Whole Home + ADU Sewage Grinder: a bad idea??
tedbeef
| Posted in General Discussion on
I’ve recently come across a great piece of land in town, and would be building my first house on it (much of it being DIY). The only hang up: the sewage connection is above the land (by less than 10″) and would require a sewage grinder for the whole house + ADU.
Should I consider this a red flag as a prospective buyer? Are sewage grinders mechanically reliable when traveling short-ish distances? For what it’s worth, I’m in California and would have solar so I don’t anticipate loss-of-power being an issue.
PS: I see there are threads about this in the forum, but they are over 20 years old. Hoping to find an updated answer; and also hoping sewage grinders have improved over last two decades.
Replies
Some areas in South Carolina have grinders/pumps for small lifts , and some have the grinders maintained by the local sewer district. This may allow for use of one brand of pump. Ido not know how that's charged (expense)
Investigate any proposed solar system you're considering with respect to providing power to the home if the grid is down. Many of the popular PV systems shut down when the grid is down. You'd need a battery storage system and a system designed for them to provide electricity when the grid is down.
We bought a house with one of the last septics in close in suburb of DC (in maryland). Long story short, the downslope back lot had an easement across our lot (and it went over our septic field) for that lot's hookup to the sewer/water in front of our house. Title insurance paid for crafty lawyers who got us a suitable settlement and solution: we also got hooked up to sewer on the back lot developer's dime, and we fixed the easement location, etc. Back lot developer-built house put in a single sewage ejector in a 100 gallon pit (for a 6 bathroom house, that had to lift up about 60' vertical across about 200'). Our plumber put in a tandem pump setup, Zoeller is the manufacturer, with a 600 gallon tank. We had a few issues over the years (one of the rookie plumbers wired the alarm wrong, then let's just say someone was flushing a lot of cotton products down the toilet and both pumps eventually seized up, and the alarm was not alerting to problems). Since that unfortunate series of events, and the alarm getting properly wired, we've had very few issues (the plumber did also have to replace the control panel at their expense: they didn't get one of the conduits well sealed and a worm got up in there and crawled across the circuit board and fried it). Recently (after a few years of no issues), the tank was leaking out the top. Turned out the floats were all stuck at the bottom because of oil buildup. The pumps both manually turned on (word to the wise, don't over pump because you will airlock the ejection line and the pumps don't do anything but spin; ask me how I know) and we cleaned out the sludge and the floats worked fine. I got some floaty-type citrus degreaser product that is supposed to float on top and prevent this from happening. We've had pretty much all the bugs worked out and a couple of years of no real issues. My best advice: get someone who does these all the time so they know all the tricks and secrets. It's expensive to fix. And if both pumps fail, you're calling a septic company to pump it out. The idea of the tandem is that if one fails, you can manually pump with the other. That only works if the alarm is working to alert you of a pump failure. We also had to get a generator to power the house, because 600 gallons fills up real quick if you got showers and laundry and toilets, etc and you want to ride out a week's long power outage.
Two edits to the above: the "grease" my plumber keeps yelling at me about...I cook and I kept telling him I don't put any grease down, etc. Turns out, we figured out my wife's shampoo has lots of coconut oil in it. That's the stuff that keeps collecting on the floats and pumps and builds up into clumps. So try the degreaser if you go this route...seems to work well. Second, my neighbor with the lighterweight ejector and single pump...not sure I've ever seen them have an issue with it...
Thanks for insights. Great tip on the degreaser.
I've got one in my vacation house. Works fine. Probably will need to change the pump every decade - not a big deal. Buy a good quality one.
Have had one for thirty years. No grinder. Just a pump. Replaced it once. About a 40 gal. tank. 3” pipe in 2” out. The tank is good for a short while w/o power. No tampons, cigarette butts, or illegal drugs should be flushed.
Spend the extra money on a duplex pump system. That way even if you have a pump failure the second pump can take over. That said sewage pumps are very reliable as long as they don't get plugged up by someone putting the wrong things down the drain.
I have a 9 year old system with 7 year old pumps. I know of what you speak.