Trenchless Sewer Line Replacement in Lisbon

Repair or replace? What the camera settles in Lisbon

Nobody should quote a sewer line in Lisbon without first putting a camera through it, and the footage answers one question before any other: is the pipe still a pipe? A cracked, root-filled, joint-leaking line that still has its round section and its fall to the main can be rebuilt in place with a liner. A line that has collapsed, flattened, dropped into a belly or been pushed out of grade by a root ball cannot be lined back into shape; that one gets burst and replaced with new pipe along the same path. Either way the yard stays closed up. The difference is in what the contractor pulls through the old line.

What is under Lisbon homes

The industrial-era cities of the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley have some of the oldest sewer laterals still in service in the country: clay tile from before the First World War, cast iron from the building booms that followed, and Orangeburg in the postwar suburbs. Many of those laterals were combined with the storm system, which means they carry far more water than they were ever meant to.

Deep frost, heavy clay, mature maples and oaks, and basements below the water table make for root intrusion, cracked bells and infiltration. A line that runs under a hundred-year-old sidewalk and a sixty-year-old driveway has been loaded from above the whole time.

Root-bound clay with its grade intact is the classic lining job and comes out as a single smooth pipe. Crushed Orangeburg, collapsed clay and cast iron that has lost its floor are burst and replaced, often from the basement wall to the main in a single pull.

How a no-dig replacement goes in Lisbon

The crew locates the line from the cleanout to the city connection and marks the depth at each defect the camera found. For bursting, two pits are opened: one at the house end, one at the property line or the main. A steel cable is fed through the old pipe, a bursting head is attached with a length of fused HDPE behind it, and a hydraulic puller draws the head through. The old pipe shatters into the surrounding ground and the new one occupies the same route at the same depth. The two ends are connected, the city inspects the tie-in, and the pits are closed the same day.

For a structural liner the run is jetted clean and measured, then a resin-soaked tube goes in from the cleanout by pull or inversion. Pressure holds it to the host wall while hot water or steam cures it, and what remains is a smooth, seamless pipe nested inside the original. A cutter working from inside reopens any branch lines. Water is off for the cure and back on the same afternoon.

Permits, inspections and the part in the street

Replacing a lateral in Lisbon normally takes a plumbing permit, and the section between the property line and the main may belong to the city or the utility, which means a right-of-way permit and a scheduled tie-in inspection. A trenchless contractor who works Lisbon regularly knows which agency owns that last stretch, pulls the permits as part of the job and books the inspector around the day of the pull. A quote that leaves permits out is not a complete quote.

Who replaces sewer lines in Lisbon

The Trenchless Guys, LLC holds the Lisbon territory as its CIPP Verified installer. Verification through curedinplacepipe.net means the license, the lining and bursting equipment, and completed jobs have been checked, not just a listing paid for. Dial (877) 474-0056 or send the form; the camera run and a written quote naming the method come before any work. More about The Trenchless Guys's work in Lisbon →

Common questions from Lisbon owners