Do you ever think about where the water goes after you shower? What about when you do your dishes or run a load of laundry? Wherever it goes, what happens when it can’t go there anymore?
Unfortunately, it usually comes back into the house. The severity of the backups varies but if they go unchecked, it’s only a matter of time before you have a major backup that usually results in costly damage.
Here are 3 warning signs that can tell you that your sewer line is in trouble. Each sign in and of itself is worth noting but if you’re experiencing more than one, don’t ignore it.
Older homes are a great value, and home inspections can help protect homeowners from having to sink thousands of dollars into costly repairs. However, one thing that’s often not inspected is your sewer main lines. Over the years, everything deteriorates, including your sewer line.
Sewer lines in older homes often used materials that have broken down or have separated at the joints, allowing water to seep out and erode the supporting soil, or roots to get into the pipe. Over time the ground can settle, causing bellies in the line. Those bellies slow the flow of water allowing waste and debris to collect and cause a blockage. Sometimes you end up with a combination of these issues.
A properly installed and functioning drainage system has a specific ratio of slope and venting. If you ever hear a gurgling noise that means the ratio is out of balance. You might hear something like that when you flush your toilet or drain your sink. That could mean something is blocking the pipes, trapping air inside. When new water goes down, the air pushes back and makes the gurgle.
Water isn’t supposed to come up in your bathtub when you try to drain your sink. It shouldn’t start coming up from a floor drain when you flush your toilet, either. If water comes up somewhere else after you’ve tried to get rid of it, your main sewer line may be restricted or blocked.
All the drains in your homes eventually converge on the sewer main line that then connects to the city. If that main sewer line gets restricted for any reason, the only place the water has to go is back in the house.
