Best Mesa Plumber | Sewer Backup

Best Mesa Plumber Prevents Sewer Backup

Best Mesa Plumber, Ben Franklin Plumbing, is teaching you what you need to know to avoid sewer back up.  We’ve discussed how a mesa plumber needs to be on the watch for broken pipes.  Now we’d like to address how mesa plumbing early on to avoid problems.  An occasional sewer back up is inevitable for some homeowners but there are things you can do to prevent them, or at least make them easier to fix if they occur.

To help avoid a sewer back up in your mesa plumbing, prevent grease from going down your drains. We advise against pouring grease, oil or fat into your garbage disposal or drain. Grease will slowly accumulate and impede your garbage disposal’s grinding ability as well as potentially cause drains to clog.

If your home was built in the 1960s or 1970s, you may have “Orangeburg” pipes (also known as bituminous fiber sewer pipes) that need to be replaced. Orangeburg pipes were typically manufactured by rolling bituminous material (tar) and paper into the shape of a tube and they have a tendency to deteriorate over time. Not only do they flatten out and lose their round shape, but they are also susceptible to the invasion of plant roots. Both issues can result in repeated blockages of the sewer line from the house to the public sewer in the street or alleyway. To determine if you have Orangeburg pipes, you would need to have a licensed plumber investigate.

We also caution our customers against flushing wipes down the toilet. Even the “flushable” kind can clog down the line and build up until a large clog occurs.

In the event of a sewer back-up, two things can be done ahead of time to make the repair process easier.

First, it’s helpful to have a sewer line cap that pops up when a back-up happens, in the hopes that the back-up will occur on the outside of the home. The sewer line cap is sometimes covered up because it is seen as an eye sore. However, because it connects the above and below ground sewer lines, it is vital to keep it accessible to be checked on or repaired when necessary

Second, it’s also advisable to have a ground level clean-out installed if you don’t have one. Make sure the clean-out cover is in good condition and remember to avoid letting objects go down into the clean-out that can cause back-ups, like rocks and twigs.  The Best Mesa lumber can install these for you.

Follow these tips and hopefully you can avoid a sewer back-up altogether or, if one happens, deal with it without added difficulty.