Pipe and Sewer Drain Replacement How To

Pipes and sewers drains are some of the most important parts of any building. It is through these pipes and sewer drains that wastewater get sent out from the building so that you and everyone else don’t get sick because of contamination or pollution.

Pipes normally last 30 to 50 years, depending on what materials have been used in the plumbing. Therefore, it is important that you know a few basic concepts about your pipes, so you are better prepared to take care of them.

Here’s a list of different types of pipes and how long they typically last under normal circumstances:

Galvanized Steel Pipes

These types of pipes can last you a lifetime or about 80-100 years.

Copper

The copper types, on the other hand, can last 70-80 years. Not so bad, too, as long as you pay careful attention as to when something goes wrong due to some unexpected circumstances like tree roots getting into the sewer lines and breaking the pipes.

Brass

This can also last a minimum of 80 years and maximum of 100 years just like galvanized steel but may differ in pricing.

Repairing and Replacing Pipes and Sewer Lines

Now that you have an idea of how long pipes last before replacement, it is also time to tell you a little bit about how we repair or replace your damaged or old pipe and sewer drain.

At The Pipeshark, we have three options that we offer to our customers in terms of pipe repair and replacement. These are pipe bursting, pipe lining, and pipe boring.

Although each of these methods have limitations, they are far better than the traditional method, which requires a lot of damage, often leaving your lawn or pathway in a mess. Let us take a look at these three options.

What is pipe bursting?

Our pipe bursting method of replacement does not require the digging of trenches in order to get the old pipe out and put the new pipe in. We use the trenchless technology method where we can replace the pipe underground by simply having an insertion pit on one end and a receiving pit on the other end.

We then use a tool that allows us to break the old pipe underground and replace it with a new pipe through the insertion and receiving ends.

What is pipe lining?

From the word itself, pipe lining means creating new lining within the old pipe underground using epoxy forming a hardened shell inside afterwards. The epoxy is the final touch in pipe lining. Before that, we first need to make sure the pipe is clean since it’s going to serve as the host of the lining.

What is pipe boring?

We only use this when we need to make new pipes. So the process is to drill a hole wide enough to let the new pipe in. It does not require digging a whole trench to find the sewer drain or create trenches.

At The Pipeshark, we are proud to say that we are the only plumbing company within Philadelphia that has all three technologies. We are well-trained and well-experienced at using these machines that even some of the plumbing companies rely on our expertise to help their customers.