our second blog, we are continuing the theme of how “Professional”
contractors, Licensed & Insured, are only in business to turn a
profit, under the guise of providing a service to Home or Business
Owners…We feel this is especially true with franchised home
improvement contractors…
We were called out to a home in Baton
Rouge, Louisiana – a neighborhood near Perkins and Siegen Lane…Homes
built in the early 1980’s…The Homeowner in this case had the Main
City Sewer back up into his home at 5 am with nothing flushed or
running in the house, water pouring from underneath both toilets, as if
someone turned on a pump…
The homeowner first called us and
after listening to the symptoms presented, we advised the homeowner to
call DPW (Department of Public Works) and get them out to look at this,
since this was obviously the City Main backing up into the
home…Homeowner was told by DPW dispatcher that no one would be
available at DPW until after 8 am, despite the fact there is an
emergency after hours # in the phone book…
Through the phone
conversation, we learned that this same exact scenario happened about
18 months ago – the City Main backed up into the house and flooded
it…The homeowner didn’t want to have us out, because he thought we
couldn’t “certify” the sewer problem was on DPW’s side of things, due
to the previous event, where a licensed plumber came out, used their
Sewer machine and determined the stoppage was on DPW’s Main Sewer…
Photos of Friendly Home Services’ Backwater Valve Installation
We
explained it wasn’t necessary to have anyone “certify” the stoppage was
on DPW’s piping, since anyone with any real plumbing experience or
training could look at the facts here and determine that with no water
running in the home at 5 am, the sewer backs up from underneath the
toilets, that the water has to be coming from the City Main…East
Baton Rouge Parish & the Department of Public Works both have a
policy of denying responsibility – it’s what they do best…
The
Homeowner decided to call out Roto-Rooter Plumbing & Drain
Cleaning…A plumber came out and found the sewer with his probing rod,
but then didn’t take the extra few minutes to find a clean out near the
back of the house…Instead, once Roto-Rooter found the sewer, he dug a
small hole and using his claw hammer, smashed a hole into the 4″
diameter thin wall PVC sewer pipe…He then ran his Sewer Machine Cable
through the broken sewer pipe down the line once, supposedly 100 feet
and then declared the problem was on DPW’s Main Sewer…The homeowner
meanwhile had gotten a hold of someone at DPW Sewer Department, who
were sending their own crew out to “look at the situation”…
Roto-Rooter
charged the homeowner $135.00, then quoted him a price of over $400.00
to repair the broken sewer line where the plumber smashed it with his
hammer, and install a clean out…Roto-Rooter never “certified” the
problem on his receipt…The homeowner even asked the Roto-Rooter
plumber to wait for DPW to come out, to explain to the Sewer Department
crew what he found on behalf of the homeowner…The Roto-Rooter plumber
told the homeowner he couldn’t wait and left in his plumbing
truck…The Roto-Rooter plumber also told the homeowner that he now had
a “Poor Man’s Clean Out”…The homeowner also stated that the
Roto-Rooter plumber was rude and not very helpful at all…Also, he was
there at the house for less than 1/2 hour…
The first crew from
DPW arrived just 10 minutes after Roto-Rooter and after hearing what
the homeowner had to say, which wasn’t much since he really didn’t know
or understand what he was trying to explain concerning his sewer
backing up…The first DPW crew found a manhole, looked down it and
after seeing the Sewer Main flowing, told the homeowner the problem
wasn’t theirs and left…
We had another phone conversation with
the Homeowner, who called us back for more advice…It was at this
time, we realized that there was a strong possibility that the
homeowner’s sewer line and one of his neighbor’s sewer lines were tied
together with a wye fitting prior to the DPW main sewer, and that the
stoppage was past this wye, but before their 4” yard lines tied in, or
tapped the City Main…This is why the first DPW crew didn’t see a
problem in the manhole, because the problem wasn’t in the trunk line of
the City Sewer Main…
Photos of Friendly Home Services’ Backwater Valve Installation
What
had happened? There was actually two houses stopped up, but our
customer’s sewer is lower or downstream from his neighbor…So when his
next door neighbors got up at 5 am and took care of their morning
constitutions and showers, getting ready for school and work, all the
water the neighbors used ran right back into our customer’s home,
flooding it…
By this time, our customer was really frustrated,
was out $135.00, had contaminated sewage on his floors and carpeting
and had that awful raw sewage odor permeating his home…Since this was
the second time this happened in 18 months, Friendly Home Services
strongly recommended the installation of a Backwater Valve into the 4″
PVC sewer line…
A Backwater Valve is essentially a fitting
with a big flapper in it, similar to what is in a toilet tank…Water
can flow out of the house, but the moment the City’s Main Sewer backs
up, the flapper closes and no raw sewage can back up into the
home…Another alternative is the installation by DPW of what they call
a “Liberty Pump”, which is a small lift station buried in the yard, but
uses an electric pump to keep the City Main Sewer from backing up into
a house…Liberty Pumps work great until power is lost, like in a
Hurricane or a Tropical Storm, whereas a Backwater Valve will function
regardless…
To make a long story not as long…After being
very persistent, the homeowner was able to get a 2nd DPW crew out to
Inspect the sewer with a Video Camera, after which they found the
problem was indeed as we called it – two homes with sewer lines tied
together with a wye fitting, with the stoppage being on DPW’s sewer
tap…A 3rd crew was then sent out to dig up the yard and repair DPW’s
Main Sewer, installing a 6″ PVC clean out in the backyard for future
inspection…
For our repair; the installation of a Backwater
Valve and 2nd clean out downstream from the Valve, the homeowner spent
$85.00 in PVC fittings and two hours of labor – one hour to dig
everything up and one hour to cut out the damaged section of pipe
broken by Roto-Rooter and complete the installation of the Backwater
Valve and 2nd clean out…It took us literally 2 minutes to locate and
uncover the existing clean out, which was less than 12 inches upstream
from where Roto-Rooter had smashed a hole…The existing clean out had
a threaded plug that was lying upside down on top of the clean out
fitting…The clean out plug was never threaded back into the fitting
the last time the drain was cleaned 18 months ago by the last
“plumber”, who was also licensed and insured…
After we
finished, we have the following configuration: 1) the original clean
out (Roto-Rooter didn’t find); 2) the Backwater Valve and 3) a new
additional clean out…This way, a cable or hydro-jet can be both run
up the sewer underneath the foundation (using clean out #1) or down the
sewer towards the City Main Sewer (using clean out #2) without risking
hanging a cable up inside the Backwater Valve and damaging it…The
only caveat being that nothing with strings can go down the sewer now –
no tampons, dental floss or personal wipes – three items that should
never be flushed down the drain in the first place…
Now the
Backwater Valve will not prevent every kind of stoppage in your home,
only the scenario of the City Main Sewer backing forcefully
upstream…The sewer pipes under the home that flow to the Backwater
Valve can still have unrelated stoppages and cause the backflow of raw
sewage into your home, but at least it will be your sewage, not your
neighbor’s…
The general rule we advise customers concerning
their sewers is this – Going #1, Going #2 and bathroom tissue are the
only things that should be flushed…Anything else can hang up in the
sewer line or in the toilet itself, causing a stoppage…
Remember
that the china inside the trapway of a toilet is not glazed, so the
surface is exactly the same as inside the toilet tank, but with little
barbs in the china that catch anything with strings…Personal wipes
should not go down for the same reason – Personal wipes don’t break
down like tissue and will get hung without shredding in the toilet or
sewer line, causing a stoppage…
We hope this is helpful information, regardless of where you may live in the USA…
Photos of Friendly Home Services’ Backwater Valve Installation
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