fitting plastic adaptor to 6" clay socket

[elmsoft]

Below my (Victorian era) house is a clay soil pipe connection , long disused. I have bought an adaptor which looks as though it should fit right inside the pipe with the surrounding disk hard against the shoulder of the socket and making a seal. I'm reluctant to use force and the adaptor won't easily fit inside the clay pipe. Can I tap it home?

 

[Hugh Jaleak]

Not sure what adaptor you have, but it should be a snug (watertight!) fit. I'd be wary of tapping anything home into a pipe of that vintage, they can be extremely fragile, and you may run the risk of cracking the entire pipe along it's length..... I'd look at using a Fernco type connector on the outside of the pipe if at all unsure.

McAlpine do a 4" connector, (similar to a pan connector but accepts 110mm plastic in the other end), which should fit ok. I would hazard a guess you have a 4" clay pipe, 6" would be used on a run where a number of properties are connected.

I would also suugest it may be wise to get the pipe CCTV surveyed before connecting up, unless you are confident of it's condition downstream. Possible it could be cracked/full of roots/collapsed, especially if it's been left redundant for some time.