Garbage disposal/ septic question

[dawzie]

Do a search for Cape Cod Biochemical Co. I'm a dealer for their products. USDA proven and approved. The rid-x product is cheaper and easier to get,doesn't work as well.

Do you need a half ton truck, you only go to the recycle center once a week or do you need something to pull that four horse trailer.

 

[Bird]

I use about $20 dollars worth of pills a year and the inspection contract is $220 per year. I don't think I'm paying anymore than if I lived in the city and had city sewage.

Paying any more? How about paying about half as much as in the city? Our city looks at your water usage in November, December, January, and February, throws out the highest month, averages the other three, and that determines your sewer bill for the next 12 months. Even though that's the lowest months for water usage, my current sewer bill is $41.52 a month or $498.24 a year.

Of course, I moved back to town in November, 2002. Prior to that I was paying $200 a year for my inspection contract.

 

[jinman]

Of course, I moved back to town in November, 2002. Prior to that I was paying $200 a year for my inspection contract.

My contractor is out of Aledo, TX (Aerobi-Tech). That's about 90 miles from me. Last year when gas got so high, they raised their rate from $200 to $220 per year. I figure that's a bargain.

Aerobi-Tech is owned by Kyle Clifton of NY Jets fame. He's a Texas boy from Olney, TX.

Kyle Clifton Bio

 

[LBrown59]

Just me and the wife here.
We do have a disposal in the sink but use it very seldom. I really don't like them.
We have our tank pumped every other year. I also switch leech fields at the same time. We have a distribution box that allows me to do this.
I've got my softener dumping the recharge water into the footer drain that goes out to the field behind the house. I also separated the washing machine water from the septic system and it goes into the field also.
I'm trying to be careful about how we use our system because the septic system regulations have recently changed around here and a replacement system would cost me $22,000-$25,000. Ouch!
-Len

Uncalled for.
No sewer should cost anywhere near that.
Outragesly preposterous.

 

[donawilcox]

I sold a house last year and the owner did not even know were the tank was and never had a problem. His Dad purchased the home in 1969. I am one that on the old fashion systems if there is not a problem do not pump them. Once you pump them is when you ahve to get the bacteria working again. and like one said if you are putting a lot of bleach or something else that kills the good bacteria you need to be adding something to help it get started. Have never heard of dog food. You can use Yeast but from what I have heard that is basically what Rid ex and some of the others are

I grew up with septic and we had disposals

good luck

Don

 

[jinman]

I sold a house last year and the owner did not even know were the tank was and never had a problem. His Dad purchased the home in 1969. I am one that on the old fashion systems if there is not a problem do not pump them. Once you pump them is when you ahve to get the bacteria working again. and like one said if you are putting a lot of bleach or something else that kills the good bacteria you need to be adding something to help it get started. Have never heard of dog food. You can use Yeast but from what I have heard that is basically what Rid ex and some of the others are

I grew up with septic and we had disposals

good luck

Don

Don, I don't think any septic system design allows for the modern automatic washers and dishwashers that are the standards in our homes. My neighbor has the identical aerobic system as I do. He puts his laundry water through it, and every four months, his filter is clogged with 1/2" thick gray sludge from the laundry lint. On the other hand, my filter has a thin brown coating that rinses away with a hose. (My installer carries a sump pump and drops it down into the the final fresh water tank to pump the water he needs to clean off the filter. Slick!) Of course, I'm talking about an aerobic system because they are the most modern type of septic system. I think anyone who sees what a washer can do to that type of system would take positive steps to keep the laundry water out of the septic. How much sludge inside conventional septic tanks is due to laundry waste (lint and other solids)? I can't say, but I'd sure like to see two exact conventional systems side-by-side with one of them having a grey water drain.

In my case, my builder put the washer drain into the sewer, but I redid the drain to make it a grey water drain. I run the water out on top of the ground to evaporate and my grass loves it. The phosphates make sure the roots are good and the grubworms are few. When it rains, the runoff spreads the laundry "contaminants" out over a larger area than if they were confined inside an absorption field. Sunlight is a mighty decomposer to boot.

Don, I'm sure you can have a septic system that functiions without special maintenance if you are careful with bleach and detergents. I just don't understand why we have to put anything into septic tanks that will endanger or kill what makes them work in the first place. If city codes say you have to do it that way, so be it, but I will continue to divert my grey water until the county demands I do it another way.

 

[dooleysm]

A couple things:

First off, whoever mentioned Rid-X being yeast, I don't know if that's true, but yeast is a fungus, not a bacteria, so I kind of doubt it.

Our house will be 5 years old this fall. We have a single tank (I don't know if it's 500 gal or 1000 gal. I know it's the size of the vaults we used in the cemetery business to hold caskets, and in fact was delivered to us from 'Odon Vault Company') which feeds into a distribution box that goes out to 5 100' leach lines. The leach field is surrounded by a perforated pipe that flows out into a drainage ditch. The whole leach field is well downhill of our house and I rarely go out there to look at it. It's overgrown and I've bush hogged it twice since we moved in, just to keep the trees and shrubs knocked down.

We've never had any issues with our system, but I was planning to dig down to the tank (it was completely covered when it was installed), add a cleanout tube, and have it pumped this summer, just to see what was going on in there. I have changed my mind on this plan due to the insane amount of rain we've gotten this summer. I don't want a honey wagon driving through my yard leaving ruts in the wet soil. I think this project will have to wait for next summer.

 

[Charlesaf3]

makes sense if you pump a lot of bleach etc into the tank you should add back bacteria, as you are killing it off. Also makes sense to use the gray water from the wash to my mind - its usually against code, but if done properly I don't see a problem. Code worry is that you have an infection, put clothes contaminated with that infection in the wash, and then the gray water is a vector. I think the chance of that is low in real life, and if you drain into a dry well or some such pretty much vanishes.

25k would be a pretty standard septic install around here.

 

[Western]

My perk test was $150, my system was $2800. They are cheaper now that the housing market has all but gone. I did get quotes in the $5000-7000 range for aerobic systems.
I got lucky on the perk test I guess. (sandy loam)

My installer has done this for like 30 years. Him and his son came out had her done in around 5 hrs, including the county inspector. oh yeah the permit was like $200

Over all, I was tickled by the price and the speed this guy got it done.

 

[Bird]

My brother and I paid $4,000 for our aerobic system and the installer drove all the way from Palestine to 20 miles west of Corsicana. But that was in 1996 and 1997. A brother-in-law in the same area paid $4,100 for a local guy to install theirs in 1998. But our $10 permit went to $420 in 1999, after they fired the county sanitarian and hired a new one.