I believe my line(s) are clogged. my system pumps up hill into the backyard. The pump is working but water level not going down, I pulled the pump and 1 way valve thinking that the field was jus water logged. Only about 1/2-1 gal of water came back down the pipe, which leads me to believe block/clog somewhere.

What is the best (cheapest) way to approach this.

My idea was to run something rigid/HD untill it stops and then dig up that part of pipe, etc. I have a plumber guy that can help but its not free and dont know what they carry on truck that would help.

Ideas ?

If your leach field is clogged....time to budget for a redo. Actually past time to budget for it.

Might be able to have a plumber run a camera down there but once a leach field fails....there isn't much that can be done to patch it up.

Im thinking its the piping going up to the field, it could be the field too, jus dont know, id have to start somewhere and it seemed clogged about 10-12 feet from the tank.

One of my dilemmas is that im trying to buy a piece of property adjacent to my property and was just going to have a gravity system ran over to it, so dunno. MIght jus fix this one and not worry about putting in the other one, jus be nice to do away with pump system.

might be cheaper to buy the other property and plumb into that septic system.

Ive thought about that,,but its an old abandoned single wide that I doubt anyone would know anything about septic, it literally could be an old drum buried.

Have enough land for another field?

If you do not I would hate to be you.


A new field is expensive enough.

Replacing soil in a field is really expensive.


Can you switch to aerobic?
They require power and maintenance (chlorine tab about once a year) but can discharge on the surface.
Digestion, Chlorination, De-chlorination tanks.  Can be slightly above ground but buried for freeze protection.

They are not allowed in all areas.

this property is odd shaped, have creeks and hills all around, limited , for now, where field would go. If I buy the other property, I can run gravity system over there, problem is , it could be months or not at all for me to get the property, the guy is "thinking" about it, hasnt made a decision or price.

If I remember the your other thread you found a map of the system???

Is there a distribution box and lateral lines at the top of the hill?

The map is crude and doesnt say...

I have inspection report from 1991. says 4" drain line. I have 2" coming out of septic tank, so dunno what thats all about. says there are 3 drain lines up the hill 20-40 feet long. Field is 129' from house.

What a miserable job.    Best to pay the plumber to scope the line and know exactly what you are dealing with.

As a sparky, I'll never again do a lift pump service call.

Id get a septic expert in there.  I have heard of people who have had good results blowing out their system.  Hopefully there is someone in those hills that can help you.

Unless your area requires something special, a leach field isn't too expensive. I put an entire system in including tank for $4000. 1000 gallon tank and 300 ft of lateral lines. I had a company do the entire thing for me. Gravity drain with 4 inch pipe.

Talked to plumber guy, he has 50' snake, we are going to try that, go 50' and then dig up line and go another 50'. dunno how thatll work. I tried to put a hd cable and it only went 10-12 ft,  I do know its clogged, when I pulled cable out, a lil more water came with it.

Pressure washer crawler line.

Had teenage daughters that didn't get the 'do not flush female things down the toilet' instructions.   Plugged up the drain lines something awful.  We ended up digging down to the outlet of the tank, breaking into the drainlines and running a hose up into the individual drain lines and flushing all the plastic out of the drain lines.  I had a septic service pump the tank, then flushed the lines out myself.  It's been fine ever since - that was nearly 20 years ago.  I put in a flush cap on each of the 2 main drainlines - of course I've never needed to touch it since then.

I know you are trying to save $$ here, but I bet you are going to pay that plumber good money, for only a temporary or no fix.

The real fix is to dig in a new leach field.

If you have three laterals up the hill I have to believe you have a distribution box to distribute the water equally in the laterals.  If you can locate it with a steel rod, preferably after a rain, you can pop the top and see if it's dry.  You can also snake the 2" line from that direction ( towards the septic) and from the septic towards the d-box.  Snake gently so you don't punch a hole in the 2" pvc at a tight elbow.  Make sense?

Yea..jus trying to find that box, if there is one will be rough but have to try..

Missed that post.  Good luck.

Sometimes you can get lucky by reading the land.  The grass is greener or a slight depression over the laterals.  The d-box will ordinarily be located near the lateral nearest the house but it's hard to say how many feet away.

Yea when the field wasnt clogged, the ground get soupy, so I have good idea on the drain lines, just where it all connects will be a challenge.

Bets of luck to you OP. I just went through something similar for my 27 year old home that I purchased 4 years ago. My below-ground field wasn't draining - evident by the amount of standing water in the field's check line that wouldn't drop much - so I had a septic company out who diagnosed a bad/saturated drain field. Tech said drain fields usually last anywhere from 15-40 years depending on the soil and other variables. I had three companies put in bids, all of which were about the same ($7-$10k to install a new field, diverter valve to switch between fields, and a filter system).  

When the company I hired dug up the current pipes from the septic tank to the existing drain field to install the diverter and filter they found a very solid 4' long biomass was clogging the line to the old field. The old field was still shot, but the biomass was the culprit of the recent backups we had been experiencing in the house.

Two days later and a big chunk of my nice back yard lawn dug up I have a new below ground drain field installed. With the switch I can alter between my new field and old one which allows each to dry out sufficiently between uses. And the filter acts as a catch to make sure any non biodegradable products (feminine products, etc.) that shouldn't be flushed but if they accidentally are could clog up the drain field don't have a chance to get there. 

If your ground gets soupy you probably need a new drain field.

I have one of those fancy microfast systems with aerators and pumps and timers. The pump out to the leech field has a filter on it to prevent stuff from clogging it up. But the water that goes to the leech field is pretty clean looking already. The filter just takes out anything big that made it through. It gets cleaned and the system inspected once a year. To my knowledge they've never found anything in the filter.