Leaking and inaccessible soil pipe

[vegasgo]

Our soil pipe runs down the back of our house, in between ours and next door's extensions, basically meaning the pipe is inaccessible. About a foot from the ground it has split/cracked, quite a dischage whenever you flush the loo, have a shower etc, bit of a health hazard.

I hope we're covered by insurance (neighbour seems to think this happened before his extension was built and only a temporary repair was made), but we have to wait 2-3 working days before they get back to us to even arrange an inspection.

I guess the only way you can reach the split pipe is by knocking a hole through our (brick/breeze block) extention wall which obvioulsy is not ideal, unless anyone has any other suggestions? Ta.

 

[seco services]

your neighbour must be abit of a w***** then if here knew it was faulty then went and slapped an extension up without asking if the soilpipe was goning to get fixed first.

 

[Bahco]

You might need to relocate the soil pipe and reroute all the waste pipes which is likely to be rather expensive.

 

[bpowell555]

Less so if you do a bit of the digging yo'self

 

[vegasgo]

In fairness, my neighbour did consult the previous homeowner about getting a more permanent fix on the soil pipe before the extension went up, but he decided not to. I guess it lasted 10 years or more, but now we've got to fix it!

It's probably a job I can do myself, just don't want to knock too much of a whole through the wall - I guess about 1.5sq ft should be enough to get a decent amount space to work through to get access to the pipe, though next door's extention looks like its flush with the pipe so dunno if I'll be able to wrap bitumen tape right around it - or should I cut out a section of plastic pipe and gum it over the crack?

 

[seco services]

if you can put tape on the pipe you must be able to manage to change that section of pipe.

 

[twgas]

how about a skinny plumber?

 

[vegasgo]

Even the skiniest plumber in the world wouldn't be able to do the job. Reckon I'll only be able to work with one hand through the hole so little chance of changing the section of pipe!

 

[seco services]

is it a two storey extension or single ?

 

[vegasgo]

Single, so I think I should be ok to knock a hole through the wall without the whole thing falling down.

 

[seco services]

can you get on the roof of the extension and hold the soil pipe at roof height

 

[vegasgo]

Yes I can but the leak is about 1ft off the ground so being able to access it at roof height isn't much use.

 

[vegasgo]

If I were to repair the leak with bitumen tape then brick up between the extensions above the leak level and fill with concrete, I guess that would be pretty solid?

 

[seco services]

if you can reach it from the roof and manage to wrap tape round it, you can change that section off pipe by cutting it a roof level and someone pulling it out of the bottom socket.

 

[vegasgo]

Trouble is its an iron pipe with bolts attaching it to the wall (not reachable) and even if we got it off you've still got to go through the wall to secure it at the bottom.