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It seems that our toilet system might be screwed up, we've had the leaching field pumped a couple of weeks back but every now and again the toilets still dont seem to fflush properly and the water level gets pretty close to the top of the bowl or actually overflows.
Sometimes they flush fine, other times not so bad, anyone have an ideas what could be happening to cause this?
Regards,
Lee
If your other drains are working okay, I'd suspect something has fallen into the toilet and is plugging the line for the toilet alone.
Usually with a septic tank all the plumbing in the house all goes into the same tank, so if the tank isn't working properly, every drain in the house will be slow and backing up. And you will see sewage in the lowest bathtubs.
I would have to agree with Bill. A problem with the system would mean that water would back into the lowest point first. In our cabin, that is a shower stall. Typically I find that when I have problems with just one fixture, it is an isolated problem.
Have you tried to snake the toilet?
Yeah we've snaked the toilets and every now and again the system does appear to be backing up in to their the shower in the bedroom or the bathtub in the main bathroom.
Like i say though a few months back we actually had the dudes come and suck all the crap out of our leaching field which we were told should stop the problem, but it doesnt seem to have.
Im wondering if it could possibly be a crack in one of the pipes underground as every so often we'll hear the main toilet bubble and release air out of the pipe into the bowl itself.
I really know absolutely nothing about plumbing stuff, give me electrical work or construction stuff and im happy as a pig in shit though LOL
Regards,
Lee
Bummer. While a blockage in the line is still possible, symptoms like this would place it in the main line between your house and the tank, which means an expensive professional snaking. And it sounds like maybe the whole system is sick, which is a big hassle.
Your tank might not be working properly, or your leach field could be saturated with greases or other contaminants.
First thing to do is reduce the load as much as possible. If you use a garbage disposal, stop entirely. Cut back on water use as much as possible - switch to low flow showerheads, and do everything you can to reduce the amount of material going down the drains. Give the system a chance to recover and rebuild it's bacterial population, and give the bacteria in the leach field a chance to work on the sludge that has filled the soil.
Make sure no unneseccary chemicals are put down the drains, especially things that can seriously hurt the bacteria.
Make sure the tank is pumped. That was probably done with the leach field flush, but just mentioning the basics.
You can try those bacterial enhancer treatments, but they have a low chance of really working well. You can try heavy lye treatments, but they also dont work that well.