Your plumbing problem has not gone away and it does not seem to be getting any smaller. Now you have to bring in a plumber or a sewer line contractor to take a look what’s going on. It’s most likely going to cost a pretty penny. And it’s just not your favorite thing to deal with. No matter where you live in Solano County, whether in Suisun City, Vallejo, Benicia, Vacaville, Fairfield, Allendale, Nut Tree, Collinsville, or Green Valley, handling sewer line problems is not top of anyone’s list. So, you’ve decided that you need to call someone in. But what will happen next? Will you be living with huge trenches in your yard and driveway? Will the complete sewer line have to be replaced? Who can you call to deal with a major sewer line crisis?
Your Solano County Sewer Line Contractor Saves the Day
You really don’t want to think this plumbing thing is a big deal. You have a clogged drain or blocked toilet. You’ll be able to dissolve the clog by pouring something down the drain. You’ll be able to plunge the toilet to clear the blockage. But sometimes, the problems won’t go away, or only go away for a while. Your toilet continues to block up even after you have plunged it. You have wastewater coming up into the tub. You smell sewer smells in your yard or home in Solano County, in Suisun City, Rio Vista, Allendale, Dixon, Vacaville, Green Valley, Fairfield, Benicia, or Vallejo. You may even see toilet paper littering the yard. Any of these is an indication that you need the help of a sewer line contractor.
The sewer line is used to carry waste from your house. The sewer line connects up to the public sewer system. As a homeowner, you may be not know that you are the one responsible for the sewer line from the house to where it connects with the public system. Typically the public system hook-up is located where the sidewalk abuts the property line. If your sewer line problem affects more than a small segment of the line, it makes sense to get in touch with your local authority to see where the city takes over responsibility for the pipe. You may need to coordinate with the city so that you fix only the segment of the sewer line that you are responsible for. You want to save yourself both the cost and the liability of working on more of the sewer line than you are responsible for.
Sewer lines have wear and tear over time. Like everything else in your house, the sewer line has a life span and will need replacing when that life span is over. Sewer pipes made from clay or similar vitreous material often deteriorate quickly and were often used in older homes. Your sewer line also suffers from other forces. When the earth freezes and thaws, the changes can affect the pipes in the ground, causing them to shift or to sag. The sagging, or bellying, occurs when earth is forced out from underneath the pipes. At other times, pipes have been poorly installed and are offset, meaning that they don’t lie straight, so blockages form easily. Trees and shrubs are constantly on the reach for water, and their roots can penetrate the pipes. Even very fine roots can make it easier for blockages form, wreaking havoc with your sewer line. Dumping lots of grease down a drain over time can also cause blockages to form. These are some of the causes of sewer line damage, in addition to age.
Just How Big is the Problem With my Solano County Sewer Line?
A sewer line contractor or a plumber who takes care of sewer lines can repair or replace your sewer line. It is important that your sewer line contractor identify the problem before making recommendations or efforts to fix it. The sewer line contractor should have a camera that can be used to view the interior of the sewer line and locate the problem exactly. Your sewer line contractor may need to jet the pipe to clean it first before using the camera. Jetting means clearing debris from the pipe with high-pressure water hoses. The camera should be used so that the contractor is not guessing about the problem.
Search your property for a cleanout. You many have more than one of them. A cleanout makes it much easier when you need to work on your sewer line. Cleanouts are capped, or lidded, pipes that give workers access to the sewer line. You may be able to find the cleanout in your yard, particularly along the walls near where the bathrooms sit. A few houses have the cleanouts inside, perhaps behind the toilet, though this is not common. If you don’t have a cleanout, the sewer line contractor will have to access the sewer line through an interior fixture, such as a toilet, or through a roof vent. These latter methods incur more expense than using a cleanout.
If you face a sewer line repair, it may be a less costly project for you. On the other hand, you may have to step up for a complete sewer line replacement. In many cases, if the problem is localized, it may be possible for the sewer line contractor to patch the pipe. Patching consists of replacing the damaged area of the pipe with a new segment of pipe. In some cases, a patch makes sense. Keep in mind, though, that if you will have to keep patching the sewer line, making all those different patches can be as expensive as or more expensive than replacing the entire sewer line, since you have to keep opening up and closing the access every time you have a patch applied. The decision to patch or replace really depends on the severity of the damage; your sewer line contractor should be able to assess and offer recommendations.
How Will my Solano County Sewer Line Contractor Replace my Sewer?
Sewer line replacement rarely gets undertaken lightly. You probably imagine your yard or driveway being torn up, with trenches all over the place, and a project that goes on and on. In some cases, the repair may require a trench. But fortunately, there are also other methods that your sewer line contractor may be able to use.
With the CIPP, or cured-in-place-piping, you can run a new sewer line with a less invasive approach. Called a trenchless sewer repair, the process begins with a hydro-jetting step, in which highly pressurized water cleans out the pipe. A machine then feeds a PVC-soaked liner down the pipe. Once the liner has been put in place, a bladder is sent down to fill out the liner while steam molds the PVC liner to the existing pipe’s interior. After the liner cures, the bladder gets taken out. The new liner now forms a strong pipe that will resist stresses, cracking, and roots. It’s possible that the CIPP process can be performed without any excavation required, by using access from cleanouts or from manholes in the street. In other cases, some excavation may be employed, but it is significantly less than the full-trench approach.
Another trenchless technique is pipe bursting. In the pipe bursting approach, a hole is dug at the start of the sewer line and another hole dug at the end of the sewer line. The bursting head is placed down into of the holes. The bursting head is a device that will break apart the existing pipe in the ground. As the bursting head proceeds forward, it breaks up the pipe in front of it, at the same time it drags a new pipe along behind it. The new pipe is laid along the same path as the pipe being burst apart. In most cases, the old pipe that was burst apart is left in the ground.
What Else Could my Solano County Sewer Line Repair Entail?
You will need an expert guide to help you decide whether to use a trench or trenchless method. Besides bringing expertise, the contractor you pick must be a licensed sewer line contractor or plumber. It doesn’t matter whether the company calls itself a sewer line contractor or refers to itself as a plumber who specializes in sewer lines. In either case, the firm must have a California contractor’s license and display that number in its advertising. The plumber’s license is called a C36, and the sanitation system contractor’s license is called a C42. Licensed contractors are tested by the state and must be bonded. You should also look to make sure the contractor carries workers’ compensation insurance, or else you will be liable for workers injured on your property.
No matter where you live in Solano County, whether in Suisun City, Vallejo, Fairfield, Nut Tree, Benicia, Vacaville, Rio Vista, or Allendale, ask your contractor about permits. Most cities or counties require permits for sewer line work. Your contractor should be able to help you with the process of getting the permit.
Approved materials are the third component you must add to your licensed contractor and your permit. If you want an enduring and code-compliant repair, you need to be sure the proper materials are being using. Most localities have codes that regulate the types of materials put in place. Some specific types of pipes are banned for use as a sewer line. For example, many regions do not allow clay pipes because they break easily. In other cases, certain types of plastic are not allowed. Your sewer line contractor should be able to knowledgeably discuss the kind of pipe being used and its conformance with your local codes.
There are a few things that could blow up your sewer line repair budget. For example, there may be trees that have to be removed with the stumps ground out, since those trees are interfering with access to your sewer line. Obviously, this removal will add to the cost of the sewer line replacement or repair. In most cases, your gas and clean water lines should be installed well away from your sewer line. If you have the unfortunate case where you have an older home or a home not built to code where the gas lines are close to the sewer line, the workers have to be much more careful and costs could rise. Another issue that can affect the cost is how far away the public sewer hook-up is from your property line. You may end up digging into the road to reach it, which will increase costs.
Tree or shrub roots are frequently responsible for damaging pipes. Sometimes, a sewer line contractor will tell you that they can save the trees, leaving them mostly intact and still growing after the sewer line repair. If the trees or shrubs caused the problem by infiltrating the pipe with their roots, at least some of the roots must be removed, since the pipe they are infesting will be replaced. Be sure to ask your sewer line contractor closely about how he or she thinks it is possible to spare the trees or shrubs. Also ask about the possibility of future root intrusion, if you do want to save the trees or shrubs, since they will still be living close to the pipes.
Solano County Septic Tanks and Sewer Conversions
Septic systems are an alternative to sewer lines and public sewers. In the septic system, the wastewater is piped out of the house and sent to a tank for storage. The tank must be drained from time to time, at the homeowner’s expense, so that it can be refilled. Sometimes, a city or other local government mandates that users to move to a sewer system from a septic system. Or the homeowner may choose to make the switchover once the city sewer is available, since the public sewer system can be more convenient than maintaining a septic tank. If you need to convert from a septic system to the public sewer system, a sewer line contractor can help.
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