Sewer Pipe Lining

A new pipe built inside the old one

Cured-in-place pipe, CIPP, is what most people mean when they say trenchless. Instead of removing a failing sewer, the installer builds a new one inside it. The new pipe starts as a flexible tube, usually polyester felt, sometimes fiberglass, that is saturated with a two-part resin, epoxy, polyester or vinyl ester, on site or in a plant. The tube is fed into the existing line through a cleanout, a manhole or a small access pit, inflated with air or water so it presses tight against the old pipe wall, and cured until the resin hardens into a rigid shell. The old clay, cast iron, concrete, Orangeburg or corrugated metal becomes a mold. What remains in service is the liner: one continuous piece from end to end, no joints for roots to find, no cracks for groundwater to enter, and a smoother interior than the pipe it replaced.

What it fixes

Lining answers the most common sewer failure, which is a pipe that still holds its shape but no longer holds water. Vitrified clay that has opened at every bell joint and filled with roots lines beautifully; the roots are cut out, the joints are sealed under the liner, and they do not come back. Cast iron that has scaled rough and narrow, and pitted along the bottom, is descaled and lined, which restores both the capacity and the integrity. Orangeburg fiber pipe, used in subdivisions from the 1940s to the early 1970s and now at the end of its life everywhere it was laid, can be lined as long as it has not yet deformed. Concrete storm and sanitary pipe with open joints and an eroded invert, and corrugated metal rusted through at the bottom, take a liner that becomes the structural pipe. A liner also rebuilds a pipe that has cracked longitudinally, as long as the pieces are still in place.

What it will not fix

A liner follows the pipe exactly, and that is its limit. If the old line has a belly, a low section that holds standing water, the liner will have the same belly. If a joint has stepped sideways by more than the liner can bridge, the liner will narrow there. If a section has collapsed or been crushed under a driveway, the tube cannot pass through at all. In each of those cases the right answer is pipe bursting, a point repair where the problem is a single spot, or an open-cut replacement of the bad section, and a reputable installer says so on the camera footage before quoting. A liner cured over a belly is an expensive way to keep the same clog.

How a lining job goes

1. Camera and locate. The full line is recorded, and every defect is marked on the surface with its depth. Footage from a home inspection or a utility survey works too.
2. Cleaning. A hydro jetter and, where needed, chain cutters or a descaler strip roots, grease, sand and scale down to bare pipe wall. A liner has to bond to clean material, and the second camera pass after cleaning is often what settles the scope.
3. Measuring and wet-out. The tube is cut to the exact length of the run and the resin is mixed and worked into it, by hand and roller on a residential job, under vacuum in a plant for larger diameters.
4. Installation. The saturated liner is inverted with air or water pressure, turning inside out as it travels down the pipe, or pulled in with a winch and then inflated with a calibration tube.
5. Curing. Depending on the resin, the liner hardens with ambient heat, hot water, steam or ultraviolet light. A residential lateral usually cures in a few hours; a municipal reach takes longer and is scheduled around bypass pumping.
6. Reinstating branches. A robotic cutter, guided by camera, reopens every branch line the liner covered: a kitchen drain joining the main run, or a hundred house laterals along a city main.
7. Final video. The camera goes back through the finished pipe, and the recording goes in the file with the warranty.

Lining compared with the alternatives

Against open-cut replacement, lining wins on nearly every count except one: it cannot change the pipe's route or correct its slope. It costs less once concrete, paving, landscaping, shoring and permits are counted, it finishes in a day rather than a week, and it leaves the surface alone. Against bursting it is less invasive and usually cheaper, but bursting handles crushed and deformed pipe that lining cannot, and bursting can upsize. Against a point repair it costs more up front and fixes more, since a point repair addresses one defect and a liner addresses the whole run. The camera decides, and many lines get a combination: a full liner with a point repair at the one spot where the pipe stepped, or a burst through the collapsed section and a liner through the rest.

Epoxy coating versus a structural liner

Two things are sold as pipe lining and they are not the same. A cured-in-place liner is a structural pipe: it has its own wall thickness, calculated for the loads, and stands on its own if the host pipe falls away. A sprayed or brush-applied epoxy coating is a thin layer that seals pinholes and stops corrosion on a pipe that still has its strength; it is the right tool for two-inch branch lines and small-diameter cast iron under a slab, and the wrong tool for a lateral with open joints. Ask which one is being proposed and why.

What drives the price

Residential lining is priced by the foot and by difficulty: diameter, depth, access, the number of branch connections to reinstate, how much cleaning the pipe needs and what the utility requires by way of permits and inspection. Commercial and municipal lining is bid per foot by diameter with cleaning, bypass pumping, reinstatements and testing itemized. In every case the comparison that matters is with the alternative, and on a line under a slab, a street, a parking lot or a mature tree, the trench nearly always loses. No one can price a line responsibly without a camera through it.

Longevity and warranty

Liner manufacturers rate their products for a 50-year design life, and the first CIPP installations from the 1970s are still in service. Installer warranties vary by contractor and by job; residential lining from the installers listed on this site commonly carries a multi-year to 25-year warranty, and the written warranty delivered with the job is the one that governs. For a homeowner the practical meaning is that roots stop coming back every spring and the next buyer's sewer scope comes up clean. For a utility it is a main that stops leaking groundwater into a system that was overflowing because of it.

Getting a straight answer

No one should quote a liner over the phone, because no one knows what is in your pipe until a camera has been through it. The inspection comes first, the footage is reviewed with you, and the recommendation follows from what it shows. Your state page explains what is likely in the ground where you are and whether a verified installer is listed; if none is, the national line locates one for you.

Estimates are free. Call now. (855) 804-1434