We’re considering running the line from the septic tank to the drainfield right down the middle of the driveway. The primary benefit to doing this would be to avoid disturbing the beautiful native vegetation of the site. The run down the driveway will be about 100′, and we will use foam board over the pipe to protect against frost. Anybody have any experiences doing this? Is this a nightmare waiting to happen?
Thanks
Learn how the pros keep their hand tools sharp without breaking the bank.
"I have learned so much thanks to the searchable articles on the FHB website. I can confidently say that I expect to be a life-long subscriber." - M.K.
Dig into cutting-edge approaches and decades of proven solutions with total access to our experts and tradespeople.
Start Free Trial NowGet instant access to the latest developments in green building, research, and reports from the field.
Start Free Trial Now
Replies
use driveway grade pvc pipe, has heavy walls and couplings
first, its a code violation
how - why? what code?
We've got lots of them ( Waste lines under driving surfaces) here
is it because of pavement?
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Gotta agree with Brownbagg concerning code violation and burying the line under the drive (the totality or major portions of it.) At least it's a violation here. Every county around these parts has the same restriction. And evidently in other locales around the country as well.
The line is however allowed to cross under the drive.
I suspect the county health department will have the final say, no matter where one lives. They sure do here unless you intend to do it on the sly and risk the consequences of being found out. A hefty fine is the reward.
Here's another place that doesn't allow it.
http://babyurl.com/N9YxOm
Knowledge is power, but only if applied in a timely fashion.
Edited 4/30/2004 10:54 pm ET by GOLDHILLER
I wasn't flaming Brown, or disagreeing with him. Just want to further my own knowledge and understanding. That's why I asked Why. A blanket, "'Cause it says so" never has done much for me. I have to know why. It's the way I am built. The hollow void of not knowing creates a vacumn in my brain and could lead to a cave in.
;)
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
No flaming suspected.
I'm pretty sure the reasoning behind the no driveway or building on top of a drainfield, is based on shooting for the best performance and longest life.
When the trenches are dug here for the fields, the sides of the backhoe bucket slick the sides of those trenches, effectively reducing their capacity to absorb and consequently filter the effluent. Before we're allowed to close up a trench or even begin adding the rock layers and pipes, we have to jump down in there and scarify the sides again to restore permeability. That way when the soils in the bottom of the trench eventually begin to loose their ability to absorb, the side walls begin to take over the chore. The water can readily move sideways in the soils here provided that no impediment exists, like those slicked walls.
If a driveway is placed over the perforated runs of the fields, the soils become very compacted which naturally interferes with water movement and that drastically hastens the demise of the system.
And.......alot of the water in the trenches is dissipated thru transpiration vertically......especially during the warm months of the years. More than one might suspect. If a lawn is growing over the top of those fields, so much the better in that regard. All of those factors increase the life expectancy of the drainfield.
Consequently, when the health department says no driveways or buildings, they really have the HO's best interests at heart. Or a least that's how it works here with our soil types.
Since nearly all residences here that have a drainfield also have a well on the same property, adequate filtering of the effluent before that water finds its way back into the well plume is pretty darn important. All the more so if that well isn't being chlorinated. Once the filtering capability of any given drainfield trench system diminished, the chances of "channeling" of the indaequately filtered effluent back into the well plume increases. A fissure or crack can easily develop providing a ready route back into that plume. Then one could face not only the spector of paying for relocating and constructing a new leechfield, but also a new well..........and that's if the space exists on the property to simply relocate without having to adopt extraordinary and more expensive measures because all other viable options have been exhausted.
No driveways or buildings on a drainfield. "It's a good thing." - MS
:-)
Edit: Forgot to mention another important part of this. The bacteria responsible for the breakdown of the "undesirables" in those drainfields are aerobic critters. They depend on a supply of oxygen and you can imagine how helpful a driveway is to their general health.
Knowledge is power, but only if applied in a timely fashion.
Edited 5/1/2004 12:55 am ET by GOLDHILLER
Well, after a cup of coffee and re-reading all this, starting with the intial post itself..............I must say that my eyes and noggin' were more tired last night than I apparently realized.
We ain't talking the drainfield at all, just the supply line to the drainfields. DOH!...... on my part.
That line is permitted to be under the drive here so long as it's well protected from being crushed.
One dope-slap for me.
Knowledge is power, but only if applied in a timely fashion.
double dope slap for me since you made the correction before I corrected you, LOL
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
I think we are talking about two differnt things here. I heartily agree that a filed should have its own spoace and not be compromised by structures or driveways on top.
But the question here was simply about the drain line leading the waste soils from the house to the system, not the system itself.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
The says that you can put the driveway over the drainfield.
As I read it he is talking about a transmission pipe, not the drainfield.
I just looked at a house that had the line going from the tank to the leach field right under their asphalt driveway and the house was built I think 5 years ago. Maybe its a new code or every county is different etc...
The code for this could be different for different places.
As far as I understand, the line can cross the drive but not run underneath it along its length.
I guess it's much like a wire can run across a return air space but not along it.
"The code for this could be different for different places.
As far as I understand, the line can cross the drive but not run underneath it along its length.
I guess it's much like a wire can run across a return air space but not along it."
The one I saw was exactly like this. The line ran across the driveway.
put it in sand bed and keep it at least two feet down.
What I think of as the biggest potential problem is frost heaving. A plowed bare drive will lift three or four inches here in the winter and not evenly, depending on how much sun/shade it gets and whether evenly. If your line is lifted that much, you can have a break in it.
Welcome to the
Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime.
where ...
Excellence is its own reward!
Piffin makes good points about bedding in sand. And about frost heaves. However, sands feeze deeper than fine-grained soils with more moisture content. It is mostly the freezing of the water that "consumes" the cold being conducted downward. The sensible heat capacity of dry soils isn't much. The latent heat of water to ice is a lot.
About foam: the rule of thumb up here is that adding an inch of blueboard is like a foot of depth, two inches like two feet. So I'm at 11' + 2" foam = 13' which is usually deep enough.
Don't know about it being a code violation, not in my neck anyway. The sand point is mandatory because clay backfill will settle after you put your drive in (I'm assuming you're putting this in before the drive, but was confused as to how you have nice landscaping already in place - you're not open cutting the drive, are you? If so, contact a directional boring contractor. Of maybe it's a gravel drive.) I would use #8 commercial stone as bedding instead of sand, 6" bed, because if you're trying to maintain fall in the pipe of 1% or whatever it's difficult to do with sand. Don't use solvent-weld pipe, use gasketed. Jet the sand backfill with water if you are paving over. I would put a clean out where it turns down your drive to ease maintenance, with a cast iron cover like east jordan's 1570.
remodeler
Running it down the middle of ther drive means that WHEN you have to repair it, the drive hass to come out.
Why not run it down the drainage swale next to the drive?
SamT
the health depart here. No lines within five feet of any slab ,sidewalk, driveways. No trees within twenty feet of leech line. tank itself must be five feet from house no farther than fiftheen. clean out between house and tank. 1/4 fall to tank.
OK
What does the HD in Dan Powers location say?
SamT
My excavator says its not a problem with the health dept. The reason we're trying to go down the (gravel) drive is that we have extensive native vegetation that we're trying not to disturb, sage, wildflowers, bushes etc. That stuff takes a long time to recover.
I appreciate all the advice.
Dan Powers