That explains everything!
Though there was a local Frenchman who refused to pay the bill for a SPANC inspection as a matter of principle. But I haven't seen him for a long while - probable chained to a wall in an "oubliette" somewhere!
We use bio liquids and never powders, no oils or fats down the sink or in the dishwasher in which we also use bio products but we still get those solid lumps as you describe them. Our jet wash does not clear them, I have clips to attach the jet head to the chimney rods to do 18m of pipe that gets occasional blocks, hence cut back rigid plastic chimney brushes to dislodge and push through the blocks of solid white stuff. Heaven knows what other people's systems are like and why there are so often effluents running into ditches that make my eyes water.
Earlier, it is said, people were 'looser' given the lack of archaeological evidence of lumpy bits.
As for Mike, SPANC is the acronym for Scheme for Praying on Alien Non-Compliance. They just love anybody not knowing the rules so that they can shower them with verbal ess aitch one tea but foreigners are extra fun, or so my OH's SPANC inspector pal seems to imply and she is one of the nice ones!
Back in the UK, in the good old days, when the council would send a man round to unblock your pipes, one of their guys showed me a 50cm. cylinder of solid white gunge that he had just removed. He explained that this was a normal result from mixing cooking fat and washing detergents.
I guess modern washing powders are better than they used to be and we all are (should be) using less fat in cooking. I always wipe fatty pans with paper towel before washing them, but I find it hard to explain to visitors who insist on doing the washing-up.
I have a pressure washer attachment for cleaning pipes - too long a run between access points for rods. I have the feeling that the 110mm. pipework that we had in the UK, was less liable to give problems. The small additional diameter actually resulted in around 50% extra capacity.
Yeah but there weren't as many of us all cr*pping at the same time ;-)
Looks great Deborah. Plenty of people in London are living in worse accommodation than that! But I feel that it would be too big a project just to get over a few weeks of inconvenience (no pun intended) each year. Perhaps a chemical toilet would be the easiest answer.
I wonder if the Australian authorities who make the rules have ever considered the effect of cattle excrement on the aquifer? Sometimes I think these people are there just to make jobs for themselves and life difficult for everyone else. In France we have the dreaded SPANC (service public d'assainissement non collectif) but I like to think of then as the "Society for Prevention of Average Common Sense." Strange to think that the human race managed for 65 million years before the invention of the flushing toilet!
Probably right Vic, more likely to affect farmers working with slurry tanks. But the warning is given on several Websites and we don't want you to have to appear as a witness at an inquest! ;-)
I was taking it for granted Mike is verrrrrry skinny :-D
You'd have to be pretty unlucky to fall down the 18" diameter hole in mine & if the tank is properly vented there should be very few gasses.
The croute, oh yes. We have immense amounts of lime in our water. When that is held by the fats in washing/washing up liquids it builds up in the pipe to our bac degraisseur. I have modified chimney cleaning brushes to use on the rods to clear that. It causes overflows in the pipe junction (little man hole) and has blocked entirely. I take lots of it out of the bac where it floats about fortunately.
There you go! This is the company we used for our septic system -- Ozzi Kleen. We installed ours in early 2009 and back then it cost just over $10,000 for that unit to be installed. I would have no idea what it costs now and they only quote the prices if you write and ask for a costing.
http://ozzikleen.com.au/sewage_treatment_system_FAQ_RP10
And here is the composting toilet that we used -- Nature Loo. It had a vent stack that was part of the installation and that vent stack had a wee little fan inside that sucked all odours right out. Everything that your body produced went down into a chamber right under the porcelain toilet unit. And so you never saw anything, you just put a scoop of sawdust or fragrant wood shavings right over the top of it and left the building!
What everything 'fell' into was a very large round black container that sat underneath the toilet unit. That's why in almost every installation that we have ever seen in the country, they're in slightly elevated units so that you go up a set of stairs and into the toilet building or the toilet room.
Mark built us one of those iconic little 'Outdoor Dunny' buildings and it was clad in corrugated metal on the outside. But inside it was insulated and had plasterboard and a proper window and a lino floor. So no, it wasn't at all rustic -- it was quite pretty.
I'm going to see if I can attach pictures -- but if not, here were the steps. (1) He built a raised platform that looked like a small enclosed deck. One of the sides was hinged so it could lift up and slide the black waste tank in and out. Those tanks are not dreadfully heavy even when they are full because, due to the constant venting action, the waste is breaking down and drying out. So he could get them in and out from under that platform with a normal hand trolley. (2) He framed the small building and applied the cladding and the corrugated metal roof. (2) Mark installed the window and door and added a set of stairs and a handrail made out of a wavy bit of slender tree.
Once the black units were full, he would wheel them out to a far end of one of the back paddocks and leave it there with the vent whirly thing atop it spinning around and around for six months. And after that? It had dried out all of the liquid and turned into this dark smell-free compost that could be shovelled out and spread around fruit and nut trees. The companies here in Australia all advise you to not use the compost on food products that you harvest straight into your kitchen like salad greens and vegetables, but it is perfectly safe to use on fruit, nut, ornamental, and citrus trees. They thrive on it!
Hope all of that gives you some ideas. And fingers crossed that the pictures actually upload.
The septic system we installed looked like a small UFO as they were lowering it into the ground -- and it pumped the waste out into the drain fields twice a day after it had 'churned and separated' around inside the huge tank for awhile. The thing was massive and it would have done the job for a small village!
It was one of the approved models from the local council and it was one of those bio-things that produced water so clear in the drain fields that the cattle farmers up on those incredibly large farms in Queensland used the output to water their cattle. They said it was NOT SAFE for humans to drink, but apparently it was fine for cattle and sheep.
The electronics panel was in a compartment right at the top with a snap down cover, but it all went under water when our farm was flooded. They had to order an entire new compartment full of complicated electronics that had the sensors, the timers that knew when to churn and when to drain, and the chemical sensors that measured the clearness of the water.
When the entire unit was lowered into the ground and covered over with dirt after we got the council sign-off, I asked why there was that funny orange thing sticking up and I could also see the access panel for the electronics area. That was so the unit could be inspected EVERY THREE MONTHS and the certificate of compliance for that period sent off to the council. That meant we had a contract with our plumber for return visits each year. But those return inspections were also required by the council.
The funny orange thing turned out to be a bright orange safety light that flashed like mad if anything ever went wrong with the unit. And guess what was flashing all night long for weeks after the flooding.
The council up here is so pedantic about water cleanliness and what few septic units you are even allowed to put in because our aquifers in this part of Central Victoria are SO close to the surface that they don't want to take any chances of that water becoming polluted. It's what they pump out of the ground and send on into everyone's homes. For that same reason, farmers are not allowed to dig bore wells for any cheap and unmetered water for their crops or animals. If they want free water, they'd best be installing huge rainwater tanks for the one rainy season we get a year! The bore holes could allow chemicals from farming or animal waste to go down into the aquifers which is the source of everyone's drinking water up in those small towns. So the council is quite strict about enforcing all of that.
The composting toilet was very straightforward and had no odour at all once it was installed correctly. After I finish eating my lunch, I'll see if I can find links to the septic system pages and the composting toilet that we used. Surely they are both still in business a mere 8 years after the fact!
I can imagine that a backward flow might cause churning in the settlement tank, allowing solids to block the filter or if the tank became totally filled with water, some of the "croute" could flow over the internal partition with the same effect when the level begins to drop. I suspect that may be what happened in our case.
Anyone thinking of following Vic's advice should be aware that it is possible to be overcome by sewage gases and fall into the hole - quick, but not a nice way to go! Safest to work from the up-wind side and have someone nearby in case of problems.
They recently excavated part of Walbrook in the city of London that is not part of the subterranean river. The stench was apparently so bad that some of the archaeos had to wear oxygen gear. It was a section filled in around 1450!
In the late 60's an archaeologist friend of mine was digging mediaeval cesspits in Alcester. They still stank!
Them "stones" is Volcanic rock (pumice) You usually take out the basket & hose 'em down to clean them. I prefer to leave it until the basket is almost blocked as it takes most of the fines out of the discharge water & keeps the lateral drains clear. It's a fine line but as there is usually only two of us it's easily controlled. You can buy a sack of new rock at your local merchants. I can't see what damage flooding can cause to a normal gravity tank. I understand it could block the lateral drains if stuff got past the prefilter basket but as the tank is normally almost full a little more head would be little extra pressure on it so what can it do? Of course if the tank was gin tight, the outlet blocked & the system backed up to a very high level it might conceivably cause some damage. As most properties have a toilet on the ground floor this is unlikely to happen as the pan would overflow.
If anyone is considering cleaning out the prefilter best to plug off the outlet with a rag before you lift out the basket to avoid any nasty stuff going down the laterals.
Some departments allow composting toilets generally, but even some districts then don't. They are worth it because they are cheap and good for about 20 years at low maintenance cost. Find out and consider installing. Don't do it on the 'black' though. If you ever sell up then the DPE might well block your sale until you have a complete new installation, especially if your district does not allow them.
Interesting. Ours has no electronics. Was yours a pumped system? It seems that a septic tank system should return to normal when the water level drops, unless there is physical damage. But ours stopped working six months later due to a blocked filter. There is a container full of stones that is supposed to prevent solids entering the drain field. The septic tank man said we had too many "cailloux."
I have considered the possibility of installing a composting toilet, seems to make a lot of sense, but I think there may be legal problems in France. Any ideas about cost and management?
Well, it was owned by the Delors family. On the form of the last one we have heard of cesspits must have been a family trait :-D
A cesspit - well there's posh, as they used to say in Wales. Here, nothing was ever found, but we heard that they grew excellent vegetables!