Septic tank problems

[vawtman]

Ive been having problems with the breakdown of solid waste(thought it was me at first)LOL

The pump guy couldnt believe the amount of solids in the tank after only 1yr.

 So i decided to test the dishwasher detergent the wife uses that was labeled septic safe.I put 1 teaspoonfull in a 5gal bucket of water and used my daughters pool test kit and the reading was out of the range(so high).

 Sure it might be safe if you use it once a month.

 I know this isnt re related but been spending my re time diggin and spedin my re money on you know what.

 I think this (the septic safe detergent)is the culprit.Other thoughts?

 Just a warning to others.

[TomW]

vawtman;

Been living with septic systems for decades and you do need to beware what you dump in it. Things like bleach, drain cleaning chemicals, detergents, etc can really mess up the bacterial action.

I even tried those additives and they were a waste. One of my buddies swears by tossing a couple buckets of cow sh*t in regularly by flushing it. You might consider a  better brand of biodegradable laundry soap and forget about those bleach saturated toilet cakes, drain cleaners, etc. Thats city stuff and will kill your personal, living wastewater treatment system.

Watch the bran, too!!

Good luck

Cheers.

TomW.

[vawtman]

Hi Tom

 Lasy year i took the washing machine with all its lint out of the equation by surface dumping it.Amazing i could make a carpet out of the lint.

 Like you i dont beleive in all those gizmos.Even if i did use them WE would have killed them in the past.

 Thanks for your thoughts.

[jmk]

 I dug up mine and pulled all the tiles apart that made up the header pipe. It was plugged up with an awful black greasy gunk. We have four main lines to the field. They were plugged up for about the first two - three feet. I ran a garden hose through it and got it all out. Put the header pipe back together, and had the tank cleaned. Then I put some septic help stuff in it and it works fine now. We have a garbage disposal and I blame it on that. Letting grease in the tank isn't good. I will have to say it was the $#|+iest job I ever did. It was a hard job, but it beets pay to have it all removed and a new one put in. Plus our tank went years without being pumped, like 20. Good luck!

[Countryboy]

You did not hear this from me.  Don't tell anyone if you use this method.  (Ok, don't allow any females to find out.)

Toss a dead kitty cat in your septic tank.  (They don't sell dead kitty cats in stores, but I hope everyone here is bright enough to figure out how to turn that live stray into a dead septic cleaner.)  

Cats are full of bacteria, and a kitty cat carcass will clean out a septic tank in a hurry.

Kitty cat is also one of the best baits I have found for trapping coyotes too.  Kitty cat is a preferred meal of coyotes.  (Uh, you didn't hear that tip from me either.)

And just for the record (especially if any women are listening):

I LOVE kitty cats.  =)

[TomW]

country;

Well, I used to use kitty kitty for baiting 'coons, 'yotes and grinners but never heard the septic tank trick.

I guess I file that away for future reference.

Cheers.

TomW

[harrie]

yes, the kitty cat works. but what is better is a seperate graywater tank that the washer dumps into. I went a step further and also dump the kitchin sink into it. My septic has never had to be pumped, and its been in survice for 30 years now, and I only have a 50 foot perferated line comming off it. Maybe some states do not allow the grey tank, and to be truthfull, I dont know if my state does either!!!!

[feral air]

We use Spetic Remedy (1-800-761-2027) and haven't had any problems. Not affiliated, just fairly satisfied.

We use normal Dawn dish soap for washing hands every day, sometimes some bleach for whites and we don't worry about that bit of cheesburger grease in the pan. Arm & Hammer detergent for clothes. We used the anti-bacterial Dawn for washing hands for years before I could finally put a stop to that nonsense.

We're not religious about adding it either. They suggest once a month and we're lucky if we remember to do it once every 3 months.

We did have to pump once in the 10yrs we've been here but we had 6 people using the facilities every day...never any clogs or serious issues though.

[vawtman]

Here kittykittykitty.Kidding Countryboy thanks for the thought.My thoughts are that these so called septic safe detergents will even kill the cat residue.

I must have my tank pumped and inspected every 3yrs.Lately its been 6months and worry they might condemn it.That would be a huge expense that could be preventable.I would probably do it myself under the cover of darkness.

[domwild]

A colleague of mine tossed a dead cat into the septic tank. I am not joking. He is a perfectionist who had used too much bleach during cleaning.

Looks like the bacterial action of decay gets the tanks starting again.

Regards,

[CG]

I am guessing all the contributers to this hilarious post are from the US. I am in the UK, and have lived with a septic tank for about 14 years. The septic tank is a seperator, and very little more than that. My neighbour has a Klargester, with has an electric motor to pump air through his tank to increase and aerobic bacteria, and even he has to pump his tank out. All this hubble, bubble, toil and trouble, hokus pokus, crap (forgive the pun),just doesn't work. Just because you haven't had to have your tank pumped out doesn't mean it's working well; a bloke in my village worked for the council pumping out tanks, he had to pump a tank out which hadn't been pump for 26 years - it took him hours.

I live alone, and have been pushing my luck with my tank - I haven't had it pumped for about 6 years, but I could live to regret that.

Thank you all for a very amusing post, I must try to get a print out of to show the folks in my village how they do septic tank things on the other side of the pond.

[jmk]

 Cats are known to plug up the septic suckers hose, so the ten cats in the tank probably slowed your man down.  

[vawtman]

Hi cg

 I didnt realize you guys had septic tanks yet much less live with them.Anywho i think after a little research my intuitions were right.Dont use Cascade my past product.

 http://www.jsplumber.com/Septic.htm

 Kitties dont work im finding.

 Weird i got a call from a dishwasher co. today but wasnt home.

[CG]

vawtman,

I didn't want to give the impression that we shouldn't try to improve the breakdown of solids by bacteria, just that it had its limitations. Where I am the main problem is with the leach field, it's sunk in clay and so the build up of water in the whole drainage system is quite accute in wet weather. Do you have Klargester tanks where you are, either the compressed air or biodisc types? If we install this type of tank, the authorities allow us to dump the water from the tank straight into a water course. My neighbour puts his into the ditch that runs in front of our linked properties. This answers about 90% of the complaints made of the sceptic tank users in my village. Living alone I don't have the water problems an average family would have with overflowing manholes, due to a build up of water in the system; which pumping out is no solution, because water from the land just pours in again. But this summer in a wet spell my highest manhole, which is near my front door, was full to the top. If I had had, say a bath, I am sure it would have blown the top when I emptied the bath. My neighbours couldn't take this sort of thing any more, so they installed the Klargester, at a cost or about $12,000 at today's exchange rate.

So here the answer is found through mechanical stirring of the solids in the tank, by disc or air, which increases bacteria activity. I have often woudered if we could use or wind turbines to do this. I can't because my tank is too close to a bank of trees and a hedge, but that has not stopped me thinking about it. Perhaps a wind pump could pump air into the tank, like the Klargester's electric motor does. Or it could pump water through a solar collector to warm up and then around the tank. The extra warmth, especially in the winter, might improve bacterial activity. Of course this would not be a 24/7 operation, which the Klagester is, but it might help. Whether it is worth the cost, I couldn't say, but it could be an interesting experiment, and if successful it would be yet another use for wind power.

When I push my bicycle past my neighbour's Klargester, as I start my daily ride into town to make these posts, I can hear it gurgling away. It's quite reasuring that something is being done to help things along, I am sure you don't get that from dead cats in the tank - but then, the cats would be a lot cheaper.

[thefinis]

If at all possible DO NOT run the kitchen water into the septic. It is full of grease and most dishwasher soaps are full of bleach (basic cleaner in most of them) two things that hurt septic systems. I run my kitchen into its own leach line and then have a good cleanout/sump on the end of that line that once or twice a year I have to use. This may not be allowed in some areas as kitchen water is now considered black water instead of gray water. If not possible to run its own line then put in a grease trap, nasty but it helps. It is hard to believe the amount of grease that comes out of a kitchen in a year.

I only run my toilets into my septic and it has worked fine for years and years but is showing signs of needing work now. It has eaten semi-truck loads of toilet paper with 5 girls in the house and grown some big trees. The trees are probably what is wrong now. My feeling is if you can keep the kitchen grease out of a septic from the beginning it will work much better and last for years with few if any problems.

Once a system is plugged or not working right it is hard to get it back on track. Look for types of septic bacteria that eat grease and add it like once a week, It does help if you get one that works but takes time and needs to keep being done. There is/was a real good live bacteria but it was hard to find and had a self life of maybe a week came as a wet slurry. I think that Texas A&M  developed it for petro spills and I know years back some of the commercial drain cleaning guys were using it around meat markets etc to keep drains clean.

Finis

[skipinder]

Dry toilets man, a bucket and some sawdust, make compost, grow things out of your crap! And save 1500 litres of potable water per month, and no, if you do it properly (and it's simple) it DON'T smell!

[spinningmagnets]

"...here the answer is found through mechanical stirring of the solids in the tank...I have often wondered if we could use wind turbines to do this...Perhaps a wind pump could pump air into the tank..." -CG

At last, a function nobody could deny a VAWT would be useful at! a crank in the shaft runs a small air-pump to feed a hose that bubbles up air from the bottom of the tank, and the shaft continues down to slowly spin a rusty old boat propellor.

For the polar-bear-huggers in the crowd, there's no need to hunt healthy cats. I see fresh road-kill every day, just look for it (use gloves and a bucket).

Women hate rats, but think squirrels are cute and would love to feed them a piece of food, but squirrels are just tree-rats with bushy tails, and they must be CRAWLING with bacteria....

"A dog will warn you of an intruder and will fight to protect you, and if you are injured they will get help. A cat will hide from an intruder, and after he has left, the cat will come out to see if any food was spilled next to your body"

[scottsAI]

Hello vawtman,

Like jmk said garbage disposal.

The solids has to come from some where, chemicals may stop the decomposition in the tank adding to the solids, but think of this, mix those chemicals in 1500 gallons... (my tank size) with 50 gallons per person per day of water flow (mine) takes a huge amount of chems to realty cause a problem.

The chems will not stay in the tank, as new water comes in chems gets flushed out. Unless you keep adding the chems. Tanks is sized to take a weeks water for your home. (most codes) Reasonable use of chems will not cause you a problem. (septic safe ones). If you have softened water, use MUCH less soap, the water is already soapy! Had to cut down the dishwasher soap, it was eating the glassware.

Solids: my wife would grind the whole chicken after dinner. I told her to stop using the garbage disposal like that (she did but the damage was done, little did we know), Scraps are fine... all things relative. Think how much bulk is in your garbage, will be near the same in the tank, much of the solids do NOT decompose. Do this for a year.

Our field did last 20 years, cost $4800 to add another septic field. Fat does not break down, ends up floating. Lint is a killer, it does not always float or sink (floating or sinking is great, it stays in the tank), lint can plug up the septic field. Lint can decompose, so if limited it will not kill your field. We pumped the tank every 3 years, the solids were not bad, soil was not great. Should not have passed inspection. City inspector was fired later after I bought my house. (he approved many bad fields, In my sub, 1 of 3 fields failed within 5 years, ours was only marginally better)

Check out the library, I found couple books and read them before I started using septic systems.

Many urban legends about septic systems, be careful. The pumper guy is not always a septic expert, check before you ask. (Local co. use collage kids to pump the tanks, I think they create the urban legends:-)

Have fun,

Scott.