New2Wellz
Active Member
I am a single guy living alone.
I have been in my house for just over 4 years. It sat vacant for 5 years or so before I moved in. The line going to the septic tank is cast iron. The tank is 27 feet from the house and the toilet/bathtub are only another 3 feet beyond that.
My sewer line stopped up between the house and the septic tank last November. The guy who came out snaked it from the septic tank and not the toilet (because he had prior issues going the other way, only to have his snake coil up in the septic tank).
I stood in the bathroom to listen for the snake so it would not bust the toilet. I could hear it rattling around right at the toilet, and it took him three efforts snaking it all the way to the toilet before he broke though/up the blockage. He did not extract evidence of roots. He did not say if he say what the blockage was, and in my relived state I forgot to ask him.
Today it blocked again. When I flushed the toilet the bathtub drain gurgled. When I showered the water backed up into the tub, and eventually subsided after a few hours. I used a sulfuric acid product, which eventually worked. When I did the second flush after letting the acid sit, raw sewage came up in the tub, but nothing else did. About 1/2 hour later I heard the drains clear up.
So:
1) What could be causing this? I am the only occupant. I DO use high-quality toilet paper (Charmin Ultra-Soft), which claims to be septic-safe. I cook a lot, but am VERY careful to not let grease or any solids go down the drain.
I use two sets of strainers...a very fine set for daily use, and then the coarser set with the stopper on the bottom for when I do dishes by hand. When I drain the dishwater, I do it by removing the coarse stopper and quickly inserting the fine strainers. I do not have a garbage disposal. Plus I would think that if kitchen debris were the issue, the smaller/very long (10 feet, hard right turn, then 40 feet) kitchen drain would clog long before the main.
When we looked in the tank, there was no obvious undigested toilet paper or anything else. He said it "looked healthy" (see #2).
2) Regarding the guy's statement that my tank looks healthy...
I have a concrete, 2 chamber tank. There was a bundle of thin, fibrous root intrusion into the output side of the tank, which we removed. But both sides only had liquid about halfway up, and were level with each other.
I have been here for 4 years. Other things I read state that a family of 4 would make an empty tank rise to the top in a week or so. I hate to ask a question that I fearfully suspect the answer to, but.....does this sound like it is functioning properly? Shouldn't the water level be up to the pass-through hole between the two chambers, and as high as the inlet and the outlet to the distribution box? The level is a couple of feet below each of them. But I DO have a plumber's statement that it's healthy!
Did I mention that he is married to the business owner's daughter and had not been a plumber before? (Yeh, I'm one of those people that folks tend to open up to).
Thanks, folks.
I have been in my house for just over 4 years. It sat vacant for 5 years or so before I moved in. The line going to the septic tank is cast iron. The tank is 27 feet from the house and the toilet/bathtub are only another 3 feet beyond that.
My sewer line stopped up between the house and the septic tank last November. The guy who came out snaked it from the septic tank and not the toilet (because he had prior issues going the other way, only to have his snake coil up in the septic tank).
I stood in the bathroom to listen for the snake so it would not bust the toilet. I could hear it rattling around right at the toilet, and it took him three efforts snaking it all the way to the toilet before he broke though/up the blockage. He did not extract evidence of roots. He did not say if he say what the blockage was, and in my relived state I forgot to ask him.
Today it blocked again. When I flushed the toilet the bathtub drain gurgled. When I showered the water backed up into the tub, and eventually subsided after a few hours. I used a sulfuric acid product, which eventually worked. When I did the second flush after letting the acid sit, raw sewage came up in the tub, but nothing else did. About 1/2 hour later I heard the drains clear up.
So:
1) What could be causing this? I am the only occupant. I DO use high-quality toilet paper (Charmin Ultra-Soft), which claims to be septic-safe. I cook a lot, but am VERY careful to not let grease or any solids go down the drain.
I use two sets of strainers...a very fine set for daily use, and then the coarser set with the stopper on the bottom for when I do dishes by hand. When I drain the dishwater, I do it by removing the coarse stopper and quickly inserting the fine strainers. I do not have a garbage disposal. Plus I would think that if kitchen debris were the issue, the smaller/very long (10 feet, hard right turn, then 40 feet) kitchen drain would clog long before the main.
When we looked in the tank, there was no obvious undigested toilet paper or anything else. He said it "looked healthy" (see #2).
2) Regarding the guy's statement that my tank looks healthy...
I have a concrete, 2 chamber tank. There was a bundle of thin, fibrous root intrusion into the output side of the tank, which we removed. But both sides only had liquid about halfway up, and were level with each other.
I have been here for 4 years. Other things I read state that a family of 4 would make an empty tank rise to the top in a week or so. I hate to ask a question that I fearfully suspect the answer to, but.....does this sound like it is functioning properly? Shouldn't the water level be up to the pass-through hole between the two chambers, and as high as the inlet and the outlet to the distribution box? The level is a couple of feet below each of them. But I DO have a plumber's statement that it's healthy!
Did I mention that he is married to the business owner's daughter and had not been a plumber before? (Yeh, I'm one of those people that folks tend to open up to).
Thanks, folks.
