Sewer Line Repair

In our area, the main cause is roots. They grow in through the hub connections where the old clay pipe sections join together, and once they're in, the sewage feeds them. The sewage is like super food for a root, so it grows bigger and stronger right inside your pipe until it separates the joint or breaks the pipe outright. Same thing you've seen roots do to a sidewalk, lifting and cracking concrete. They do it to clay pipe underground.

We see this all over the older parts of Fontana, Rancho Cucamonga, and especially Upland. Upland gets hit the hardest, mostly because of how many trees the city has planted over the years. All that mature vegetation means a lot of roots looking for water.

In the older houses, mostly pre-70s, the 50s and 60s builds and older, it's a different problem inside the walls. The cast iron drain pipe has rotted and scaled up on the inside, and that narrowed, corroded pipe backs up over and over. That one shows up in older neighborhoods across most of the cities we serve, including the older parts of Ontario, Fontana, Rancho Cucamonga, and Upland.

We had a sewer in the Alta Loma area of north Rancho Cucamonga where a eucalyptus root never even broke into the pipe. It ran along the outside of the line for about 60 feet, and over the years it crushed and folded that ABS pipe until it was pancaked flat. The line started at three feet deep and dropped all the way to nine feet, so we trenched the length of the yard with a four ton excavator to get to it. That one still sticks with us.

Once we know what we're dealing with, there's usually more than one way to fix it, and the right call depends on how much pipe is bad and where it runs.

A spot repair is the most cost-effective option when you've got just one section that's broken or has a single root intrusion. We fix that area without tearing up the rest of the line. When we make that connection, how we join the pipe matters. A lot of companies use a Fernco band, which is just a rubber sleeve held on with two hose clamps, and that's the only thing holding your pipe together. We use a Husky heavy duty band with a full metal shield and screws you can tighten down. It's a stronger, longer-lasting connection, and it's the difference you don't see until years later.

A liner is more and more common now, and the data backs it up. Most liners carry a 25 year manufacturer warranty. The catch is the pipe has to be lineable, meaning no bellies and no big offsets, and if we're lining clay, we have to get all the roots out first. When the pipe qualifies, lining puts a new pipe inside the old one without digging up your yard, and it makes for a very strong repair while keeping the cost and the mess down.

Pipe bursting is the other trenchless option. We pull a new poly pipe through the old line and break the old pipe apart around it as it goes. The upside is one continuous piece of pipe with no hubs or sections for roots to ever find their way into again.

Full dig and replace is always our top option when it comes to durability. With new ABS, every joint is solvent welded with ABS cement, which is a true chemical bond, so there are no loose hubs for roots to attack. The tradeoff is the excavation. Once we've dug up the line, the yard usually isn't going to look quite as pretty as it did before, and that's just honest.

One thing worth saying straight: a lot of what we see is homeowners getting talked into full sewer replacements they don't actually need. If a liner or a spot repair will hold, that's what we'll tell you.

If you've got a root intrusion, that access point is there for good until the pipe is either lined over or that section is cut out and replaced. We can hydro jet the line, which cuts the roots up and flushes them out to the main, and that buys you time, but be straight with yourself about what it is. Jetting roots is a band aid, not a cure. The roots grow back through the same opening. The permanent fix is lining or replacing that section so the roots have nowhere to get in.

We'd rather show you the problem than just tell you about it, which is why we put you in front of the camera screen instead of handing you a bill and a story. We give you the honest read on whether you need a spot repair, a liner, bursting, or a full replacement, and we won't push you toward a full replacement you don't need. When we do make a repair, we use heavy duty connections like the Husky band instead of a rubber Fernco and two clamps, because it's a stronger, longer-lasting connection. Between our owner's 20+ years in the trade and the jobs we run in these same neighborhoods, we usually know what's under one of these houses before the camera even confirms it.