Going to have my sewer lateral replaced.

What material should I have put in the contract?

“White” schedule 40 pvc vs. “green” SDR-35 pvc?

I understand the green pipe is cheaper, but weaker.

It’s about 100’ long and 10’ deep, and there’s a tree nearby. Not sure if that matters.

Thank you.

10' deep and a near by tree? Why would you even be considering the lightweight PVC? Do you WANT to dig it up and replace it in a few years?

Don't use new old stock orangeburg, even if free LOL.

So the plumber laughed when I asked which pvc he was planning on using... his exact words were “if anyone is installing the green stuff for a sewer then they don’t know what they are doing”... haha he said he only uses primed and glued schedule 40. So I feel good about that.

Sum, what’s so strange is that my sewer is about 100’ and the first 90’ is cast iron and only one 10’ length was Orangeburg. So either that was originally the way it was installed and perhaps the plumbers were one stick of CI short that day, or at some point someone had the front yard dug and the Orangeburg was replaced but the final piece under the sidewalk right to the edge of the street wasn’t changed out. Which is the only place it has failed.

Just going to have the whole run re-piped, for peace of mind. And because Hj said to do it.

I doubt they would even have "old stock Orangeburg" any more.

You should only have to replace the Orangeburg section, as long as the rest is cast iron.

Hj on the video scope, I saw some joints in the CI where groundwater was infiltrating. So I take this to mean that it’s degraded and perhaps I’m better off replacing it all now? Or is this acceptable?

If ground water is infiltrating, so can tree roots.

how can you be sure all that ground water is from many joints gone bad and not one single joint? I saw the video there is a spot where water is dropping down from above and there seems to be natural light up top. Is this from a cleanout you opened up? There is water in the pipe but not entirely sure it's "infiltrated" water. Seems if you have a bad joint and water is coming in like that you would have seen sand/dirt piled up at the bottom, and tree roots infiltration too. Any chance this is just residue water at the bottom because the bottom slope is flat and the inside of the bottom has corroded buildup so it's no longer nice and smooth?



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That would NOT happen with a properly installed cast iron sewer, so it may be advisable to replace the entire section. But, since Orangeburg is black, the most likely thing is that you are seeing Orangeburg which has not deformed, but should still be replaced.



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Yeah so these are all different problems.

There’s that significant flow of water dripping down from above the cast iron pipe. That’s actually either under my basement or right at the wall/footer area. There is no cleanout there, but there are a number of abandoned pipes under the floor from a previous basement bathroom. I’m jackhammering that section again to find out exactly why and also I’m going to go ahead and replace it with pvc, and at that point there will be zero legacy pipes in use at my house.

That was indeed groundwater falling down. In addition, and separately, there was a little geyser of water like a fountain coming up from the bottom of the pipe. Not on this particular video. That was way out under my front yard.

Finally, to HJ’s point, the cast iron under my home and under the first half of the sewer run appears metallic with the reddish-brown rust spots throughout, and the walls appear rough. Then out by my sidewalk/street, there’s another transition to the Orangeburg which appears black as you said but it has white spots on it, instead of the orange-brown.

I will post some photos of what I dig up today and tomorrow, it’s going to be, unfortunately, interesting.

Have you ever considered the trenchless repair. If its 10 foot deep that sounds like an ideal place for that type of the thing take a look at some of these things if you have a plumber around your area that has one of these transfers machines I have been quite happy with the job that was done for me because there was large trees there

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