Fellas, Need some advice so that I can pass it on to the clients. I receive a call from a Dr that owns a pedriatric practice,(we did the fitout) She says water is coming up from cleanouts and from toilet in baths. Ok! we all know what that is!!! Clog!!!
I call roto rooter! They want 800 bucks (tell him to hit the pike). My plumber comes out and cleans the drain to find (Tampons, the larger size wipes, and cfold hand towels) quite a bit of all the above…. the client proceeds to tell me that all this material is fine to go down the toilet…. Is this ok to do????? There are 3 bathrooms in the facility…
Should this stuff have passed through pipe? If it happens again should we send camera down? Its a new building and the clog was not in any area we exposed it was after our last cleanout before the parking lot cleanout. which is where we snaked!
Thanks, Lou C
Edited 5/3/2009 6:39 am ET by loucarabasi
Edited 5/3/2009 6:42 am ET by loucarabasi
Replies
My policy would be nothing goes in the toilet but toilet paper.
let them flush what they want...
you can use the loot...
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Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
"the client proceeds to tell me that all this material is fine to go down the toilet...."
Client is always right, as long as he budgets for fishing it all out again on a regular basis.
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My MIL came here from the Soviet Union, hence the idea of paying for something and not being able to use every last bit of it drives her crazy. I was called over one time to deal with a clogged crapper; the culprit was watermelon rind. She swears her mother taught her to do it, it "cleans the pipes" and you get a use for the rind of the dearly bought watermelon. Fortunately, it resolved itself with a little plunger action.
I figure its fine to go down - in small amounts; and if you let it soften a bit before the flush. Dump a box of wipes in the loo and flush right away - let me know how that goes. . .
Chances are they're pushing it down there way to fast.
If it doesn't go down the loo. She has to pay for it to be handled as a biowaste hazard.
Anything that may be contaminated by body fluids can be classified as a bio -hazard and must be treated as such.
Tell her to do the math. Bio-hazmatt. fees vs. plumbing cost and possible fines. She already pays for sharps containers, thier content and disposal, so she is not starting a new waste stream, just adding a little more cost to and existing one.
Look up blood born pathogens and such at the OSHA site for her.
Or install a grinder. Probably a reasonably cheap solution.
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. -John Kenneth Galbraith
Grinders would likely work.
We have two that grind and lift the waste from our lower level to the sewer line.
They work great most of the time, but given the brillance of these people they find a way to clog them up too. Some one flushed a large pair of underware into our line. Lock up the impeller and sheared the shaft before the motor over load and fusses blew. Took 6 weeks and $1200 to get a new one. That was one shatty jop, pulling the assembly from a 12' pit. Two years later the second on died from natural causes after 23 years of service.
Do you have any idea how big roaches can grow when they live in a sewage pit ?
"Do you have any idea how big roaches can grow when they live in a sewage pit ?"I do!First project at the first job I had after college was replacing two sewage commonuters (grinders) at Meridian NAS. The lines came from the family housing areas and proceeded on towards the lift station, 100' down the line.Those roaches were huge!Pits had to remain live too and had a bypass channel through a grate to get the big stuff. Right after lunch was our "high tide".TFB (Bill)
"First project at the first job I had after college was replacing two sewage commonuters (grinders) at Meridian NAS."And your father keeps saying you have to go to college or you will end up working in sh*t.
.
William the Geezer, the sequel to Billy the Kid - Shoe
It was a proud moment for him I'm sure.TFB (Bill)
Lou,
I was called in on a similar incident in a 1900's office building where the three separate business offices were converted to a medical clinic.
The owner/physician had three toilets backing up and 2 of the three were totally plugged. She was afraid that the old plumbing under the slab had collapse because the sump pump in the building often pumped soon after the 3rd toilet was flushed and slowly went down.
I asked her to contact a local plumber with a "seeing eye snake". The result were a massive clog outside the building as the service line headed to the main. The plumber dug it up as a roto-rooter would not penetrate the mass.
Upon opening the sewer line they removed a 10 foot section of 6" pipe packed solid with the same items as described by your post. The Doctor paid the plumber $3000 for the repairs and reasphalt of the parking lot.
The Doctor argued that the toilets should handle whatever would be flushed. The plumber said "No, you are wrong! But do as you wish I'll be happy to take your next $3000 dollars when the next clog comes in the alley main.
The doctor instructed her staff as to "TP only" and posted big signs in the bathrooms. She even argued with me about the plumbers position of TP only...I gave her no comfort and added that she needed towel & tampon receptacles in the bath stall, too!
...........Iron Helix
Funny, I thought that's why wastepaper baskets were invented.
Poop, pee, and a little TP is all that should go down the drain.
In Mexico you don't even dare put TP down the toilet.
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. -John Kenneth Galbraith
But I don't live in Mexico nor do I like their food.
They should have a "med waste" system for the larger stuff.
Toilets are machines intended for #1 and #2 type things. Anything else that gets flushed away without problem is luck!
>>>the client proceeds to tell me that all this material is fine to go down the toilet....
I wish them luck if they are ever faced with the prospect of a septic system.....
Scott.
Her practice obviously isn't Proctology.
Anal ogies are wonderful teaching tools, point out the waste system ain't all that difference than the human waste system, you put things in that cause plugs your gonna have to suffer the consequences.
Whenever I have been in any commercial facilities with restroom that is used by both sexes I have seen a receptacle by the toilets and warning note not to flush tampons.
William the Geezer, the sequel to Billy the Kid - Shoe
Just saw an article in the local newspaper that the town nearby is having a problem with their municipal waste lines, mostly because of wipes. A large part of the old sewage system is clay pipe that snags these things and next you know, major clog. They are trying to come up with a way to "educate" the town's population on what to flush and how to dispose of everything else.
Kind of amazing that most of the wipes say on the package - "Don't flush." People do it anyway. I've never heard of flushing paper towels. That's downright stupid.
To recycle an old adage,"Just because you can, doesn't mean you should."
Don K.
EJG Homes Renovations - New Construction - Rentals
"Its a new building and the clog was not in any area we exposed it was after our last cleanout before the parking lot cleanout. which is where we snaked!"
It's strange to me that the stuff made it past the trap of the toilet(s), but got hung up out in the sewer service line.
I'm not saying it's OK to flush the kinds of things you found, but if they make it past the toilet trap, which is usually only about 2 or 2-1/2 inches diameter, they should sail down the 4" sewer line with ease.
It sounds like there's something down the line that is catching solids and building up a blockage.
You might suggest that the owner pay you to get the line camera-ed to see what's the cause.
Commercial toilets (water closets) are generally wall hung units and have a full 4" discharge port. That and a 1" water supply witha sloan of Zurn type flush valve give it plenty of push to clear the toilet tarp.
We had a sudden rash of clogged lines in the first and second floor of our Data Center a few years ago. Sewage backing up through floor drains and out the restroom doors does not make a nice working environment for anyone, but for computer geeks it was way over the top.
We snaked out the clogs three times ourselves. Hired a plumbing contractor on another occassion. Then hired another contractor to run a optical snake through the line with a tracer attachment on it so we could locate any bad spots that may have developed in the pipe.
Long story, short. The only thing that had changed in 15 years of operation was the house keeping personel. A new person was cleaning the restrooms. The first thing she did was empty the trash and put in new plastic can liners every evening. She then cleaned the sinks, toilet stalls and vanity tops with paper towels. She wasn't about to put them in the newly empty trash cans, so she flushed them down the toilets. It would take about a week to accumulate enough in the 100+' run of pipe to the sewer to stop it up. Final cost for us was somewhere over $8K.
Yep, paper towels can certinly clog a pipe, given the constant use this doctors office is likely doing.