Here we go again, again!… again

/ Re-Farmer

Okay, first things first.

Yes!!! We can use our plumbing again!

But no, the problem has not been fixed. In fact, it hasn’t even been identified.

When my brother got here, the first thing we did was see if the problem was with the pump itself.

I have learned a lot about this pump today!

The back valve was removed, and it was fine. Just a bit of gunk that would not have affected how it worked.

Since it was off anyhow, I gave it a thorough cleaning, along with the length of pipe and elbow that would be reattached to it.

From what we could see inside the back valve’s opening, the disc-type thing that would spin was also clear.

The pump has clean out valves, though. I had no idea what they were and couldn’t even see one of them without having to look around the outflow pipe from the filter. That was the next thing to check. Those have probably never been opened before, but my brother managed it. He took the bottom one out first, which was the drain, which is when we got a real hands on idea of just how much water is in that pump’s cannister section!

Trying to see into those openings was not easy. My brother got me to turn the pump’s switch on and off quickly, just so he could see things turning inside, using his phone as a flashlight. Everything looked fine. He did some cleaning around the thread and even poked around with a wire, but it was not all that gunky, either.

With everything checked and cleared, we tried again.

The pump ran, but no change. No water would flow.

Okay, maybe we just needed to prime the pump.

I had no idea there was a valve for that. As with the cleanout valves, it took a lot to get it open. Once it was, we used the hose I keep hooked up to the old laundry’s cold water tap all the time, because it’s just so handy. Once it was full, he closed it up again (making sure to Teflon tape everything, along the way), and we tested it again.

Nothing. No flow at all. The only change I could tell was that, with everything all nice and clean, the motor was running a bit quieter.

Okay, the pump seemed to be working. Could it be that something was blocking the tank’s outflow pipe?

There was only one thing left to do.

Put the emergency diverter back on.

If it worked after that, then we knew the problem was not at the house end.

Thankfully, when we switched it out before, I told my brother to just leave it aside. I would put it away in the spring, and then reseal the hole in the wall that it runs through. Which meant it was just a matter of switching pipes.

The outflow pipe from the pump to the ejector, however, always has water in it. It’s just a gravity thing. So we got a bucket handy before starting to take it off. As soon as my brother wrestled it loose, I got the bucket under it, so we did manage to catch most of it, but not all!

Yeah. I got splashed.

That out and set aside, the diverter was put back on. After double and triple checking that every thing was tight, we tried again.

Yes!!! It worked! Finally, the septic tank was draining!

My brother and I headed outside to check the other end, while my daughter stayed to monitor the pump. It emptied the tank and shut itself off before my brother and I could get to where it drains into!

Which means that the problem is somewhere from the house to the ejector.

We went to check the ejector.

The heat tape was not warm, but it has a regulator and will shut itself off based on temperature. Today has been a warm day, and is still warming up (as I write this, I see we just reached 0C/32F), so that makes sense. The extension cord’s plug has an indicator light on it, so we could see that it had power. Everything looked fine.

That doesn’t mean it’s not the ejector, though. It just means, we know it’s not frozen.

What it could be is that there is gunk in the venturi valve that finally just blocked the whole thing. The only way to know for sure is to pull it out. Which would require removing the heat tape, unscrewing the elbow at the top, unscrewing the cap, and removing both, then very carefully pulling the venturi pipe out of the stand pipe, so we can see the valve at the bottom.

Which we will NOT do until spring.

Yup. We’re on the emergency diverter for the rest of the winter, at least.

If it’s not the venturi valve being blocked, then it’s the pipe itself. A build up of crud inside the pipe could have come loose or something and blocked it entirely. Based on how well the water flowed out of the ejector after we got it thawed out and hooked up again, the pipe was running pretty clear. The only real hint that there was a problem was that it took longer for the pump to empty the tank than it did before.

There is nothing we can do about it until the ground thaws out.

Once the diverter was set up and working, my brother was prepared for another job.

Installing the power diverter switch.

The pump could be turned on and off using what is basically a light switch on the wall. Under normal circumstances this is in the “on” position at all times. The pump itself is triggered by the float and pill switch, inside the tank.

Sometimes, however, there is a need to check the pump, when the tank is not full enough to trigger it on. With all the septic problems we’ve been having, we needed to be able to turn it on manually, from inside the basement. The alternative would be to open up the septic can and use something long enough to catch the cable and raise the float. That’s something we want to avoid doing even in the summer. Not a chance, in the winter!

My brother set up a couple of wires set up outside the switch box that would allow us to turn it on manually. The pump’s switch would be turned off, the wires outside the box would be attached to each other, the switched turned on again, and the pump would run. When we were done testing it, we’d turn off the switch, undo the wires, cover and tuck them away again, then turn the switch back on so the pump could be triggered by the float again.

Well, not anymore.

This is how it was set up before.

You can see the black covered wires from the pill switch coming up from below and into the box. The two wires sticking out the side from the same opening were the ones that could be joined to turn the pump on manually.

There was no schematic, so my brother had to be particularly careful in figuring out what was what. There were the wires from the breaker box (which was off, of course), the wires from the pill switch, the wires from the motor, the ground wires, and the manual diverter wires that all had to be kept track of!

He installed a new box, got all the wired sort out and attached to new switched, and put it all together, with one special feature, which you can see by clicking through to the next image (which Instagram, once again, messed with, so it’s off to once side instead of centred. *sigh*).

The manual switch has a safety cover on it, so that there is on way it can be turned on by accident!

Then he left the blue protective film on more me, because I commented on how I liked the blue colour. 😄

Of course, once everything was together – and before it was all closed up – the breaker was turned on and it was tested. I even made sure to get video of him explaining the which wires were which, so we can refer to it in the future, if need be.

My brother is so awesome. I don’t know what we would do without him! It even came up in our conversation today; my brother is the last living person who really knows this place. Another reason why I try to document everything, and learn as much as I can from him!!!

Once he was done with all this and his tools were safely put away and to the side, I did the floor pipe maintenance thing with the hose, showing him where I was hitting bottlenecks – except the second bottleneck wasn’t there! Or, at least, the hose passed through the opening just right, because he was there. 😄

Once that was done, I helped him haul all his tool boxes, bins and bags up and to his vehicle while my daughter, sweetheart that she is, took care of washing and disinfecting the floor. Mostly with one arm, since her ganglion is just not going away this time.

My brother may have finished up in the basement, but not with here! After loading up his car again, he went on to do things in their various storage areas for a couple more hours! Hopefully, the roads will be gone. We have just reached our high of the day; 2C/36F and are starting to get a bit of mixed rain and snow. We’re supposed to stay at this temperature through to tomorrow, even overnight.

Meanwhile, one of the first things I did was call dibs on the shower, after having been splashed while switching out that pipe. The honeypot has been put away, and we no longer have to use basins and buckets to keep water from draining into the full septic tank.

It feels so good to be able to shower again!

And use a flushing toilet instead of the honeypot.

Ah, the things we put up with to live here! 😄😄😄

The Re-Farmer

6 thoughts on “Here we go again, again!… again”

      • I ‘think’ there are several reasons. One is the design as this thing is old and the inflow from the house to the tank is odd. The tank is very close to the house and there are no gutters on the house meaning a lot of the water is falling directly onto where that odd inflow is located. The tank is not very deep in the ground. I’m fairly sure that the drainage field has been damaged over time, especially so when we had that tree cut down and the guy’s truck got stuck out there due to recent heavy rains. Its just another one of those ‘if and when I get the money I’ll fix it’ items.

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