Septic system unclogged
Thought I'd post this as it might help someone else with similar problems. My system is a closed system whereby the liquids enter a tank and then are pumped uphill to the leach field. There is a long run (100 feet) up the side of my house where the 1 1/2" PVC pipe makes a right turn through a check valve and T's off into a 4 x 20' pipe loop. Basically the liquids stopped pumping into the leach field. A septic professional thought either the check valve could have malfunctioned and froze shut or the leach field was clogged with sludge or the 1/4" holes in the pipes became clogged and unable to pass the liquid effluence. After researching on this forum and reading tons of literature and looking at reviews for many septic chemicals like enzymes, hydrogen peroxide, etc I decided that hydrojetting was my number one course of action. But to get to the leach lines I hired an escavator to dig up the area where the T was and in doing so we were able to expose the whole one side of the pipe system. This was about a 3' x 18' swath which exposes the one side of the piping where the T went into. We made a small cut just after the T in the PVC (about halfway through) and turned on the pump - the water came rushing through the check valve (as it should) and busted out of the small cut but it was not moving into the leach field. This guaranteed the leach field was clogged.
The next day I hired a septic guy that had a pressure washer with different nozzles. My escavator from the previous day was there and he also had septic experience so he cut the connection to all 4 lines and exposed the openings. We pressure washed each 18' line with different nozzles (one pushed water backwards and created a "venturi" effect and the other simply sprayed forward. We went down each line and flushed them and all sorts of sludgy material came out plus what looked like a lot of soapy liquid from years of laundry. Then we capped off 3 of the 4 openings and blasted water for the purpose of creating an intense pressure inside the system in hopes of blowing out or unclogging the little 1/4" holes that the water was supposed to leak out of. We did this to each line. We cemented the pipe system back together this time with clean outs (that protrude up through the lawn) for future pressure washing so we don't have to dig up the lawn again.
The magical moment came when we hit the pump again and the water in the 750 gallon tank went down 12" in 10 minutes. It took 3 hours for the tank to go down 3
inches before this. We tested again and again and the water seems to be leaching perfectly. Total cost was $1200...
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