I hear they're like opinions, right?

:-)

Tank is a filter. It keeps solids out of the field. Problems mean it is too late. Pumping out a tank is near zero money. Digging up, removing, and then installing a new field can be as much as a years income.

You don't see problems until long after a field must be replaced. Cheaper is to pump out the tank.

almost related

Do farts carry germs?

Ours is technically a cesspit. There is no leach field. It's a hole in the ground, lined with dry stacked stone, that fills up with about 1200 gallons of waste. A large part of the liquid slowly seeps into the soil while micro organisms break down the poo. Eventually, it gets full and needs to be pumped out. It used to be on a 3 year pump out cycle now it is yearly. The ability of the liquid to seep has been compromised by the years of caked on poo effectively plastering the stone and clogging the sand. That's my understanding.

A new septic system would run me about $10,000. A yearly pump out is currently $280. I don't see the benefit to installing a new system. I just need to be a bit more proactive come pump out time.

The sinking feeling today is the possibility that the clay drain tile (pipe) leading from the cast iron to pit may have collapsed, and if that is so, then all bets are off. I may tell the bank they can have the house.


There is a hour's worth of cleanup from today's part of the project and I still am not sure if things are running. I pulled a lot of flushable wipes out of the drain. They are not flushable, in case you wanted to know.

More urgently, are they supposed to be lumpy?:o

Well, technically, you can flush them. Just like you can flush little green plastic army men.

Good point.

Cowabunga!!!


Now that's a story with a happy ending, unless you're a plastic turtle.

I have had a couple occasions to get into the main sewer line of the house. The first time was because the sewage wasn't flowing, something like the footfootfoot's quoted story, but without the turtles. I called the plumber after my attempts with my own drain snakes of various diameters and lengths (the biggest one is 3/8" by 50') proved ineffective. The guy brought into my basement, a drum auger, a machine on a built-in dolly with miles of snake (well, 250') and a big, powerful motor to twist the snake and cutter head. He ran that thing down the drain and after a while, I asked him how far into the sewer the machine was. He said he was about out to the middle of the street! Wow.

When it came back out, it brought with it a large mass of what looked like black hair, but he said it was tree roots. I found this surprising, but that's just my own ignorance. Root infiltration through pipe walls is very common. Here's a picture from DB's Plumbing and Drain.

Attachment 48967

My problem was roots, which his machine removed handily, thankyouverymuch, but it sounds like footfootfoot's problem might be like the collapsed drain/soil infiltration problem. That's a bigger problem. I've read that it's possible to replace just that section of drain pipe by measuring how far the intact pipe runs, then excavating the drain only at the place where it's broken, which can be determined by measuring how far the snake was able to travel before it was stopped.

Those pictures were taken from a camera inside the drain of course. That's what I had done the second time by a drain inspection outfit hired by the city utility. A house close to mine was recently rebuilt and the owners had gas service installed in their new house. No biggie. But the installation of the gas lines meant that they needed to verify all the sewer lines in the local area to be sure that no gas line penetrated any sewer line. Wait, what?

Attachment 48971

You can see how that might develop into a serious problem. A video inspection can yield a lot of useful information, though the inspection itself will cost some money and isn't something I can easily do myself.

I wish you luck, footfootfoot. I hope your problem can be solved without abandoning ship.

So neighbor A had to inspect the installation jobs of neighbors B, C, D, and E, before they could tie in to gas company pipe Z? That seems like the burden is on the wrong people. B should pay to check B, C should pay to check C, and so on. That's like me having to inspect the wiring of all the houses on the street before I install a garbage disposal.

sorry, rereading my sentence makes it clear I was unclear. let me try again.

I'm not sure who is paying, I am sure *I'm* not paying. The best I could determine is that the gas installers are paying since they're the ones doing the horizontal/blind drilling and they would be the ones who are paying for the inspection. the inspection is after the fact, since the drilling was done. I asked why this is even needed (besides the obvious, I don't want intersecting gas and sewer lines) and he told me that the surveys in this area (it's an old neighborhood) are unreliable. Perhaps the sewer line is where the plans say it is, maybe it's not. Maybe there's a NEW sewer line that's been installed but not recorded properly or at all with the city. The point is, they can't be sure, and apparently they can't tell when they're drilling--ooops, that felt like a sewer line--so they check after the fact.

FTR, Mum's friend had to pay to the water company for a sewage backup because it occurred on her property.
She was in her 60s at the time, and the blockage was traced to nappies being flushed down the toilet. Hardly hers. The man who came to sort the problem out put notices through the doors of all the properties further up the same system, so that she did not have to confront her neighbours. Not that anyone ever owned up or offered to help with the fee.

Mum & Dad had a similar problem when we were little - they used terry towelling ("real") nappies, so it wasn't them.
What had been assumed to be a stream running through the garden had been there before they moved in. Turned out to be a broken water pipe. Clean tap water luckily, not grey water/ sewage. They were okay financially as it was council owned housing at the time. But the whole garden, which they were only just establishing, looked like the Somme for weeks as they tried to trace the leak.

Despite not having to pay, Mum was of course horrified at the slur on her character.
We never flushed anything solid down the toilet in my childhood (apart from little brown fish).