Sewer Lateral - Ready for inspection

This weekend we finished up the connection to the street, repaced all the clay pipe and made the new connections to the house with cast iron. It took less than 3 hours to finish it up with the help of my friend Dave and one of his employees Vic.






Now all I need to put this project behind us is to get the inspector out here and conduct an exfiltration test. I set up the test on Sunday by plugging the line at the street and filling all the lines with water. There was no drop in the water level after 30 min proving that the new sewer line is leak free.

Sewer Lateral - Commited

Today I planned to undertake the removal of the old clay pipes and replace them with the new ABS. Before we were committed I wanted to make sure I had all the right parts. This morning I didn't have a choice, part of the clay pipe collapsed and opened up. I came out to look at my ditch only to find everything we flushed down in the past day floating in it's whole form. I was now committed.

My friend Dave came by to drop off supplies he picked up at the local plumbing supply shop. (It is good to have a plumber friend)We were planning on doing the replacement together but he had to run. The other problem we ran into is that there were a couple of parts and tools missing. I was on my own to get the sewer hooked up enough to be able to flush the toilet and not have it end up in the ditch.

I proceeded to remove sections of the clay pipe hoping at some point to make a clean break that I could attache to the ABS. I was missing a chain cutter so I was trying to make a clean break with a cold chisel, I was not having very good luck. Eventually I came to a point where I could slip on a no-hub connector.

It was amazing how full of roots the pipes were. I'm surprised anything drained, solids collected in the mesh of roots and the liquids slowly leached through.

Mary came home early and helped me fit the new sections of ABS together so we could get hooked up again. We finally got everything hooked up by 6:00 this evening.

The final sections and clean-outs will get attached tomorrow hopefully (pending my friend with the chain cutter schedule) There is a good chance we may have to finish this weekend.

All the photos can be seen here.

So far the cost of the project:

City Permit = $129.30
Concrete cutting and removal = $475.00
Hired labor for digging the trench down to the pipe = $400.00
Materials = $450.00
Scooping up everything you flushed the night before = priceless

Sewer Lateral excavation

Our first major project for the house in Alameda is to replace the sewer lateral. It is a city requirement that when title is transferred on an old house the sewer lateral needs to be tested and replaced if necessary.

When we purchased the house we were given an estimate of $5000.00 to replace the lateral. We plan to complete it ourselves and save a few thousand bucks.




We have started with the first step in replacing the sewer lateral from where it exits the house to the connection at the street. The pipe consists of 100 year old terracotta clay sections buried up to 4 feet deep. You can see it is above my waist in the photo and I am 6'3" tall. We had to remove 40 feet of concrete sidewalk and dig a trench about 55 feet long. There are a number of joints that have been infiltrated by tree roots causing clogs and sewer to leach out into the ground.

You can see more photos here.

Our next step is to remove the old pipe and install 4" black ABS plastic pipe in place of the old clay pipe. we will get to that in the next couple of days.


Cost so far:
City Permit = $129.30
Concrete cutting and removal = $475.00
Hired labor for digging the trench down to the pipe = $400.00
Watching raw sewer leaking into the trench = priceless