Your home’s pipes are like your arteries; both work best when kept free of clogs! Thankfully, your pipes are a little easier to clean than the insides of your body. Even when you’re diligent about keeping grease and oil out of your drains, eventually soap scum, food debris, and general bacteria will build up in the interior of your sewage pipes.
Drain cleaning chemicals aren’t a good solution to this problem because they’ll also damage the pipes, leaving you to deal with either a clog or a leak. So how do you keep the insides of your pipes smooth and clean without damage? It’s simple: hydro-jetting.
Find out how this practice keeps your toilets and drains flowing smoothly with the occasional preventative visit from a hydro-jetting plumber. Follow along with the expert, Joe the Plumber.
Snaking is often recommended as the quick and low damage way of clearing clogged pipes. However, even the mechanical snake or rotor device operated by a professional still has a limit to its ability to clear away debris. For a stronger clearing effect that won’t cause damage, hydro-jetting is the best option.
While many assume this service is only offered by plumbers to their commercial clients, it’s also available for residential use. A hydro-jetting service goes beyond just removing clogs, which is the focus of snaking the pipes. It can be used anywhere there’s a lot of debris in order to reduce the chance of future clogs, thus solving multiple problems at once.
High-pressure water is the key to hydro-jetting, as the name suggests. However, just blasting a maximum amount of water through the pipes at high-pressure levels can easily cause damage. This is true for modern PVC pipes as well as older metal or clay sewage pipes. Thankfully, professional hydro-jet equipment allows the plumber to maintain precise control over both the pressure and direction of the spray.
High pressure is only applied to the toughest clogs or debris like tree roots, cutting away the material without risking damage to the pipes. Lower pressure jetting and flushing removes organic debris or build-up that doesn’t require high-pressure blasting. By adjusting the water flow and pressure throughout the process, the plumber cleans out each section based on its condition rather than applying the same force to the entire pipe. Check out the different plumbing services we offer at Joe the Plumber.
Few other cleaning or clog-removal methods can help with tree roots. Sewage pipes made of clay, in particular, tend to attract tree roots that can sense the moisture and nutrients flowing inside. When the clay becomes weak, or metal pipes start to leak, the roots creep in through the smallest openings and start to fill the pipe.
Clogs caused by tree roots will return over and over again until the roots are removed entirely. Hydro-jetting is one of the only options for removing tree roots without digging up the pipes and cutting them open. Of course, it’s best to check that tree roots are really the problem before deciding on any kind of jetting, boring, or pipe replacement.
Trenching is the primary method for dealing with a sewage pipe that is crushed, filled with tree roots, or leaking badly into the surrounding soil. While it remains one of the only options for crushed or broken pipes, hydro-jetting is often a good alternative for tree roots or extensive clogs.
Trenching leaves your yard disturbed and leads to dirt being tracked everywhere as the work proceeds. Digging the trench to reach the pipe can take over a day, even with the right equipment, since it has to be done with care to avoid further damage. Because hydro-jetting is done from the inside of the pipe instead, there’s no need to excavate it first.
A thorough plumbing inspection should be the first step when there’s a stubborn clog in the sewage pipes of a home. Without an inspection, you’re more or less just guessing what is wrong with your pipes. We can check your pipes inside and out to determine the problem and whether hydro-jetting is the right choice. If you’re not having problems yet, a plumbing inspection may reveal the need for preventative clearing to ensure that clogs don’t soon develop.
Solve stubborn sewer pipe problems with hydro-jetting from the reliable Joe the Plumber team. We do everything from water heater installation to clog clearing. Contact us today through our website