlord has acknowledged there is a problem with the way the exhaust air is circulating, but the problem is not yet resolved. I've put ducttape over the fan grid in the meantime. The smells still happened over the weekend, but they're less powerful.

[Spork]

Just to add to "the flapper" theory...   I have 4 fans.  They are tied in pairs to 2 vent stacks.  An upstairs bathroom shares a vent with the exhaust fan that exhausts over a cat litter box.

Every day or so, I'd get a faint sewage smell at the top of the stairs... had no idea what it was, but I was assuming it was a plumbing vent leak.   One day I smelled cat food, and that led me to the vent fan. 

My flapper was both:
* installed backwards -- At rest it would be half open due to the molded weight being at the top instead of the bottom.
* badly molded from the factory -- It didn't quite fit when installed correctly, which is probably why the electrician put it in backwards.  I had to file/sand it a little to make it fit without catching on the exhaust venting.

Poke in there and see if you have a flapper of some sort that is misbehaving... or if there is a mounting for one that is missing.  On mine, I had to remove the fan unit entirely to get to it.  Most have an easy disconnect similar to an electrical receptacle and it looks like yours has this as well.

[RetiredAt63]

To those more knowledgeably than I:  The picture has the label upside down - could the whole unit be installed upside down and therefore not working properly?

[Spork]

To those more knowledgeably than I:  The picture has the label upside down - could the whole unit be installed upside down and therefore not working properly?

Is it possible to pull out the fan unit and tell?  It should just unplug.  It's usually just held in by metal tabs or a screw or two.  When you pull it out, there will be a rough in box with wiring and the duct work behind it.

[EllieStan]

Hi all,

Thanks for your replies. A little update.

Although everything has been taped, I could still smell strong cigarette (and pot) odours in my bathroom. The landlord finally came over to put isolating wool everywhere. I asked him to check the flapper and he discovered the flapper had indeed been installed upside down! So it was always opened. He reinstalled the whole thing correctly. As he proceeded, we started to smell a strong food odour, like bad broccoli or something. I was in the den, in another room, and I could smell it! My landlord asked me ''if this the smell you're used to?'' It wasn't, cigarette is pretty much the one we smell 3-4 times a week, but still, he admitted the odour was strong.

He went downstairs to check our neighbours' exhaust and theirs too, was upside down! He was supposed to take care of it this week.

The landlord finally admitted he could smell a faint cigarette odour in his bathroom too, from time to time. But since the odour wasn't that strong, it didn't bother him. He told me the previous landlord had removed the old ventilation system because (get this): the renters would  complain they could smell whenever another renter cooked smelly dishes, like fish or curry. So there I was, complaining for over a month about weird odours and feeling like my landlord was suspicious about it, when it's actually a known problem due to the building having a structural issue with ventilation.

I have to say, he still tried his best to solve the problem. Unfortunately, I smelled cigarette Thursday when I came back from work, and I smelled it again this morning.

I called the Régie du logement, exposed the problem, and the Régie sided with me. It's nothing against my landlord, but since I cannot have complete enjoyment of my apartment, I am now within my right to ask for an indemnity. I will try to negociate a lower rent from now on (until we move out, probably by July 2016 because the issue obviously won't be solved until then). We cannot leave right now, I have to consider my SO's university session and moving out too soon would be stressful and would also cause us a financial prejudice.

I will come back to tell you if the negociation went well. If not, I will have to take legal actions.