The house I'm living in was built 70 years ago and fitted with a septic tank about 10 feet from the back of the house. The city did an upgrade connection to a sewer system shortly before my family purchased it around 60 years ago. The tank remains, but sewer pipe runs over it and connects to a main line at the front of my property. Over the years, we've had very few problems with the system.
The method for sewer lines back then was a series of interconnecting clay pipe in sections (like the photo) about 6 feet long that had a ring of tar to seal the fittings.
Over the years, the ground shifted. Although the pipes were intact, the tar between the joints separated and began to leak. It's not a big problem unless you have a tree near the sewer line where the roots from the tree (seeking water) will grown into the pipe making it crack. The roots continue to grow inside the pipe increasing the chances of things getting snagged, creating a complete blockage.
We had our first issue more than 20 years ago. I called a Roto-Rooter plumbing service to 'snake out' the drain. Unfortunately, he wasn't equipped to do the job. A call to the city got their repair truck and a guy who knew how fix things. The plumbing snake he used had a large diameter rotary cutting head that trimmed off the roots growing within the pipe. The advice was 'get the pipe replaced' as slicing the roots only made them grow back faster. I did and had 30 feet of pipe around the tree replaced with a seamless piece of PVC.
I live on a street and my neighbor lives on an avenue. Their plumbing joins with mine in a "T" connection about 70 feet from the property line. Someone on their side flushed something down the line that blocked up both sewer lines. The city was called and they replaced most of the line with PVC at no charge to either of us.
At least 7 years ago , I did a bathroom renovation and installed a 'new fangled' toilet that uses 1 gallon per flush and (in laboratory tests) can send a load down 50 feet of pipe!
(are you impressed? I know I am) This toilet doesn't clog.
On Sunday, the toilet was backing up. The problem was the sewer and not the toilet. Admittedly, both me and my wife are big users of butt-wipe and go through a mega roll every few days. That was enough to cause a sewer backup. I rarely need to hire people to do repairs that I cannot do and I dumped a gallon of drain opener expecting the problem to be eliminated. Not true. I checked all 3 plumbing cleanouts and see the trouble was in the first 50 feet... the part that hadn't been upgraded.
A trip to Home Depot Wednesday night and a 50 foot plumbing snake had me busy Thanksgiving morning. The clog is gone, my hands are tired of wrestling the snake for an hour, but it's done!
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