Sewer DIY Disaster, a Warning to Homeowners!

[@dumpybear8664]

This sounds exactly like something I would do. I had a case where a fence post was drilled right through my pvc drainage pipe. We had just moved in and there were no maps to indicate where drainage pipes were underground. Luckily this was just a second, half bath. I "fixed" it myself and it took 2 attempts of digging it up and filling it in again. I was quoted 800 dollars to fix it (dig and all). I saved 700 dollars but spent probably 10 total hours getting filthy and ruining clothes. Sometimes we need to factor in time and aggravation when taking on tasks. Thanks for your honesty, glad I'm not alone. Nice hole by the way. It would have taken me months to dig that with the amount of river rock that's in my yard.

[@Crimson_Hawk_01]

That was an amazing hole. I have done this exact same job however my hole was much smaller. Honestly your only real mistake was procrastination. Remember on a job like this to jump in and finish at least covering the pipes. Never leave completed water lines or electric lines open in a pit. Other than that very impressive.

[@leer-winnobbeefarms2131]

There but for the grace of God, we've all either been there or dodged a bullet! The only fault in a mistake is not learning from it! Lee

[@johngill5175]

trench box is what its called

[@opinionatedman]

Electrician here and I can share story after story of people who have done their own work and created more problems and expense than if I was out the first time. One guy went to replace his own devices throughout the house, killed the main to turn power off, those main breakers he had are notorious for breaking in the off position which as a HO he wouldn't know. He incurred the cost of a replacement main breaker plus an emergency fee to run out on the weekend. Was an emergency because it was already around 95 at 9 a.m. and climbing, and wife and kids were hot and telling him to get it fixed. Another good story was a lady who added her own wafer lights after watching a video, got to the point where she needed to connect all the lights to the existing light box and realized it was above her skill set, so she called a close family member who is an engineer. A job that would have taken us 15 minutes took us around 3 hours because this guy took apart the entire junction, had tape and thoughts on all the wire. The junction killed half the basement and trying to track where all the wires went, had to put a new box since the old recessed Jbox was never meant for that many pieces of romex to begin with. Story after story......I just spent 4.5k getting a massive tree taken down. It hurts spending money, we tradesman are people and homeowners as well. I support the DIY effort. Not everyone should DIY and some projects should not be DIY. Some people are competent enough to replace a switch or an outlet, you'd be surprised how many do not get the appropriate tightness on the screws and have loose connections that burn up. At my own houseI have a sewer line replacement that needs done. It is a hung sewer so only a few feet deep and I could easily rent a mini X, trench, remove the old cast, and put PVC in with a proper slope. Problem is it is under a driveway and being a sewer line I need it done right the first time so I'll be hiring a professional to do that. Not a time to penny pinch.

[@opinionatedman]

I'll also add many people have been ended being down in a hole that deep with no cave in protection. It was incredibly dangerous, glad you didn't learn that one the hard way.

[@MillennialRick]

Thanks for sharing your stories! I just hope the customers who screwed things up didn't take their anger out on you. Just like the saying "Don't piss off the mechanic working on your car" Yet people do it and they wonder why they get poor results.

[@julianp2868]

Not going to say your right or wrong all bar running water, I cannot understand why you did that. Your soil seems really sandy or loose. Grass is really resilient all bar Female Dogs urine but even that is easy to sort out. I'm not so sure about the size of hole comments, I think I would have dug a hole that big because if there is a cave in It would never have been dangerous. Where as a smaller hole you may get trapped.

[@nooneson1]

If I would've dug the hole I would've changed the pipe also that's the easier part I don't understand why you wouldn't have done that and then filled it in it would costed you about 100 dollars total they even used rubber couplings that's so easy jeesh you got suckered

[@MillennialRick]

@@nooneson1 You bet I did.

[@IsaacConejo]

I'm going to guess because you did not stagger that pit you actively did exactly what you shouldn't. So it caved. . Now I'm going to watch the rest of the video

[@MillennialRick]

@@IsaacConejo go for it.

[@mp-xt2rg]

If you were willing to dig down 7ft why didn't you just replace the pipe yourself? That's job would have only cost a couple hundred bucks.

[@MillennialRick]

@@mp-xt2rg Good Question, I could have ordered my own backflow valve and clean out. I would just have to make sure I have good slope and no bowing of the pipe after install. Lesson learned...

[@igfoobar]

A more experienced DIY would have rented an excavator and dug out the whole pipe from the house to the street.

[@arthouston7361]

Many municipalities make you hire a contractor that they have approved to make connections to the main. Where I am in SE Pennsylvania, I can dig as far as the street vent. The final lateral must be connected by the contractor that will charge about $10k for the connection replacement.