Washington · Open territory
Sewer Pipe Lining in Washington
Western Washington's sewer laterals sit in glacial till under forty inches of rain a year, with side sewers that run long and steep down the hills of Seattle and Tacoma and a city that makes the owner responsible for the pipe all the way to the main. This page covers what fails in Washington lines from Puget Sound to Spokane, who owns the side sewer, and how it gets rebuilt without a trench.
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What is in the ground in Washington
The median Washington home dates from around 1980, but Seattle, Tacoma, Spokane, Everett, Bellingham and Olympia were built out between 1890 and 1940 on vitrified clay and concrete side sewers, as Washington calls the lateral, with a joint every few feet, laid long and often shared, and draining in Seattle and Spokane to combined sewers that still serve the older districts. The postwar rings that filled north Seattle, West Seattle, Shoreline, Burien, Lakewood, Spokane's South Hill and the first Bellevue and Kent subdivisions used concrete pipe, clay and a good deal of Orangeburg fiber pipe through the 1950s and 1960s, with cast iron under every basement and in every crawl space; concrete side sewers are a particular Puget Sound legacy, and they open at the joints and erode at the invert. Basements and daylight basements are common on the region's slopes, so the side sewer leaves low and runs downhill a long way. Houses built since the mid-1970s have PVC and ABS side sewers that fail at a fitting or where a slope has crept. Much of the state outside the cities is on septic, governed by the county health districts.
Soil, water and weather
Puget Sound sits on glacial till, dense, stony and poorly drained, over sand, gravel and clay deposits that slide when saturated; the region's hillsides, from Magnolia and West Seattle to Tacoma's North End and the Bellevue slopes, creep and occasionally fail outright, and a side sewer on one of them is sheared or bellied by the ground moving beneath it. Forty inches of rain, nearly all of it between October and April, keeps the ground saturated for half the year, so groundwater infiltrates every open joint continuously and inflow and infiltration is the region's chronic sewer problem; King County's and Seattle's combined-sewer overflow orders, and the side-sewer rules written around them, follow from that. The frost line is shallow west of the Cascades and three feet or more in Spokane and the east, where the ground is basalt and glacial outwash and a trench is often a rock job. Roots from the bigleaf maples, Douglas firs, cedars and the ornamental cherries and plums planted along every older street fill clay and concrete joints year-round.
What shows up on Washington camera inspections
- Roots from bigleaf maples, firs, cedars and ornamental cherries in the joints of clay and concrete side sewers across Seattle, Tacoma, Spokane and Everett
- Concrete side sewers eroded at the invert and open at the joints, a Puget Sound specialty
- Side sewers sheared or bellied by creeping, saturated hillsides from Magnolia to Tacoma's North End
- Orangeburg fiber pipe collapsing under 1950s-60s subdivisions in north Seattle, Shoreline, Burien, Lakewood and the Eastside
- Year-round groundwater infiltration through open joints and the inflow-and-infiltration enforcement that follows
- Shared side sewers where one owner's repair involves the neighbors, and a city permit and inspection regime around every one
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.
Sewer Pipe Lining (CIPP)
A resin-saturated liner cured inside the old sewer becomes a jointless new pipe, installed from a cleanout or manhole with nothing dug up.
Best for: Root-filled clay joints, scaled cast iron under a slab, cracked concrete or Orangeburg that still holds its shape, and any line under hardscape, a building or a mature tree.
Pipe Bursting
A bursting head splits the old pipe underground and pulls a new fused polyethylene line in behind it, between two small pits.
Best for: Crushed, deformed or collapsed pipe, severe offsets, undersized lines that need a larger diameter, and Orangeburg that has gone oval.
Sectional Point Repair
A short liner, two to twelve feet long, cured over one defect, leaving the sound pipe on either side alone.
Best for: One cracked joint, one offset, one root intrusion or one leaking connection in an otherwise sound line.
Storm Drain Lining
Cured-in-place and spin-cast lining for corrugated metal, concrete and clay storm pipe, culverts and roof drains, without closing the road or the parking lot.
Best for: Corrugated metal pipe rusted through at the invert, concrete storm lines with open joints, roof drains and parking lot drainage under slabs.
Who owns the pipe, and who issues the permit
In Seattle the property owner owns and maintains the side sewer all the way from the building to the public main, which includes the run under the planting strip and street, and any work on it requires a Seattle Public Utilities side-sewer permit, a contractor registered with SPU for side-sewer work, and an SPU inspection; shared side sewers, which are common in older neighborhoods, involve every owner connected to them. Tacoma, Spokane, Everett, Bellevue, King County's sewer districts and the other Puget Sound cities follow the same principle, with their own permit and inspection requirements. A pit in the right-of-way needs a street-use permit from the city; the Utility Notification Center, 811, must be called before any excavation; and lining is accepted by SPU and most districts provided the connection at the main is shown on video. Where the property is on septic, the county health district governs instead. Lining from the cleanout avoids the long, deep trench down a saturated hillside.
Finding a lining contractor in Washington
Washington does not yet have a verified installer listed on this site, which is why the number on this page rings the national line. Call it or send the form with the property address and what the camera or the symptoms are showing, and we will locate a qualified trenchless contractor near you and make the introduction; there is no charge for that. If you are a Washington lining contractor with five or more years in business and a strong Google rating, the territory is open: apply to be listed.
Estimates are free. Call now. (855) 804-1434
Where lining is in demand across Washington
The pipe problems described above are concentrated in the older cities and the postwar suburbs around them. The communities below are the ones Washington property owners ask about most, and the same methods apply everywhere in between.
A straight answer about your Washington sewer line
A Washington side sewer is long, often shared, usually deep at the street and frequently on a slope, which is why lining is the default here whenever the camera finds a pipe that still holds its shape. Clay or concrete with roots at every joint usually does; a line sheared by a moving hillside or Orangeburg gone oval does not. The inspection locates each defect from above with its depth and the recording is yours. The scope arrives in writing and spells out the method, the length of pipe involved, the cost and the reasoning behind rejecting the alternatives.
Estimates are free. Call now. (855) 804-1434
How a job runs
Camera first. Always.
A sewer quote given without video is a guess, and guesses are how homeowners end up paying for a liner that was never going to fix the problem. Here's the sequence we follow on every job.
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Step 1
Camera inspection, recorded
A self-leveling camera runs the full line from the cleanout, manhole or roof drain to the main. Every crack, offset, root mass, belly and connection is logged with its distance, and a locator marks each one on the surface with its depth. You get the recording.
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Step 2
Cleaning to bare wall
A hydro jetter, with chain cutters or a descaler where cast iron or roots call for them, strips the pipe to its original surface. The camera goes through again afterward, because a cleaned pipe tells the truth about its condition in a way a dirty one cannot.
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Step 3
A written scope, with the alternatives
The scope names the method, the footage and diameter involved, the price, the permits and inspections that apply, and the reasons the other methods were set aside. When the right answer is a dig, the scope says so.
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Step 4
Permits and notifications
The installer pulls the plumbing permit, any right-of-way or sewer-authority permit, schedules the inspections the local authority requires and files the utility-locate ticket before anything is opened.
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Step 5
The work, usually in a day
A residential liner typically cures in a few hours; bursting a lateral takes a day or two; a building or municipal reach is phased so no one loses their drains for more than a night. Branch lines are reinstated with a robotic cutter.
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Step 6
Final video, with you watching
The camera goes back through the finished pipe. You see the new interior end to end, and the recording goes in your file along with the warranty and the permit sign-offs.