Septic question

[AndrewPatrol]

Hi, just had septic tank emptied and in the process of getting the system functional again. We suspect that it has never been emptied since the house was built in the mid 1980’s.
There is a distribution box for the field pipes straight after the tank and the connector from the septic is blocked by a growth of what seems like cement. Septic man said it shoulda been emptied ten years ago!! It was chocka’s

Im just wondering if this right or not. Could it be that it was fitted to slow the flow of water ??? Or should I just break it up (partly done when I thought perhaps I shouldn’t) and get rid of it. Growth is about 4 - 5 inches long and is the full diameter of pipe. It seems like it has perhaps built up over the years from silt, but it has gone pretty hard. It breaks up reasonless easy.

So should I get rid of it???

[riverbuilder]

Yes.

[rwbuild]

Yes, get rid of it. Ideally, septic systems should be cleaned out every 3 to 5 years depending on the number of people regularly using it, 4+ people every 3 yrs, 1 to 3 people, every 5 yrs

[lyricnz]

I haven't even *found* the septics for my place. Been here 3 years so far. Gotta go digging and lifting covers some day. Ditto storm water - I have no idea where it goes.

[AndrewPatrol]

I haven't even *found* the septics for my place. Been here 3 years so far. Gotta go digging and lifting covers some day. Ditto storm water - I have no idea where it goes.

Some of the lessons I learnt from my experience.

The septic man said said in general that the septic tank is not far from toilet, but ours is around corner and down a slight hill from it!

Our “grey water” is plumbed seperate to “black water” and runs into a distribution box which is immediately after septic.

Our Distrubution box lid was under a heap of plants and bushes, and in a direct line from septic. I gather from research that Dist box can be some distance from Septic.

Our black water pipe is about 950mm out from side of house.

We dug at back of toilet to find which way it went.

Septic was under about 250mm of solid dirt with no obvious signs.

We doubt if it had ever been emptied for at least 20 years!!


Hope this helps

And our story is now happily over for this adventure and we have a functioning system again.

[riverbuilder]

Throw some cheap yoghurt down the pan to get the bacteria going again

[Lappa]

My old man threw in a dead chook.

[Dareen]

Hi Andrew, My septic is also a mid 80's install and almost since day one I have used Actizyme on a 3 monthly application and during those 30 odd years I have only had the septic pumped out once, about 15 years ago, and was advised it didn't really need a pump out. Have had a couple of inspections since all looks good and is working fine. I also use some Actizyme through the grey water tank and it is good also. Cheers Fred PS. Woolworths stock it. DSCF4329.jpgDSCF4329.jpg

[AndrewPatrol]

Thanks Fred, I’ll look into that but I reckon at this rate the empty tank will see us out. NOP = next owners problem