Sewer Pipe Lining in California

What is in the ground in California

The median California home dates from the mid-1970s, but the state's cities grew in waves and each wave left a different pipe. The pre-1940 neighborhoods of Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland, Sacramento and San Diego drain through vitrified clay laid in two- and three-foot lengths with a bell joint at each one, and in San Francisco and parts of Oakland through clay that is now well past a century old. The vast postwar tracts of the Los Angeles basin, Orange County, the Santa Clara Valley and the San Fernando Valley were built on slabs, with cast iron branch drains under the floor and clay or, in a number of mid-century subdivisions, Orangeburg fiber pipe running to the street. From the mid-1970s the laterals turned to ABS and PVC, which is what sits under Irvine, the Inland Empire tracts, the South Bay and most of what has been built since. Each fails on its own schedule: clay opens at the joints and fills with roots from the ficus, pepper, sycamore and liquidambar planted along the streets; cast iron scales rough and narrow then thins along the bottom; Orangeburg goes oval; and plastic cracks at a single fitting or settles into a belly where fill compacted under a hillside pad. The work follows the pipe, and in California the pipe usually runs under fifty years of driveways, patios, pool decks and additions, which is why a trench here is mostly the cost of putting back what was on top of it.

Soil, water and weather

Three landscapes decide how a repair goes. Along the coast, from the Marina district to Huntington Beach and the Newport peninsula, pipe sits in sand with groundwater a few feet down, sometimes rising and falling with the tide; open joints take in sand and water, excavations need pumping, and lining from the cleanout avoids both. Across the valleys, the Los Angeles basin, the Santa Clara Valley, the Central Valley around Sacramento, Fresno and Bakersfield, the soil is deep alluvium, laterals are shallow and straight, and the state maps liquefaction zones wherever groundwater is close to the surface. In the hills, from the Oakland and Berkeley hills to the Santa Monica Mountains, the Puente Hills and the San Joaquin Hills of Orange County, houses sit on pads cut and filled into expansive clay and old landslide deposits, and plastic laterals there fail at one fitting or belly where the fill moved. California does not freeze at the elevations where most people live, but it does have earthquakes, and the state's seismic hazard maps are a good guide to where a camera will find offsets in otherwise sound pipe.

What shows up on California camera inspections

• Roots from mature street trees in the open bells of pre-1960 clay laterals from the Bay Area to San Diego
• Cast iron rusted rough and narrow under postwar slabs, worst within a few miles of the coast
• Orangeburg fiber pipe gone oval under 1950s and 1960s tracts in the Valley, the East Bay and Orange County
• Cracked fittings, offsets and bellies in plastic laterals on hillside pads and settled fill
• Sand and tidal groundwater entering open joints along the coast, from the Marina to the Newport peninsula
• Escrow sewer scopes turning up defects on a deadline, and point-of-sale lateral ordinances in the East Bay and elsewhere

Which trenchless method fits

The camera decides. A line that still holds its shape is a lining job; a line that has been crushed, has lost its slope or has collapsed is a replacement job; a single bad joint in an otherwise sound run is a spot repair. Here is what each one does and where it stops being the right tool.

Who owns the pipe, and who issues the permit

Who owns the pipe under the street is the first question on any California sewer job, and the answer changes at city limits. Most cities and sanitation districts hold the owner responsible for the lateral all the way to the public main, including the portion under the sidewalk and street; Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose, Sacramento and most of Orange County work that way. A minority maintain the lower lateral from the property line or the curb to the main themselves, among them San Francisco for the portion in the right-of-way, Huntington Beach and the Irvine Ranch Water District in Orange County, and several East Bay cities. A growing number of jurisdictions, particularly in the East Bay under the EBMUD regional private sewer lateral program and in cities with their own ordinances, require a lateral inspection and certificate at the point of sale, which is why escrow sewer scopes have become routine on pre-1980 houses. The work itself takes a plumbing permit from the city; a pit in the right-of-way takes an encroachment permit from public works; many districts add a sewer permit and an inspection at the connection; and California law requires a DigAlert ticket before any digging. A licensed contractor with a C-36 plumbing or C-42 sanitation classification handles the filings.

Lining crews in California

Lining, bursting and spot repairs in California are performed by trenchless sewer repair crews based in Orange County, covering all of Southern California, with crews traveling to the Central Coast and Bay Area for lining projects. Their lining work carries a 25-year warranty on lining work. They are listed in the CIPP Verified Installer directory, which means licensing, completed work and lining equipment were checked before the listing went live.

Estimates are free. Call now. (877) 759-5082

Where lining is in demand across California

The pipe problems described above are concentrated in the older cities and the postwar suburbs around them. The communities below are the ones California property owners ask about most, and the same methods apply everywhere in between.

A straight answer about your California sewer line

No price is quoted here until a camera has recorded the line end to end and the defects have been marked on the surface with their depth. You see the footage with the installer, and the scope you receive names the method, the length of pipe involved and why the other options were ruled out. When the answer is a dig, because a belly or a collapse cannot be fixed from inside, the scope says that too. Finding out before the work beats finding out after a liner has cured over the problem.

Estimates are free. Call now. (877) 759-5082