Just had mine pumped out the Saturday before Christmas.
I had to work so I could not be at home to watch the guy pump it.
Our pit is about 3 1/2 Ft. inside Diameter and approximately 8 Ft deep.

Saturday (just 2 weeks after it was pumped it over flowed.
The guy said that the system failed.

I made them come out and pump it again today while I watched and inspected the pit.

He told me to my face that the system has failed. And then told me that the company he worked for could come and rebuild it.

I told him I would build it myself.

My question is if the walls have not caved in and after he pumped it we had Cristal clear water seeping back into the pit from the gravel behind the walls in several spots and in 1 spot down about 2 Ft off the bottom running like a hose was running full bore.

Would you guys that know about leach pits consider the system to have failed.

I plan on inspecting it several times tomorrow to see if the water level drops in the bottom before we start turding it up.

If you guys think it has failed then I want to start rebuilding it before we fill it up with crap again.

Any advice.

Laterals are full/plugged. Call pro. Lots of regulations these days and fo vary area to area .

if the drain field runs back in after you pumped it then that means that the drain field is not perking into the ground. they will back drain some but it shouldn't be a lot. do you have a distribution box in the field or anywhere you could pump it out?

Nothing a quarter-stick won't fix after it fills back up...

Be a lot of schit flying around.........

sounds like you need a new one, but as stated best to check with local sanitarians. most of the time they will steer you right. when in doubt check with the state guys. or just do it yourself and don't get caught.

It is pumped out right now just the back flow in the pit.
I built one about five years ago on the other side of my home after I hired a guy to do it and supplied him with all of the proper stuff
to build it for me and he loaded my supply's up and took them for him self and used french pipe for the main in feed to the pit.
3 years latter I built my own after his caved in completely.

I do not care about Regulations at this point in my life.

I will build it proper and one that will not fail for the rest of my life.

I am a Construction inspector and I have seen a lot of things over my 28+ years of doing my job and have come to the conclusion that any Contractor that I can afford to pay to do the job will not do it proper. I do not have the money to hire a good one. So I do it myself.

I know the places to buy the concrete perforated pit rings and I can transport and place them my self I also have a half of a pallet of septic block left over from my other pit to level the top before I pour a Concrete top so that it will not cave in after years of walking or driving over it.

a properly designed leach field is important, it isn't hard to do. lots of info on the web for it.

Thought this was about n I gg ers living in housing projects at 1st.

True enough , how ever the soil type , type at depth , and amount of slope . Can /will change the ,"type" and footage of field. I've installed in the 1000's of home systems . Been a licensed installer for nearly 30 years .

Saw that bifore

Anyone got some Dynamite I can use.

Sure make my job easier.

Wouldn't need shoring and would save a whole lot of back breakin shovelin

Thanks for that Haven't seen this fir years.

Great for a good laugh.

Your pit is not the problem.

I have loose sand over a whole lota boulders. Drains like there is nothing stopping the water when it drys out

I stopped diggin at around 4 1/2 to 5 feet on the one I built 5 years ago cus I could not get the very large boulders out of the bottom of the hole. It made for a good floor for the pit. after 5 years of use the 4' X 4 1/2' oval pit was not even half full according to my girlfriends son who helped me with the dig and the build of it.

I put a 5" thick reinforced concrete lid on it with a good sized pump hole covered with a 16" sq. step stone for the cap and a small metal Bird bath on top as a marker so we know where it is located when we need to pump it out.

The rebuild of this one will be easier because the hole is still intact.

I will just need to shore it up as we dig down to the bottom and pull the shoring as we back fill with gravel.

Thanks guys for the advise. I will look up on some proper designs and engineering.
Just before I built my 1st one I watched the pros. do my neighbors No real engineering just used a backhoe to dig the hole , dropped the rigs in and back filled with 3/4" gravel and there was not much room between the hole and the rings due to the sandy ground conditions.

My home was built in 1942 and I would bet that this pit was the first leach pit this house ever seen so I guess it lived it's life.

OK I just looked up what I have.

It is a Seepage pit with no Septic tank.

My girlfriend does not want me to dig it up and make a new one.

The pumper said that I could install a leach line but in our ground even backhoes have a hard time digging.

Do you think I should leave the pit intact and just install the leach line.
It would have to go right down the middle of my driveway if I install the line.
The driveway right now is just about shot any ways and I have been thinking about pavers for a new driveway.

Any more advice.
I appreciate what has been given to me already.

I am not at all familiar with the type of system you describe. All septics in this area are tanks or two tanks and some sort of a drain field depending on terrain and soil types. I've never dug up or seen a pit that leeches right out of the pit as you describe so I have no real help to you that's why I encourage you to talk to one of your local professionals in your area , I would not be surprised at the type of system you are talking about is no longer legal even in your area but I do not know that for sure.

When I watched the Pro's do my neighbors I thought the same thing.
This can not be legal in my opinion.
I talked to the backhoe operator and he was the one who came over and told me that my pit had failed (the first one that I built to replace)
They put it in my neighbors front yard and let a disaster of boulders and rock everywhere for my neighbor to clean up.
the pit was about 20 feet deep with gravel placed around the concrete rings to keep the natural sand from seeping into the pit.

The County has started installing Sewage lines and every time they start they do not even get a full street completed before they give up on the job.
The ground is that bad with boulders. it destroys the best of equipment so I hand dig everything and it takes a lot of time and an A frame with a 2 ton hoist to pull the boulders out as I go. Not Fun work.
I bent the legs on my A Frame the last time I was pulling boulders in my back yard.

Sounds like they need to learn what a ",Hammer" or rock breaker is. , Good luck in getting fixed up .

If you have an old-style leach pit (no septic tank, no baffles,no laterals) and clear water is coming in thru the walls after pumping you have significant problems.

Leach pits are ancient - you must have a very old house or whoever put it in originally really took some major shortcuts. I've only seen them in 1930s or older houses. Maybe rural areas into the '40s.

They have to be above the groundwater level to work properly. If water is coming in thru the walls it isn't above groundwater level. If your household waste can't "leach" out, it will never work properly. And it can't leach out if water runs in!

Has some project or construction or landscaping happened that could change local drainage (either surface or underground)? Anybody dammed a stream or built a pond nearby? Road construction? New house built with significant cut or fill?

Adding laterals might help temporarily, but I wouldn't count in them in the long run. Leach pits lack the sludge and scum baffling that septic tanks have, and eventually that stuff will get in the laterals and plug them.

If the bottom of your current pit is actually below the groundwater level you may not even have enough depth to put in a proper tank/leach field system, or may have to go to a "mounded" system where fill is added to give you more unsaturated soil depth.

If the groundwater level is a seasonal problem your cheapest route may be fix as well as you can and treat it like a holding tank during the wet season, with regular and frequent pump outs!

Another little bit of help might be to divert your laundry "greywater" waste to a different drain if it currently goes to the leach pit. I've seen washing machines go to "french drains", buried slotted pipes - doesn't meet code in many areas, but neither do leach pits! Same for basement sump pumps if you have one - usually not a code issue for sumps.

If you have a garbage disposal rip that sucker out right away and think composting!

I have watched this a number of times and it still brings tears to my eyes laughing!

you have what we call a cesspool around here. basically just a hole that everything goes into without a leach field. if it was me, i'd put in a tank of some sorts, either concrete or poly, with baffles on the outboard line. then i'd dig a ditch about 3 feet deep, 2 feet wide and at least 50 feet long. put 1 foot of 2b stone into the ditch and run perforated 4" pipe out of the tank and on top of the 2b and then cover it with another foot of 2b. then cover the 2b with a layer of geotextile fabric or tar paper and fill the rest in with dirt. ideally you would have maybe three of these ditches with a concrete distribution box between the tank and the ditches. but as was said above, a lot depends on your soil type. clay acts like a big bowl and holds the leachate in. thats why you want to spread the leach field across as big of an area as you can afford instead of making it like a round hole with stone in it.

That would be a proper fix but he wants to put it in his driveway so that won't work very well.

Our field drain has the infiltrator chambers, those plastic Quonset hut looking things. It's been in place for 22 years with no problems at all yet. They're very fast and easy to install. Just dig a flat bottomed trench and drop them in. I don't know if they're strong enough to put under a driveway, though. You'd have to check that out.

I guess I shouldn't say no problems at all, but not what you'd expect. My drain field is in a pasture that's sprinkler irrigated. I have to water extra over the drain field or the grass will dry out over the drain lines. Pasture grass roots go deep into the trenches and it gets too dry to stay green. The drain system works very well for it to get that dry down that deep.

Been doing some homework

Years back my Uncle told me about putting Lye in the system to break up the grease and soap build up.

He had 3 girls and a boy and was contently digging new pits in his back yard for the grey water.
His ground is solid Hard pan clay with no drainage to talk about. After he started adding the Lye his digging new holes stopped.

I am running an experiment for myself before I start digging my driveway up for a new leach field.

I put some Roebic Septic System Cleaner in the tank yesterday.

I know on the other topic about Tank additives that they do just about nothing but the grease and sludge are a different item in the pool than the Turds.

It has rained for a solid 24 hours starting yesterday night and the pit started filling up after I had it pumped to the bottom.

The sides of the of the pit looked like they were plastered brick with little drain openings.

in a bit when it clears up I am going to go inspect the pit and see if the Lye has done anything at all.

The product I put in says to let it sit for 24 hours before using it.

So my experiment has started and I expect I will have to add a couple more bottles of this stuff before the system will be functional again If I can get it functional.

A cheap fix and no hard work if it works on a system that was probably put in in the early 40s.

Thanks for all of your advice it got me investigating in the right direction

Measured the water level this morning and then just now.

This morning it was at 24" with water dripping in from all the rain we got yesterday. When I opened it up there was steam inside the pit.

Just now it was around 20" with water still dripping in from the rain yesterday. No steam this afternoon.


It can not be plugged up 100% if it is moving.

after we take showers tonight I am gunna dump another bottle of the stuff in and tomorrow afternoon when I get home I will check the level again.