Hello
I dug down four feet and found my tank cover for my septic tank.
I want to add a 4' riser to the tank.
I'm having trouble clearing out the area. Usually how wide an area needs to be cleared out?
Should the hole be square or round?
thanks
Ya know, when people start talking about doing something like that, I wonder why. So I'm asking. Why?
Incidentally, if you use powdered detergent, stop it yesterday. Because it reforms an island of residue in the tank, causes the bacteria a real problem.
Ten guesses what I say about the use of bleach and other 'disinfectants' when you have a septic tank. After all, you depend on bacteria to do their stuff in there.
So if you're talking about putting the riser on to facilitate tank emptying, I suggest becoming more attuned to the proper care and feeding of the bacteria that are working for you.
Regarding clearing, you need to be at least 6" out from the opening, and when it's fully exposed, your form wood can keep the dirt from coming back in. So the most practical arrangement is square, IMO.
I've seen it done that a person would go down to the cap, put their outer forms just a couple inches out from that. Then, when all was dug, they'd remove the cap, install the inner forms, use the cap on top.
Plenty of plastic over the dirt during the digging, because you know it'll rain on the project, and you don't need erosion into the tank.
Nonsense. A cup of chlorine bleach (about 1/2 oz or less of elemental chlorine) is not going to sterilize 1000 gals of ripe sewage. Clorox is so high pH (lye is added to stabilize the chlorine on the shelf) that it will
*enhance* the bacterial action after its little bit of oxidizer is harmlessly spent.Septic tanks normally require routine pumping. It is part of the engineered design and operation, not a sign of failure. Don't be confused by ill-advised desperate pumping of failed systems.
Why (in 25 words or less) are you considering adding a "riser cap"?
My tank was about 3 feet down. I added a circular concrete tube slightly larger diameter than the tank hole. I put a concrete cover over the tube. Check out your local concrete or someplace that sells holding tanks for the riser you need. Now I only have to dig down 6 inches to remove the new cap and get the tank pumped.
I got a riser from these folks.
The top of my tank is about 4 feet down!!! I added a 2 foot riser years ago. (Cement tube with a cement lid) I fill the last 2 feet with mulch, a ring of bricks and some flowers. Very easy to dig 2 feet when pumping is required. (every 2-3 years )
Steve
snipped-for-privacy@aol.com
You get it pumped every two years. That's nice. Gives you that warm, fuzzy feeling, I'll bet. My tank had a pipe extending to the surface. Every so often, not more than 3 years, the same pumper got called to pump it. They put their hose in, pumped it out. Owner felt happy that he was doing what he was supposed to do. Pumper was happy to have the business. When we moved in, we stopped all that. After all, after 1500 gallons of water went into it, it was full again. As I see it, unless it gets emptied TO THE WALLS, all that's happened is that it got pumped. But you're welcome to your opinion. Just check the next time a cap gets taken off, the line gets dropped. The sludge gets pulled, the water gets pulled, and everybody's happy. I went 15 years without it, but toilet paper was limited, garbage disposal unit wasn't used, powdered detergent wasn't used, toilet disinfectants weren't used, etc. One fact shoots hell out of a lot of theory. But you're committed to doing it every two years, and I'm not seeing any reason to try to change your habits.
If it can get to the tank. I had the same problem with the kitchen sink backing up for my dry well, which takes the 'grey water' from the dishwasher, sink, and water softener recharge. I had the tank pumped and it seemed to help a little bit, but the sink was very slow to drain. I then had someone come to power auger out the waste pipe from the clean out in the basement wall. The waste pipe runs about 25' from the clean out to the tank. At some point near the end of the 25' run, he ran into a solid wall of something in the pipe. He thought the iron pipe might have broken and a piece was blocking the pipe (there are no trees anywhere near the house or tank, so not a root problem). I then had to have him dig down to the pipe, starting from the tank. He pulled out a
6' piece of pipe which runs from the tank to a pipe coupling and a bunch of water ran out of the other still-buried pipe end. He found the 6' piece was solidly full of a white granular material for about 3' from the tank end. He said it was, and it looked like, dirty powdered DW detergent. Using a screw driver to poke at the stuff, it only broke off in little dry pieces. I figured it would take a few hours to break it all out, so we just replaced it with green plastic pipe. I use the liquid DW detergent now.HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.