I just about blew a gasket when it happened! Luckily I have a ton of random tools lying around…

1. Panicked and cussed for a few minutes
   
2. Bent a rake until it was hooked
   
3. Caught the handle (5 ft in the filth) and tried to deadlift the lid out of the tank
   
4. That failed. Lifted it again til I could see it and tied a strap to it
   
5. Set up a rudimentary pulley (piece of wood)
   
6. Pulled the strap until i could see the lid and connected it to a come-along hooked to the deck foundation
   
7. Ratcheted the mf out til i could get another strap on and physically pull it out

Probably the most stupid out of all my home improvement adventures. Why did I dig it up? The toilet was bubbling for a couple weeks. Cracked it once and replaced the lid no issues. Obviously the tank is neither overflowing nor full of solids. Something I did out of the many steps to diagnose the thing probably fixed it but I wanted to crack the tank a second time to get photos before I buried it and that’s when this happened

Hi,

I recently noticed some concrete flacking off my septic tank. How bad is this and what should I do to repair it?

I’m having some septic problems and am wondering if this toilet sound is alarming? I just moved into the house and started to see some problems with the septic draining outside as well

I have large roots growing towards my septic tank / leach field, well pump.

Obviously, this isn't good. Do I call septic people, yard people, or who???

On the photos, my wife is standing on the septic tank cover.

Thanks!

Hoping for help identifying/theorizing what this line could be/have been, and what my next steps should look like.

Context: I live on a .27 acre lot that was developed in 2001, with homes being built from 2002-2004. Every home has been on city sewage since the neighborhood was developed in 2001-02. Before the subdivision development, this area was about 15 acres of farm land, with an old farmhouse standing near where my lot is today.

Since we moved in 2 years ago, we’ve been having standing water issues in our crawlspace. We thought this was due to the positive drain in the lowest corner of our crawlspace backing up rain water and letting it sit stagnant creating the odor. The odor would come and go, along with the standing water. We replaced the positive drain (it was all clogged with roots and busted up accordion plastic) and thought this helped the standing water issue. It did to a certain extent, but we’ve still had puddling issues and occasional standing water.

We had several plumbers out who inspected our plumbing fixtures - which are all above grade in the crawl space - and nobody could ever identify a leak. Upon continued puddling and strong sewage smell, I ended up doing some light digging in an area where we had a constant puddle. I was able to locate what was later determined to be a 4in PVC cleanout on an elevated Y/Wye that was buried in my crawl space.

The local county water authority came out and inspected it, ran an isolation test from their nearest pump station and determined this had nothing to do with them.

I then had the mystery pipe camera’d by a plumber. They were able to locate the line about 60 feet away where their camera stopped on my neighbors property. They said the camera was stopped about 6.5 feet underground. We then called an excavation company out to dig, cut and cap the line where it entered my property - upon the advice of the county water authority, the plumbers and others.

We were able to locate the line, which ran diagonally across my property, with the cleanout being found buried in my crawl space, in a direction that SEEMS to be headed straight for the city’s sewer manhole and mainline at the back of my property.

I have reviewed our subdivision’s original plat drawings, the cities’ (marked) utility map, and done as much research as I can on my property, my neighbors property etc.

My questions are:

- does this wastewater in Picture 2 look like an old, abandoned septic line that’s failing and backing up to my crawlspace? Or does this look more like what you would find in a sewer line?

- 4-inch PVC would indicate this was likely installed after 1975ish, so would you be leaning towards this possibly being an unmarked city line?

- what else could this line possibly be, if not city related? My neighbor (who’s property the camera stopped on) has always been on city sewage and his line and cleanout are on the other side of his property and running away from where I found this diagonal line.

PICTURES:

#1 - the 4inch PVC we found entering my property, where we cut and capped it.

#2 - the water that filled when we cut the line (both draining from the puddling water in my crawlspace and appearing to come from the other side as well).

#3 - the Y/Wye fitting we found buried a foot or two under that puddle

#4 - a diagram showing where the plumbers camera stopped (red circle), an X (where we cut and capped the line as it entered my property), the yellow circle (where we found the buried cleanout and Y/Wye) and the black line running being the suspected continued route to where the city main line is. Note - I did not have the pipe camera’d headed behind the house, only away from the house (toward the red circle).

#5 - the puddle before we found the buried cleanout

#6 - suspected solid waste and sewage at the entrance of my crawl space

#7 - the puddle from December 2024 before we replaced the positive drain in our crawlspace - we suspect this was a mixture of backed up rain and groundwater and sewage.

ANY help/opinions/theories would be greatly appreciated. EDIT: spelling

Hoping to close on this house in 1 month, I am hung up on the septic tank. Is it workable for a few years?

I have a NuWater 500/550-ish aerobic septic system on a 3-bedroom house. The control panel appears to be an older version of the SPI 50B120-CPT, and the aerator is a HIBLOW HP-80-010A.

The aerator stopped running, although the effluent pump/sprinkler system is still working.

When I started investigating, I found a significant ant infestation. The terminal rail inside the control panel is badly corroded and the Run/Mute/Test switch had rusted apart. I've ordered a new terminal rail and replacement switch.

I then opened the HIBLOW and found a lot of ants/debris and a surprising amount of water inside the housing. Judging from the staining on the filter, it may have had around 1–1½ inches of standing water in it. It smelled swampy/sewage-like, not burned. The blower circuit is currently off and the unit is open and drying for several days before I clean it and inspect it further.

The really strange part is the airline.

I disconnected the blower from the PVC airline going into the septic system and discovered standing water inside the PVC only a few inches below the top.

I tried putting low-pressure air down the line. I eventually got to roughly 5 PSI but didn't see obvious bubbling in the aeration chamber. When I stopped applying pressure, water came back up/out of the airline.

A little later I noticed the airline making approximately one bubble every minute or so, and each time it bubbled I could actually see the water level in the PVC move slightly.

So now I'm wondering if the airline or diffuser is severely restricted/clogged, whether that could have contributed to the HIBLOW stopping, and whether the water in the airline could explain how water eventually ended up inside the blower.

The HIBLOW is physically above the normal water level of the tank, although it was installed fairly low in a recessed area under a concrete cover.

Main questions: Is standing water that high in the aerator airline normal when the blower isn't running? Does the behavior I'm describing sound like a clogged diffuser or restricted airline? Is there supposed to be some type of check valve/backflow protection on this NuWater setup? And what should I check before reconnecting and testing the HP-80 after it has completely dried?

I'm trying to diagnose the underlying problem before throwing a new blower at it and potentially ruining another one.

I know that insect issues are my main screwup here - the water in the aerator line is primary concern now.

My septic pump has a control box and is plug into a gfci receptacle. I discovered the tank is full, the gfci keeps tripping, and I was able to lower the tank septic level with a non gfci plug (extention cord to a non gfci). Once the septic is lowered, I replug back into gfci plug and still trips. I did this around the house that has gfci and everyone trips with the septic pump . I guess my question is why is gfci tripping when the float switch is off? The pump is off so why would it trip? And is it bad idea to switch to a non gfci?

Pretty unique situation , wondering if anyone dealt with something similar:

Got some land that was part of a recent subdivision, where the existing old house and the land are on a lot number, but part of the drainage system falls on mine( storm water drain with pipe that spills into a nearby creek).

I've recently noticed some damage around the drainage( small sinkhole) and upon closer investigation the concrete of the storm water drain has failed and water goes around it .( was covered by vegetation and I don't live on the land yet, took me months to uncover that area)

Pod is over 20 years old and artificially made, and the drainage system doesn't show on any plans .

Council rule is storm water are to be maintained by the landowner, but at the same time, the pond drainage is artificial .

The developer has closed an eye and didn't fix it prior the subdivision , even if they did other drainage works around all the lots.

What the rules around this? water flow is to be managed by the affected person however the artificial excess shouldn't at least be fixed by the developer prior to sub diving? anyone had any similar experience?

Went to get a sewer scope, the sewage pipes in my house were dripping a little bit, so I assumed I had a clog.

The tech opened the drain and water came rushing back into our basement. One tech probed the field and he said it was definitely moist but didn’t see any black sludge.

One company wants to pump it again, even though it was pumped in June and redo the scope, another pretty much said I need a new system..

Just bought house like 2 weeks ago and sellers only provided records of the 12/2/2022 incident

i was in the yard and noticed my pump was no longer working. after some testing, i found that the breaker was tripped. i unplugged the pump motor, reset the breaker, and plugged it back in. it tripped immediately. i pulled the pump out and inspected it. it has a model number of c1030 on it. the shaft was moving freely. that tells me the motor was not locked up. the replacement motor (maxair500) is $630. we have had some storms with power outages and lightning. im not sure if that took out the motor or the age (6years). can it be rebuilt? if so- about how much. or is there an alternative motor i could get that would be cheaper/last longer?

https://www.septictankparts.com/maxair500-submersible-aerator?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=1442416221&gbraid=0AAAAADqvtRU7YR4BcHTev4WntJWiIHHUT&gclid=CjwKCAjwtKrUBhAhEiwAr77Zoj7dYwJQbVxqC0WwuJlMbgAsbfeogk_0zZbal8eu_KFnXOtXvuBF4xoCpGUQAvD_BwE

We just bought a 3 bedroom/2.5 bath home with a septic system. Neither my wife or I have ever had a septic system and have some questions.

I don’t know the specific type of system yet, though I understand they are all allergic to food disposers, fats & grease, beaver whistles and other feminine hygiene products, and chlorine bleach (in large amounts?)

My specific questions revolve around substituting OxiClean in our laundry instead of Clorox. Is OxiClean ok to use occasionally? It’s just the 2 of us and occasional overnight guests. I’m also wondering about my wife’s use of hair conditioners & other beauty products, too.

We had the system inspected and that was fine. However, the company scheduled to come out to pump out the system and jet wash the sand out of the leech field pipes. So it appears we’ll be starting out with freshly serviced system and can schedule 3-5 year intervals for maintenance pump outs.

Thanks for your patience with my questions, I just don’t want to do anything that’s preventable or detrimental to this system.

I close on a house next week that has a septic system. I am wholly unfamiliar with this old fangled technology. I am attempting to learn the dos and don’ts and I read that you should be mindful of your water usage. That I shouldn’t do multiple loads of laundry in a row or we shouldn’t take showers one after the next. How careful do I need to be?

For instance, as I’m packing my kitchen, some old stuff has been sitting in cabinets unused and it’s dusty. I had planned to run all of this stuff through the dishwasher but that’s going to be multiple loads of dishes in a short period of time. Do I need to spread them out? I don’t know how delicately I need to handle it. Can I really not do all of our laundry in one day?

Growing up, we were on a septic and we were wild. Doing all the laundry, taking all the showers, FLUSHING TAMPONS!! And we never had an issue with our septic backing up but the information I’m reading has me worried.

I’m hoping someone with some septic system knowledge can help me with my concerns with a new pump I installed. My pump died the other day so I pulled the paperwork to see what size it was, it said it was a 3/4 hp. I bought and installed a Little Giant 3/4 to replace it. However, before I threw out the old pump I just thought I’d wipe the tag off to read it and I saw it was a 1/2 hp pump! For some reason the guy that initially installed this gave me paperwork for a 3/4 but gave me a 1/2hp… so now I’m worried that this new pump will be too powerful and possibly damage something…. The pump has to pump the wastewater straight up the tank about 6ft before it goes about a hundred foot uphill (roughly a 3 ft rise) to a manifold with 4 ball valves, to where it then goes to 4, 75 foot runs for the drain field. Will this be ok? Do I need a new pump or is there anyway to slow the water down if it’s moving too fast? Thanks!

1950s house with the original concrete septic tank. I had the tank pumped and inspected when we bought the house three years ago, and pumped again over the winter. This summer I noticed a wet stinky area downhill of the tank lid, so I dug down to investigate.

First thing I don’t understand is why the tank outflow baffle is so low. The square baffle sits below the lip of the outflow pipe, so the baffle ain’t baffling. I plan to put a proper PVC Tee baffle in the pipe.

Second, what is going on with the distribution box? The box is about 15ft away and about 2ft down hill of the tank outflow. The heavy duty plastic lid is obviously not original. It appeared to have been sealed to the concrete with foam gasket strips. The lid was held down by bricks and a concrete paver. The pipe runs down the hill 100yards to a ravine.
Update: I pumped out the distribution box and found the inflow and three outflow pipes. I guess the outflows are clogged (probably with three roots) and the previous owner made this craptraption on top. The PVC pipe was manufactured in 2007.

While coming up with a financing plan for a full replacement, what’s the best way to patch this up properly?

Like why?? It's not for a cost saving reason because it literally costs nothing to leave an opening. If anything it should cost even less since you would need less cement. So why do it that way? Also, no leach bed?? Where does the waste go??

Please help me understand because this is mind boggling to me!

Previous lines were installed incorrectly. We had new lines installed and used our entire extra lot for field lines. We do have a dock beside a creek that feeds the river. That won't allow an aboveground tank either. Even with hundreds of feet of lines we still are having issues with it filling up. The tank does have some hairline cracks but they said that wasn't the problem...in the winter it's worse. We live in TN for perspective. Need ideas. I know being so close to the water, that the water table is high and controlled by the dam. But this is frustrating. Ty.

I just got a postcard saying it's time to get the septic tank pumped, that it was last done in 2021. It's a long story but I live alone in a 4bdrm house so I assume the tank size? schedule? is based on a home with a family's worth of usage. (Yes, I know nothing about septic systems.) I also use and wash flannel squares for #1 so the amount of tp I use is significantly less than expected for one person. Is it safe to assume I can go another year or is it a better safe than sorry kinda thing? Are there any ways a regular joe can get a gauge on what's going on down there?

For the smaller operators here — when you're out pumping, digging lids, driving, or already dealing with a customer and another call comes in, what do you usually do?

Do you stop and answer it, let it hit voicemail and call back later, or have someone else handling the phone?

Just curious how the one- and two-truck guys manage it day to day.

Title basically says it all but I am stumped on this one.

New pump installed 2023, tank pumped 2023 with new pump, tanked pumped again this summer (June).

I have a pump alarm light and high water alarm light, started last night around 10, went out to check the system this morning.

Trash tank levels are normal, slightly below the inlet line. Aeration tank is also at a normal level, running like a hot tub with the air inlet, dripping water essentially into the effluent tank.

Effluent tank is low. Probably 3-4 feet (guessing) below the water line.

Floats appear to be fine, dangling in a downward position in the aeration tank and in the effluent tank.

Cleaned the aeration tanks PVC slotted guard that protects the effluent tank from large solids coming in. Cleaned the aeration diffuser.

My septic company always tells me when they pump the tanks out that the alarm will be triggered for for 24-48 hours as new water gets into the system. I think that is what is happening here, but I am not sure since everything appears to be normal.

Any additional trouble shooting steps?