Finding service sewerage pipe to inspection chamber

AlexMac

I rang the water board (Thames Water) when we had a blockage outside... and a kid sitting on a computer in their call-centre in India called up the original plans on a screen and described the configuration underneath our driveway, all the way to the public sewer. I thought this was pretty amazing given that the house was 150 years old, so someone had obviously had to digitise ancient charts and maps!

Like your situation, an inspection hatch had disappeared or been tarmaced over; when the Water Board's contractor arrived he couldn't even find it with a metal detector- but there still was one accessible one 30 feet away, immediately adjacent to the house. So he just jetted all 30-40 feet to the public sewer; for a very reasonable £70 or so (as we couldn't prove the blockage wasn't on our land.

That was before the change of regs which mean that drains shared by more than one property are the Board's problem; even if on private land... So give the water board a try?

AdrianC

They have access to the maps, sure. But the ground is likely to differ from the maps.

I was talking to some BT guys recently, who were doing the fibre broadband installations. They'd recently been putting a new pole in, with somebody from the water company trying to find a main nearby. The maps said it was on this side of the road. It wasn't. Three guesses how the BT guys found it on the other side of the road?

G_M

AdrianC wrote: »

Three guesses how the BT guys found it on the other side of the road?

Errr...

1. there was a sign saying "Mains"?
2. they did an internet search?
3. coathanger?

Do you use it to hang your shirts?

I've bent it up into a whisk and use it for cake-making.