What do you dump into your septic system?
Besides poo? A friend is planning to build a new house and must use a septic system. He will be out in the sticks, on a slight hill, with a farm ditch behind it. He plans on running everything into the tank, I suggested the ground water from the basement be ran over the hill into the ditch. I think it would be easy to overload the septic tank, especially with a dish washer, washing maching, garbage disposal, showers, etc. I know of folks that have all of the above going over the hill, except the toilets.
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great place to ask some of these guys really know their sh!!t 0 -
How many people will be living in the house?
When I built my house I knew there would only be one or two people living here, so everything goes into the septic tank.
If I had a big family I would certainly have built a greywater disposal system, it is just a big hole in the ground, filled with gravel, into which the grey water pipe goes.
Also, I am very careful about what goes down the kitchen sink, no grease or food, of course, no garbage disposal.
Septic system is ten years old, no problems.0 -
Yeah, everyone has an opinion about septic systems. I like this subject. Everyone thinks they are an expert about $-hit, including me.
I think the secret to a septic system is first, know your soil. Make sure the system will adequately disperse into the soil. We put one in for a local church where the soil was a tight clay. The ground wwas an old timber soil that did not drain well. As we dug, the ground smelled like hog manure, just a stale sour smell already in the ground. Besides a clorinator, we had to dig out a big area for the field and lay down a lot of pea gravel so there was something to drain into. The entire field had to be dug out rather than just trenches.
My guess the next secret ts to make sure the septic lines are flat enough. Yes you want some pitch to flow downhill, but not too much. I think sometimes people get too much pitch and the water flow too fast and doesn't float the more solid crap with it. Consequently, the tank fills up and has to be sucked out.
If the septic is on a hill side let the laterals go across the hill. They can be at different levels with the connecting lines at steeper angles, but keep the lateral with just a slight grade.
Ours is six years old. 1,500 gallon cement tank. We don't hold much back. I don't care for dumping grease down the drain either. The garage and sump pump don't go down the drain either, but the field can handle it. We live on some very sandy soil. Knock on wood, but I don't plan on pumping the tank.0 -
When I lived in Orange I used a 80 year old septic tank/system. I agree with Allen except I used the "grey-water" to water the plants in the front and back yards.
Make sure the leach-field is as big as possible. The poo-poo itself should not become a problem excess water may become a problem.
Only use a treatment pack when you use the system for the first time. After that you will not need it again unless something happens/goes wrong.
If something does go wrong with the system get a couple bags of caustic soda and dump them down the clean out hatch. Remember caustic soda will burn anything it touches! Wait a few days (Yay I know it smells/sucks when the system is down) and have it pumped. You will then need to add a starter pack every 6 month for the next 2 years because the residual of the soda will kill the starter pack.
I know it sounds bad but I only had my system cleaned out 3 times in 9 years.
Once before we moved in. Once when a toilet flapper broke in the back bathroom that no one used and was running for who know how long? And once after about 6 years. that year was the year El Nino hit and the rain never seemed to stop!
Tell your fiend good luck.
Dean
quote:Originally posted by allen griggs
How many people will be living in the house?
When I built my house I knew there would only be one or two people living here, so everything goes into the septic tank.
If I had a big family I would certainly have built a greywater disposal system, it is just a big hole in the ground, filled with gravel, into which the grey water pipe goes.
Also, I am very careful about what goes down the kitchen sink, no grease or food, of course, no garbage disposal.
Septic system is ten years old, no problems.0 -
We use to just shoot a stray cat and dump it in... 0 -
My septic system was put in in 1949 and still works great.
This system has the old grease trap for the grey water and every 4 or 5 years the grease needs to be cleaned out.
This system has only been pumped 3 times in almost 60 years.
I guess thats a pretty good system.0 -
Make sure it is "legal" to divert the gray water.
Here, you can NOT use gray water for anything.
It MUST go into the septic.
Lots of people change their brand of soap, tissue paper, etc. to keep from killing the micro-organisms needed to breakdown the solids. After doing so, they don't have to have their tanks pumped near as often, if ever.0 -
Consider diverting grey water if you can. Limit the amount of chlorine that goes in there- bleach, dishwasher powder, etc. It kills the little critters that digest. Garbage disposal not a real good idea when on septic. 0 -
Put mine in in 1979, pumped in 1990(deq required when we built the new house, clean as a pin)& has not been touched since.
Wash machine water is the only thing that doesn't go in it.
It's also important to keep deep-rooting plants off the drain field.
[^]barto[^]0 -
Site engineer will percolate the soil. And recommend the size/type of septic system. Tell your friend, if he hasn't closed on the property yet, to expect several thousand dollars more in expense if the site-survey calls for an above ground septic system.
A good site engineer will also recommend the correct chemical/bio agents to add to the system after it's up and running <---excuse the pun[:D] Best, Joe0 -
A garbage disposal going into a septic system is not a good idea. Septic systems are designed to handle human waste, not leftover pork chops and chicken bones. It takes too long for that stuff to decompose and will eventually clog up the system.
I would try not to put great quantities of water into the system. It's not a storm drain.
My basement drains go into a field drain. Everything else goes into the septic system. I try not to put a lot of stuff in it that will kill the bacteria. Use bleach very sparingly. Other than that, everything is pretty normal.
My system was put in in 1976 when the house was built. I don't have any guarantee that I won't have a problem tomorrow, but so far everything has worked fine. The next time it gets pumped out will be the first time. The people I bought the house from raised three boys here with no septic problems.0 -
Unfortunately, everything from this house, except the kitchen drain, goes into the septic system. The kitchen drain goes to a grease trap and then to the lateral line downstream from the tanks.
I say "unfortunately," because the septic system was designed to handle the same sort of waste as one would find in the bottom of an outhouse. It was never made to handle vast amounts of water, detergents, soaps, and bleach.
The notion of having a separate holding/distribution system for grey water intrigues me, but I have no idea how to design or build one.0 -
New rules in Ky. are the clothes and dish washer go to a D-box which gets divirted to a separate lateral line not connected to the septic tank. At least that was how it was explained to me when I got my permit back in the spring. 0 -
All of the drains in the house, except the basement floor drains, go into the septic system here.
In this part of the country, a lagoon to catch the topwater off of the tank seems to work better than any lateral field. Deals with large flows of water pretty well, too.0 -
nunn it is easy to build a graywater disposal system.
My buddy Gary built one for his house. He figured how big of a hole you needed to hold a 9 ton dump truck of gravel.
He got a back hoe to dig a hole that big, about 10 by 8 feet, 7 feet deep.
He got a ditch witch, and dug the trench from his house to the hole.
He got the dump truck out there and had them dump enough to fill the hole to where the bottom of the trench was. Then he set a 20 foot section of pipe, into the trench and out into the middle of the gravel. Then they dumped the rest of the gravel on top of the pipe.
He put a foot of dirt on top of the gravel, then ran the pipe back up to the house.0 -
I understand how easy it would be to design a grey water system, it's really nothing but a big dry well.
How can you do this after the house is built, and "everything" is plumbed into one large outlet waste line going into the septic tank?
I presume the answer is "you can't", unless you are on a crawl space foundation, and have access to your waste drain lines.
Cement slab as in Florida,.....you are stuck with what you have.
I had to put a new drainfield in a bit over a year ago. It was one of the old black corrugated tube in rock designs. 2 of my 3 outlet pipes were totally plugged with fine tree roots from a big Oak, and had gone all the way into the D box, and filled it up.
Needless to say that tree is history! The new type system recommends pumping every 3 to 5 years, so I guess that is what I will do.
Hobbyguy,.......where did you hear about the ground beef thing?
I thought it was bad to even use a garbage disposal!0 -
I have an aerobic septic system, and this what the house rules are:
1. Only poo, pee and toilet paper go down the toilet.
2. Only poo, pee and toilet paper go down the toilet.
3. Only poo, pee and toilet paper go down the toilet.
We have a disposal but use it only occasionally. Everything else is raccoon bait.
I don't know much about them. Yet. Be nice if it stayed that way.0 -
quote:Originally posted by mateomasfeo
I have an aerobic septic system, and this what the house rules are:
1. Only poo, pee and toilet paper go down the toilet.
2. Only poo, pee and toilet paper go down the toilet.
3. Only poo, pee and toilet paper go down the toilet.
We have a disposal but use it only occasionally. Everything else is raccoon bait.
I don't know much about them. Yet. Be nice if it stayed that way.
At the rate you can pump the above out,.......get ready to learn about them![:D][:0][;)]0 -
my house was built in 1983,everything goes into the septic tank including the garbage disposel,only problem I have ever had was about 2 years ago a tree root broke the pipe just as it goes into the tank and flooded the back yard with smelly black water, I live on a hill above 5 acres of field and have about 500 yards of field/leech line for all the extra water to run off , I can not say if it helps or hurts but I add a big box of Rid-x every other month,,after 20+yrs of no problems I not going to change now 0 -
quote:Originally posted by HappyNanoq
We use to just shoot a stray cat and dump it in...
coons here[:D]0 -
Oh, just anyone that gets too nosey...Anymore questions??? 0 -
quote:Originally posted by tobefree
Oh, just anyone that gets too nosey...Anymore questions???
Is that good bacteria, or bad, as in a garbage disposal?0 -
quote:Originally posted by Marc1301
quote:Originally posted by tobefree
Oh, just anyone that gets too nosey...Anymore questions???
Is that good bacteria, or bad, as in a garbage disposal?
Good for me ---- bad for them!!!0
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