Septic system newbie

Plumbing Forums

Help Support Plumbing Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

dingus22

Member
Joined
Feb 22, 2022
Messages
10
Reaction score
0
Location
Illinois
First of all thank you to any reading and willing to provide feedback, it is much appreciated!!

So we bought a home that we have spent almost two years renovating. Total gut, pretty much all new everything. Simple house, 750 ft2 ranch. I have never had a septic system but this house has a concrete tank, built in 1985. Two weeks ago we moved in and I had a septic/sewer guy come out. He pulled the tank cover, determined I only had about 10% solids (no need to pump it out), pulled the secondary tank cover, outlet pipe was above the water level, he said I should be all good. We start using the toilet and doing some laundry.....sewer gas smell in the house!? In the basement, there is an ejector pit for a bath down there. It kinda smells....so I take a 2" elbow, throw some duct tape on it, and jam it onto the bottom of the vent pipe. Still getting the smell? I thought maybe the gas was coming back into the house and down that pipe into the pit, which has an old rusty metal cover, NOT SEALED. Couple other key facts: the house sat for at least 2 years with nothing going into the septic tank. My thought was maybe the tank needs some "good bacteria" instead of the bad stuff that causes this bad gas?? I was gonna try putting some yeast and Rid-X into the tank outside in the hopes of changing up the bacteria situation? Might that help?
Also, my plumbing vent stack has two 90 elbows on it up on the roof, so it essentially "points down". I did that to keep debris out as we are surrounded by woods. Could this be preventing the vent stack from drafting out these gases properly?

I also smelled some gas out by the tank cover outside even, is that normal?

Again, any advice, suggestions, or thoughts on what might help would be so helpful! Thank you.
 
Last edited:
Everything must have a trap and everything must be sealed.

The sewer basin must be sealed.

Toilets must have a seal between the flange and the toilet.

All vents must extend to the outside above the roof line.

Hope this helps you.

The 90 on the roof is fine.
 
Everything must have a trap and everything must be sealed.

The sewer basin must be sealed.

Toilets must have a seal between the flange and the toilet.

All vents must extend to the outside above the roof line.

Hope this helps you.

The 90 on the roof is fine.
Thank you! I have all of those covered besides the ejector pit in the basement being sealed. One correction: it is a 180 on the roof vent, not a 90 only so if that is pointing "down" maybe that could be part of the problem. Thinking about it now, I may just get back up there and cut that off......
 
Thank you! I have all of those covered besides the ejector pit in the basement being sealed. One correction: it is a 180 on the roof vent, not a 90 only so if that is pointing "down" maybe that could be part of the problem. Thinking about it now, I may just get back up there and cut that off......

It’s not the ultimate problem but cutting that 180 off might improve your situation.

Even if the smell then went away, there’d would still be a problem. Putting a 180 on a vent won’t cause an issue by itself.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top