Plumber recommendation...

[Gofor]

A couple thoughts:

Depending on the age of the house, the county may have a copy of the septic installation permit. If so, it will give you a good idea where the septic and leach lines are, and then they can be located by a probe. In my yard its easy to find the leach lines with the drought. Bent clothes hangar witching rods can get you close. The septic would be impossible if I didn't know where it is. However, it is probably within 10' of the house and directly out from where the main sewer line runs out.

Also, if there is only one vent, it can get clogged, especially if there was any high ground water situations (you mentioned water running through or around the workshop last year). Toilet paper, especially the soft fluffy type, can float for a while. If the water level goes up too much, it can float up into the vent pipe and cause a paper mache type plug. My brother had this problem, however his symptom was slow drainage, not gurgling. If you snake the line and it seems clear, also try snaking down from the roof vent (If you can do it safely).

Good luck

Go

[junquecol]

Dave, If you can locate the access hole into tank, you are welcome to borrow my "sludge judge" to measure the solids content of your tank. If it is greater than 30%, you tank needs to be pumped. "Sludge Judges" were originally made to test the pulp content in fruit juices. I don't think I would want any juice that my "sludge judge" has been into! The word for the solids in the leach field is bio-solids. Is the gurgling a new thing, or has it always been present? You know with all those elvs using the toilets, your septic system may have too much inflow.

[DaveO]

Originally Posted by Gofor

A couple thoughts:

Depending on the age of the house, the county may have a copy of the septic installation permit. In Johnston Co. the Health dept. has the septic/leach field as-built drawings. But they have them recorded under the original owners name, I am the third owner of the house and can't find any records of who was the original owner.

Also, if there is only one vent, it can get clogged, especially if there was any high ground water situations (you mentioned water running through or around the workshop last year). Toilet paper, especially the soft fluffy type, can float for a while. If the water level goes up too much, it can float up into the vent pipe and cause a paper mache type plug. My brother had this problem, however his symptom was slow drainage, not gurgling. If you snake the line and it seems clear, also try snaking down from the roof vent (If you can do it safely).

Good luck

Go

Mark would there be a vent on the septic tank itself? I have looked down the roof vent for as far as I could see with a flashlight looking for a possible clog. I should try snaking it.
Dave

[DaveO]

I think that I am going to have to take many of y'all recommendations this weekend and do some investigative research into the location of my tank and lines.
I haven't always had this issue, it has gotten progressively worse over time. So something has changed that is causing it.

Thanks to everyone for all the advice, ideas and tips.
Dave

[Gofor]

The vent will probably be located on the roof above the wall your primary bathroom toilet backs up to. There probably will be not vent over the septic tank [I say probably, because back in the 40's and 50's, people sometimes put a vent pipe (inverted U shaped piece of pipe coming out of the ground) on the septic tank. It doubled as a vent and and overflow pipe]. Most older 1 bath houses were built with the vent pipe coming straight up behind the toilet. The bathroom sink was tied in either in the wall or below floor, and the rest of the sinks tied in in the crawl space, or outside the footprint of the slab if no crawl space. Somewhat newer houses had another vent for the kitchen sink. With recent construction, the vents may run half the width of the house across the attic before they go out the roof.
You may want to check in the attic for bends before snaking the vent from the roof.

Go

[McRabbet]

Dave, If you go to your Registry of Deeds Office, they should be able to give you links to the prior owners based on the recorded deeds. Many deeds also provide a reference back to the prior owner, so the old deed that the people you bought from had may show that linkage as well. It is fairly straight forward. With that information, then go to the Johnston Co, Health department with that info in hand.

[Alan in Little Washington]

Originally Posted by DaveO

Mark would there be a vent on the septic tank itself? I have looked down the roof vent for as far as I could see with a flashlight looking for a possible clog. I should try snaking it.
Dave

I had to snake a line from the roof vent of a 2 story house with a steep pitched roof. A couple women's things caused the clog! Be careful and DON'T drop the snake- been there, done that.

[JohnsonMBrandon]

If I was a betting man I would say your tank is full and needs to be pumped out. If the problem just started I would doubt its the vent pipe although its possible. Sounds to me like the tank just needs to be pumped. I've been wrong before though....so take it for what its worth.

[Sully]

A semi-local plumbing/septic service has a sign:

If it don't flush,
don't cuss,
call us.




You might also consider keeping a mesh bag of pennies in the tank of each toilet. The copper should help inhibit the growth of roots into your field lines.

J

[Ray Martin]

Originally Posted by jwaterdawg

...

You might also consider keeping a mesh bag of pennies in the tank of each toilet. The copper should help inhibit the growth of roots into your field lines.

J

What will the copper do to the culture in the septic tank?

Ray

[JimmyC]

I think that you might have to use older pennies, I don't think that there is much copper in pennies anymore. I don't know what year they changed over, but I'm sure one of the members will know better.

Jimmy

Originally Posted by Ray Martin

What will the copper do to the culture in the septic tank?

Ray

[Ray Martin]

Originally Posted by twodognc

I think that you might have to use older pennies, I don't think that there is much copper in pennies anymore. I don't know what year they changed over, but I'm sure one of the members will know better.

Jimmy

Think you're right, Jimmy. They are mostly zinc now. And with what little copper is left in them, the coin still costs more than a penny (is that what we call irony).

Ray

[junquecol]

What will copper pennies do that copper water pipes don't ? I think the idea is to get some copper sulfate into the leach field to kill tree roots. The gurgling is a function of poor/ missing venting. It could be that the fixture was set so that the trapped gases find it easier to go through the trap on fixture rather than out the vent stack. Could be something as simple as a "flat dry vent" that is stopped up. First, I would take a water hose up on roof, and flush out the vent stack.

[JimmyC]

Bruce,
I agree with you about the copper pipes, but most people down here seem to have pex comiing in and PVC going out. So far I haven't seen any copper.

Jimmy

[DaveO]

Well I did a bit of investigative crawling around and I believe I have found at least two issues that could be contributing to my problems.
First I poured a 5 gal. bucket of water down the vent pipe to check if it was clogged. It looked like most of the water flowed trough it freely. But I saw the reflection of water in the bottom of the pipe, and it is at the highest end of my DW line. Then I went under the house and opened the upper most clean-out and had a small bit (gallon or less) of clean water come rushing out. So first problem is that I think I have a partial blockage in the DW line. I am going to try and snake it out.
Second, while waiting for the snake that I am borrowing from Mike Guy to arrive, I decided to check the slope on the pipe. I found ~ 1/4" per foot drop in the pipe until just right after the drain intersection beneath the room with most of the gurgling issues (also the farthest from the vent). At that point the pipe actually goes up-hill for a couple of feet before dropping again to go out into the septic tank line. It doesn't look like it would be very easy to raise the DW line to get more fall out of it. Most of the piping is glued up fitting to fitting so I can just shorten a section and get a little more elevation from the line. It also doesn't look like I can get the end of the run to drop down to correct the up-hill sloped section.
I am not a happy camper right now

Dave