How to thaw frozen pipes in a private house. How to defrost a frozen sewer pipe - ways and means How to clean a frozen sewer in a private house

To be honest, I'm a little surprised that someone's sewer can freeze. Sewer pipes, in principle, cannot freeze, there is nothing to freeze there, except for the pipes themselves. In order for ice to form in the sewer, several unfavorable factors or mistakes made in the process of arranging it must converge.

Possible causes and ways to eliminate them.

1. The most common reason. Drainage from the septic tank is disturbed Either the irrigation field is made insufficient for the normal drainage of the area, or the depth of laying drainage pipes too small for your region. In both cases, as a result of insufficient overflow of the septic tank, the water, entering the pipe leading to the septic tank, no longer moves further and freezes. New portions of warm drains are no longer able to warm up and defrost what was frozen before. In the end, you notice that the water does not go away. And she has nowhere to go.
To restore the sewerage in this case, you need to pump out the drains from the septic tank. And it will have to be pumped out periodically until spring or until the real cause of insufficient drainage is eliminated (in general, it will have to be redone or completed). And only after reducing the level of effluent in the septic tank, you can try to warm the sewer pipe.
Digging a pipe in winter is below average pleasure. A hair dryer can only help in an airy area, such as an underground or basement. It seems to me that in this case The best decision- it's a barrel hot water with pump and hose. It is better to start heating from the side of the septic tank, if, of course, this is possible with your septic tank, periodically pumping out drains from it.
2. Small water leaks, due to a current faucet or valve in the toilet bowl, do not have time to get to the warm septic tank, freezing on the way. Freezing layer by layer, block the free space of the sewer pipe.
As a rule, an ice plug in this case is formed only at the very beginning of the pipe and is easily warmed up with steep salty boiling water. Naturally, it is simply necessary to find and fix the leak in order to avoid a repetition of an unpleasant situation.
3. Insufficient slope and can lead to the same unpleasant situation, only in this case the water can freeze over a longer section. Such cases are especially common when the owner of the house lays a pipe with a diameter of 32 or 40 mm in the bathroom instead of a baseboard. Drafts that occur at the junction of the floor and the wall only speed up the process and aggravate the situation, threatening to burst the pipe.
In this case, it makes no sense to warm the entire pipe by any means, it is easier and faster to warm the junctions of pipes and fittings with the same hair dryer and disassemble the entire circuit, starting from the transition to the underground. And then melt the ice with any convenient way. I strongly recommend that during the subsequent restoration of the sewerage scheme, give the pipes the maximum possible slope in your situation.
And finally, a little advice. In severe frosts outside, do not turn on the flow of water through the tap in a thin stream. In this case, you yourself provoke the freezing of water in the sewer pipes and do not really save the water pipes, where freezing comes from the walls. It is better to periodically spill some amount of water with normal pressure, completely replacing the volume of water in the supply pipes. And try to avoid drafts. Not only people are afraid of drafts, but also pipes, and any.

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If the question is being decided how to warm up a frozen sewer pipe underground, all available methods are considered. An ice plug is formed if errors were made during installation: the slope of communications was not observed, the diameter of the pipeline was not large enough, etc. In areas with a harsh climate, thermal insulation is necessary. When these conditions are not met, sooner or later you will have to decide what to do if the sewer is frozen. At the same time, it is important to maintain the integrity of communications.

frozen sewage pipe

Common causes:

Insufficient slope of sewer pipes. In this case, the speed of movement of effluents is low, which is why the liquid freezes faster.
Small diameter sewer pipes from the inside. At the same time, the movement of water slows down.
A leak has formed. In this area, the liquid freezes more intensively, ice contributes to an increase in the area of deformation of communications.
A small amount of water flows through the pipes. Due to the low speed of advancement, the drains freeze.
Lack of insulation, which is especially dangerous in areas with a harsh climate.
Violation of installation requirements. At the same time, communications are not laid deep enough - above the level of soil freezing.
Blockage formation.

If the liquid in the sewer pipes is frozen from the inside, consider different methods based on the use of heat sources. It can be a soldering iron, hot water. An effective option is based on the use of wires for heating pipes.

Defrost methods

When choosing the appropriate method, 2 factors are taken into account:

freezing place;
the length of the pipeline, with a significant length, it is more difficult to solve the problem, since it is often difficult to provide access to an icy area, it is also not always possible to detect it in this case.

An effective method is to flush the system hot water. It is effective provided that the ice plug has formed near the drain. Salt is added to the water to speed up the process. Then you can warm up the system quickly. If the pipeline is characterized by a large length, as the effluent moves, the temperature of the liquid drops, which reduces the effectiveness of the method.

More efficient ways:

A metal pipe can be heated with a soldering iron. To get to the communications, you need to dig a trench. In winter, this is difficult to do, because the soil is hard. This means that this task will require a lot of effort. In addition, if the pipeline differs in significant length, the amount of work will increase. A soldering iron warms up communications along the entire length. Plastic products won't survive direct impact open fire.
Electrical heating. This is outdoor method to clear the ice block. For its implementation, terminals are used. They are fixed along the edges of the emergency section, voltage is applied. In this case, the metal pipeline is heated, heat is transferred to the frozen liquid. In a short period of time, the ice plug disappears.
Chemical method. Special reagents are used. The method has more disadvantages than advantages. For example, there is low efficiency. This is due to the fact that as the effluents move, the water with the reagents cools down. In addition, the concentration chemical substances decreases. This method helps clear thin ice, but it takes a lot longer to clear an ice block.
U-shaped heater. Thanks to this form metal elements do not allow the entire structure to get stuck inside the pipeline. The heater is connected to insulated wires. Its size must be less than the internal diameter of the pipeline. The design is brought inside the communications, advanced towards the blockage. Then they connect to the network. Warming up is fast. This method is suitable for removing ice plugs in metal pipes. To implement it, you need to prepare a cable of sufficient length, preferably with a margin.
Hose with flexible wire. Homemade construction also enters the pipeline. Thanks to the hose, hot water is delivered directly to the place where the ice plug forms.
Boiler small size. It is brought into the pipeline for heating water directly in the area where icing has occurred. This method also suitable for metal communications.
Heating cable. It is applied to a frozen pipe, connected to the network. The disadvantage of this method is the need to dig a trench.

How to warm up plastic sewer pipes?

The main requirement is to avoid direct exposure to high temperatures. To warm up a plastic pipe, consider the following methods:

Use of a steam generator. This option is the most effective, because it provides the desired result quickly, without having to spend a lot of effort. A steam pipeline is inserted into the pipe, the equipment is turned on, and the ice plug begins to warm up. The advantage of this option is that there is no need to dig a trench to get to the pipeline. However, the steam line is long enough to break the ice plug that has formed near the drain. The disadvantage of this method is the need to purchase special equipment.
The use of a heat gun. To implement the method, you will have to dig a trench. The device is directed to the icy pipeline. The defrosting rate is high. However, it is not recommended to influence communications with powerful equipment, since the temperature of exposure to the plastic pipeline rises.

To heat the sewer, you can use any heating devices, for example building hair dryer. The exception is devices that produce open fire. During the heating process, insulating materials must be used.

How to prevent freezing of the sewer?

As preventive measure periodically flush the system with hot water. It is necessary to drain large volumes of liquid. If the street keeps low temperature, the system is flushed regularly until warming occurs. Along with heating the sewer pipes, other preventive measures should be taken:

It is necessary to lay communications below the level of soil freezing. AT different regions the climate is different. Accordingly, the boundary of soil freezing may be different. If this factor is taken into account when laying the pipeline, the system will continue to function even in severe frosts. In those situations where the sewer has already been installed, and the owner is faced with the problem of freezing in the first winter, it is recommended to dismantle it in the spring, deepen the trench along the entire length of the pipeline and install communications at the required level.
To prevent freezing, the pipes are insulated with special materials. In this case, non-hygroscopic coatings are used, which are characterized by low thermal conductivity. This method will not help when laying communications too close to the soil surface. To avoid freezing of pipes, it is necessary to apply thermal insulation materials desired thickness.
Used communications should be characterized by a sufficient diameter. During installation, it is necessary to control the slope of the sewer.
Heated sewer pipes. In this case, a heating cable is used. With a strong decrease in air temperature, it is regularly connected to the network.

Self-heating cable as a way to prevent sewer freezing

Various types are used:

resistor;
self-adjusting.

In the first case, the cable is characterized by constant resistance along its entire length, which ensures uniform heating of the sewer. As a result, the likelihood of pipe freezing is significantly reduced. It is only important to connect the cable to the network in a timely manner. The disadvantage of this method is the increase in energy costs.

If it is not possible to constantly control the temperature of the pipeline, there is a need for a self-regulating cable. It changes its conductive properties depending on the conditions. When the water cools significantly, the cable starts heating. Upon reaching desired value temperature, it turns off. Installation instructions:

the surface of the pipe is cleaned;
the heating cable is laid: in turns (with a certain step) or along the pipe (2 cores are laid on both sides of the communications);
from above, the structure is covered with heat-insulating material;
the ends of the cable are connected to the shield.

After the preparation of communications, laying in the ground is carried out.

Sewer pipes, unlike water pipes, rarely freeze. After all, the drains do not stand in them, but move towards the sump, in addition, the wastewater at the exit from the house has room (or even higher) temperature. So, in order for the sewerage system to freeze on the site, it is necessary that several unfavorable factors or mistakes that were made during the design or installation come together. If the sewer is frozen, what to do in this case?

If the sewage system in a private house is frozen, then in this situation it becomes impossible to use water. Therefore, it is necessary to eliminate the plug in the sewer pipeline as soon as possible.

Moreover, before defrosting the sewer, it does not hurt to find out what caused such an accident and, if possible, immediately eliminate it. Since, if this is not done, then freezing will be repeated.

Causes of ice formation in pipes

In most cases, the reason that the sewer pipe in a private house has frozen is errors during the installation of the system. An accident may also result in misuse sewerage. Here are the main reasons that can cause freezing:

Insufficient slope of the laid pipe or use of a pipe of a smaller diameter than necessary. Both of these errors lead to the fact that water with impurities moves with low speed, so when severe frosts the liquid will freeze. It should be noted that it is in these situations that the longest ice plugs often occur.
Drainage failure in septic tank. If the filtration area made for post-treatment is too small or the depth of the drainage pipes is insufficient, then the water will not leave the septic tank. Naturally, this will lead to its overflow, and the newly incoming water will linger in the pipes. In this case, to correct the situation, it will be necessary to pump out the contents of the septic tank, and repeat this operation periodically until the onset of warm weather, when it will be possible to re-equip the filtration fields.

blockage. The formation of a blockage can cause the owner of the house to have to puzzle over how to defrost a frozen sewer.
Small leaks. If a faucet or valve in the house is leaking cistern the toilet bowl does not hold water, then a small amount of water will constantly flow into the pipes. Due to an insignificant amount of water, it can freeze on the way to the septic tank and, freezing layer by layer, create an ice plug.

Advice! There is an opinion that in severe frosts, water should be let out of the tap in a thin stream so as not to freeze the water pipes. In fact, this should not be done. Water pipes this measure will not save (since freezing starts from the walls there), but it may well cause freezing of sewer pipes.

Pipe defrosting methods

After the cause of the accident has been clarified, you can begin to eliminate it. First of all, the scale of the "disaster" should be assessed, since this may affect the way the problem is solved, how to melt the ice in the sewers. Need to define:

Where is the water block located?
What is its approximate length.

Filling the system with hot water

When looking for an answer to the question of how to thaw the sewer, the easiest way to deal with ice blockages can help. To eliminate them, pour hot water with the addition of salt into the sewerage system. This way is good:

Simplicity
Efficiency in the event that a small plug is not located near the place where the sewer is taken out of the house. This method helps well if the water has frozen in the sewer riser.

Advice! If the plug is on long distance, then pouring boiling water into the system is useless, it will still cool down until it “gets” to the place of freezing.

Heating with a blowtorch

This method will help regardless of where the pipe is frozen. But since the pipeline is located underground, it will be necessary to dig a trench in order to carry out defrosting, which in winter time is definitely not an easy task.

In addition, use blowtorch it is possible if the pipeline is mounted from cast iron, and it is impossible to heat the plastic sewer in this way, since the pipes will simply melt.

Heating with steam

How do they warm up plastic sewerage if the use of an open flame burner is excluded? In this case, you can use the steam generator and restore the system with hot steam.

The steam generator can be purchased for personal use or you can use the services of companies offering troubleshooting on pipelines. What should I do if the pipe freezes?

The steam generator starts.
A steam pipeline is inserted into a frozen pipe until it rests on a layer of ice.
As the plug melts, the steam pipeline will need to be moved deeper until the accident is completely eliminated.

The advantages of the method include its efficiency and safety. The downside is the need to purchase special equipment. A variation of this method is hydrodynamic flushing.

In this case, to solve the problem of how to break through a frozen sewer, installations are used that supply heated water under pressure. This method of defrosting allows you to simultaneously eliminate existing blockages, as well as check for damage to pipes along the route.

Outdoor heating methods

In addition to using a blowtorch, there are other ways to heat pipes externally. For example, to solve the problem of how to thaw a frozen sewer, if the pipes are metal, the electric defrosting method is often used.

To do this, terminals are fixed along the edges of the emergency section, voltage is applied to them, the metal is heated and the ice plug inside melts. In addition, defrosting the sewer with the help of external heating can be done using:

Hot air produced by a heat gun.
Self-heating cables that are laid on pipes.

Prevention measures

It is clear that defrosting sewer pipes is not a very pleasant job, and besides, you have to deal with it, as a rule, when it is cold outside. To avoid this, it is worth taking preventive measures in advance.

It is clear that not in all cases it is possible to lay pipes to a depth at which the soil does not freeze through. Indeed, in the northern regions of the country, then it would be necessary to dig trenches of many meters deep. In such cases, pipe insulation is used, as well as a heating cable for sewerage.

The principle of operation of such a cable is very simple. Unlike a conductive wire, the cable creates resistance and heats up under the influence of current. Heat is transferred to the pipe, and the liquid in it does not freeze. The used heating cable for sewerage is of two types:

A resistance cable that has a constant resistance along its entire length and heats all sections of the pipe evenly.
Self-regulating cable. Such a cable is able to change its conductive properties depending on local conditions. That is, the cable will itself regulate the heating in cold areas and stop heating when the temperature reaches positive values. Moreover, not the entire pipe will be heated, but only those sections where the temperature is below zero.

Advice! Of course, a self-regulating cable is much more expensive than a simple one, but its use allows you to reduce electricity consumption and not worry about manual adjustment operation of the heating system.

Installing the cable on the pipe

The rules by which the cable should be laid in the sewer:

The surface of the pipe to be installed must be dry and clean.

Depending on the type of cable chosen, it is laid in turns with a certain pitch, or two cores are strengthened on both sides of the pipe. From above, the cable is fixed with adhesive tape with a foil layer.
A heater is put on the pipe and the trench is backfilled.

Advice! The foil layer on the adhesive tape will serve to prevent heat dissipation.

If necessary, the heating cable for sewerage can be cut into pieces of the desired length. After installation, the ends of the cable will need to be connected to the shield or to the outlet.

So, to eliminate ice plugs in sewer pipes, various methods. In the event of an accident, the causes that caused the malfunction should be identified and eliminated as soon as possible. Compliance with the rules for laying pipelines, as well as the use of insulation, including a heating cable, will help prevent freezing.

July 6, 2016
Specialization: professional in the field of construction and repair ( full cycle holding finishing works, both internal and external, from sewerage to electrics and finishing works), installation of window structures. Hobbies: see column "SPECIALIZATION AND SKILLS"

The question of what to do - if the sewage system is frozen in a private house, usually arises suddenly. As a rule, the problem is detected either in the morning after a frosty night, or upon arrival home after a fairly long absence. In any case, there is little pleasant here, but the problem is completely solvable.

Why the sewer freezes, how to restore its performance and how to prevent such a development of events - I will talk about all this in the article, based on my own experience.

Causes and consequences

With the onset of cold weather, when the night temperature drops below zero, there is a risk of sewer pipes freezing. As a result, ice plugs form in the cavities, which block the movement of drains.

Normally, a properly laid and normally functioning sewer should not freeze. However, there are factors that can cause the entire system to fail. The most important of them I will give in the table:

Cause	Why does it freeze?
Shallow laying	As a rule, the outer part of the sewer network is laid in the thickness of the soil. In addition to purely aesthetic reasons, this is due to the desire of each of us to protect the pipe from the cold, since the temperature at the surface of the earth will always be lower than at depth. However, during severe frosts, freezing can also affect the deep layers of the soil along with the pipes laid there. To avoid this, I strongly recommend that before starting work on laying sewers, study the climate information about your area and determine how deep the ground freezes.
Lack of insulation	All pipelines that are laid outdoors, in the ground, in unheated or periodically heated rooms must be equipped with thermal insulation. If this is not done, then even small plot in the basement of the building can be a source of problems with the formation of ice plugs. Of course, the thermal insulation of pipelines increases the cost of construction, but still the price of insulation is much lower than the cost of repairing or overhauling the entire system after a rupture, especially unpleasant in winter period. As mine shows personal experience, attempts to save on thermal insulation only lead to an increase in costs.
Blockages inside the pipe	In order for the pipe to freeze and form a critical mass of ice in it, it is necessary that there be some kind of content inside. Normally, sewer pipes are empty most of the time, but if you neglect their regular cleaning, then a blockage may form at the turn or junction of the knees, on which ice will gradually accumulate. The result is predictable - sooner or later the entire gap will be blocked. By the way, a decrease in the flow rate is a universal diagnostic feature. If you notice in time, you can fix the problem before it goes into a critical stage.
Insufficient slope	Operational removal Wastewater from the lumen of the pipe, its laying with a slope towards the collector, septic tank or cesspool. The optimal slope angle is 3-4 degrees, and if you make it smaller, then the risk of stagnation of the liquid and, as a result, its freezing, increases significantly.

In addition to the above reasons, the efficiency of drainage in a septic tank or other reservoir also plays a role.
If a storage capacity will be overflowing, then the water from the pipes will simply have nowhere to go.
That is why in my house, before the onset of cold weather, I always inspect the septic tank, and if it is more than half full, I pump it out.

As a rule, alone, these factors rarely lead to the formation of ice jams, but if two or three of them become relevant at the same time, then problems cannot be avoided. The results of such a coincidence are usually quite sad:

since the drain is completely or almost completely blocked, it will not be possible to use the sewer until the reasons for the blockage are completely eliminated. Alternative - outdoor toilet- in winter it does not seem attractive;
when the liquid freezes, it expands, which can lead to swelling and rupture of the pipe. It is especially unpleasant if the accident occurs either in basement(sad personal experience - until I discovered the problem, it leaked fairly), or underground (digging frozen soil to carry out repair work- pleasure is doubtful).

Summarizing, I would like to say one thing: it is better not to bring sewer pipes to freezing, timely identifying and eliminating possible reasons. However, we can all make mistakes, and therefore it is very important to know how to fix them, and how to break through a frozen sewer with minimal cost time, effort and resources.

We solve the problem

Recipe one - washing with hot water

Having discovered that the sewage system is frozen and “no longer flows” through the pipes, many act purely instinctively - turn on the hot water tap at full power and try to fill the entire pipeline with liquid.

This measure can only be effective if the freezing is light enough, but then it is enough to wait a few minutes and the situation will resolve itself.

If the problem is serious enough, then its solution is complicated by the fact that by the time hot water from the tap gets into the pipes, there is already cold water. Therefore, at one time I decided to act more inventively:

Before defrosting the sewer - if they are frozen, it is necessary to localize the location of the ice plug as accurately as possible. As I noted above, the problem areas are turns, pipe joints, as well as horizontal sections without proper insulation.
When we more or less accurately establish where the water has frozen, we get to the nearest revision and open it, gaining access to the pipe lumen.

I hope when laying outdoor sewerage Did you follow the instructions strictly enough, and were inspection wells equipped at every turn and at least every 10 meters on flat areas?
If not, then I have bad news for you - you are suffering pretty much ...

We take a cable that is used to clean the sewer, and a long thin hose. We attach the hose to the cable with adhesive tape so that the end of the cable with a spiral nozzle for breaking blockages protrudes by 3-5 cm. Additionally, you can fix the hose along the entire length with intercepts every 50-70 cm.
We start the cable with the hose into the pipe lumen and gradually push it until we hit the ice plug. With a few movements we try to destroy it - we most likely will not succeed, but it's worth a try.
We insert a funnel into the free end of the hose, which we then additionally fix so that we do not have to hold it with our hands.

Now we are preparing a salvific solution: boil three to five liters of water, add five to six tablespoons of salt (or more) to the water, mix and pour into the funnel immediately after the crystals have dissolved.

If the revision is very close to the frozen area, then part of the boiling water may pour out of it (in my case, it turned out that way).
We are taking precautions!

After waiting two or three minutes, we push the cable forward, destroying the ice plug. If it fails, we repeat the operations with pouring boiling water.
When the problem is fixed, we close the revision and flush the pipe with plenty of hot water to remove the remnants of frozen drains.

Recipe two - heat treatment

If the thickness of the plug exceeds 20 - 30 centimeters (it is not clear how the sewage can be brought to this, but I had to deal with this situation at least twice), boiling water does not help. You will have to use improvised means:

The old heating element (namely the old one, since the probability of its failure during operation is very high, so we take what is not a pity) we attach to two insulated wires. We carefully wrap the contact point with electrical tape so that liquid does not get inside.

We wind the wire with the heating element to the pipe cable. If a hard cable is used, then you can do without a cable - anyway, we will not use its nozzle to destroy the cork in this situation.
Through the revision or the removed knee, we pass the entire structure into the lumen of the sewer and move it to the place where the ice plug forms.
We turn on the heating element, making sure that we ourselves do not come into contact with the wet walls of the pipe - although we took care of the insulation, we should be careful.

If a metal pipe froze, then I would not risk using electrical appliances.

Gradually we move the heating element deep into the pipe, trying to melt at least a small through hole.
As soon as the movement of effluents is restored, we remove the heating element with the cable and simply flush with hot water.

To be fair, it should be noted that in such difficult situation I didn't always manage to do it myself. If the idea with the heating element was not successful, then you should contact the local Vodokanal: usually this organization has powerful steam generators with a rigid hose that allow you to melt the ice inside the pipes. Naturally, you will have to pay for the departure of the repair team.

Recipe three - external heating

If we have access to a frozen section of sewer, or we can provide it (from my point of view, sometimes dig half a meter frozen ground- this is quite an acceptable payment for the opportunity to solve the problem without loss), then the situation is noticeably simplified. What to do - if the sewer pipe is frozen - we will tell below:

Metal pipes (steel and cast iron) are quickly put in order with a blowtorch. We simply turn on the device and flame the pipe walls against the ice plug: usually two or three minutes is enough for me to completely eliminate the blockage, but if you have no experience, it is better to take a little longer, but not damage the pipe itself.

Plastic pipe should not be exposed to open flame. The area under which the ice is located is wrapped with rags and poured with boiling water, creating a “bath effect”. The procedure takes me longer than when working with a blowtorch, but not by much.

Quite often, ice accumulates in tees, which are quite problematic to warm up. To enhance the effect, I tried to put a container of boiling water under the tee: the rising steam heated the walls of the pipe in their coldest part, and the cork turned out to be hot water.

Boiling water, of course, needs to be topped up periodically.

If you have a household steam generator, for example, included in the car wash kit - great! We use it in the same way as a blowtorch: a jet of steam directed at a sewer pipe is not too inferior in effect to a flame, but it can be used for metal, and for plastic, and for ceramics.

Finally, there is a very extreme method - electric defrosting. We install terminals on the surface of a metal pipe and apply voltage to them. The pipe heats up, the ice melts, the movement of effluents is restored. The main difficulty: a professional electrician must perform all operations!

Prevention

thermal insulation

If we are just planning to lay sewers, or if we have solved the problem of freezing, and do not want it to happen again, then it is worth figuring out how to avoid such a development of the situation. The easiest way is to initially lay the pipes correctly, and you can do this by doing the work the way I once did on my site:

We lay the outer part of the system in trenches, the bottom of which is below the freezing level of the soil. For most regions, this depth is from 0.8 to 1.5 m, but sometimes you have to go deep to 2 - 2.5 m.
At the bottom of the trench we pour sand cushion about 15 cm thick.
We lay the sewer pipe in thermal insulation. I used a casing made of mineral wool, but you can also take a "shell" of polystyrene foam or simply cover it with sawdust with a layer of 25 - 30 cm.

We fill the sewer with clay from above, and then with the earth taken out when digging a trench.
The areas passing along the surface are also carefully insulated using material at least 50 mm thick. The same applies to sewer pipes that run in unheated rooms.

Cable heating

However, even the thickest layer of thermal insulation cannot always cope with a sudden sharp drop in temperature. In addition, in some regions of Russia it is very difficult to lay a sewer below the level of soil freezing - you will have to dig a trench well for two meters. In this situation, active heating saves with the help of special ones.

Frost prevention is carried out in the following way:

A self-regulating wire (my choice because it won't overheat or burn out) or a wire connected to a thermostat (more cheap option), wrap around the pipe or lay on its surface.

The design of some cables also allows for internal installation.
By the way, they can be used not only in sewerage systems, but also in water pipes.

Fixing a heating element with the help of metallized adhesive tape, which contributes to the concentration of the generated heat.

From above, I mounted a heat-insulating shell - in any case, it will not be superfluous.
When cold weather sets in, I connect the cable to the mains. When current passes, the conductors heat up, giving off heat to the walls of the pipe and preventing its contents from freezing.
In addition to preventive work, cables of this type (of course, pre-laid along the pipe) can also be used to eliminate ice plugs that have already formed. It is enough just to turn on the heating element in the system, and in half an hour or an hour the problem will be solved.

Pipes running in extreme conditions, sometimes you have to warm it up

Cases when sewer pipes freeze are not uncommon. And methods of dealing with this phenomenon have been developed. Therefore, do not waste time worrying, but immediately move on to action.

The sewer system is frozen - call the plumbers ...

If ice has formed in the sewer pipes, there is no drain, then the first thing that comes to mind is to call the water utility services. And this correct solution. The plumbers have necessary equipment for defrosting, or at least should have in theory.

You don't have to do anything yourself - just pay .... To heat sewer pipes, steam generators are used - special devices that supply steam through hoses to the place where ice forms inside the sewer pipe.

But it often happens that plumbers have a lot of orders, or they all quit at once. Or you just don’t want to spend extra money for a problem that you can fix yourself.

To melt the ice in the sewer yourself, you will have to imitate the actions of plumbing services or go for some tricks.

If a sewer pipe is frozen, then first of all you need to remember what material it is made of, i.e. plastic pipes or cast iron? For different types pipes can be used and different methods.

How to heat up a cast iron pipe

Metal pipes are easiest to heat with electricity. But this requires a special device - a step-down transformer with adjustable voltage supply. Usually, to heat cast iron sewer pipes that are frozen, they use welding machine. It can output a voltage of about 30 - 70 volts.

One wire is connected to the pipe, and the other is grounded away from the pipe. As a result electricity passing through a metal pipe will go into the frozen ground along its entire length.

It is desirable to connect electricity closer to the freezing point, so that the maximum current passes through the pipe in this place. For example, this is possible if manholes for sewerage are equipped.

But in most cases, there are no manholes in private areas, and the freezing point of the sewer pipe is not known in advance. Then it is advisable to connect the frozen pipe to the phase in two places - at the point of exit from the house and at the point of entry into the septic tank.

When an electric current passes through the pipe for several hours, ice will thaw along its perimeter, and a small drain will appear. After that, boiling water is poured into the pipe in large quantities before full recovery bandwidth.

Connecting the pipeline directly to a 220 V outlet is not allowed (although some do).

Frozen plastic sewer pipeline, how to melt the ice?

Heating with electricity is the easiest way to melt the ice in a frozen sewer. But what if the sewer pipe is made of plastic, because it almost does not conduct electricity.

Then it is best to try to create an imitation of a steam generator. Long thin pipes (plastic or metal) are needed that can be pushed into the pipeline to the point of ice blockage. A filling funnel is connected to the end of these pipes.

Boiling water is supplied to the pipes. The incoming water will displace water from the sewer pipe, so you will need to organize the necessary utensils to collect it. It is important to squeeze the pipes as close as possible into the ice plug, i.e. into the gap that is located at the top of the pipe between the ice and its wall.

Get ready for a long day of work. The defrosting of the pipeline will occur slowly - by a meter per hour. The speed depends both on the volume of the supplied boiling water and on the volume of ice in the pipe. The consumption of boiling water is approximately the same - 10 liters of boiling water per 10 cm of advance. But the traffic jam itself may not be too long.

If they started to heat the sewer pipeline with water, then the process cannot be interrupted. After all, the pipe will be completely filled in the area from the house to the place of the ice jam. If you stop the process, then all the water in the pipe will freeze in a short time, and then it will be much more difficult to warm the pipeline. When the process is stopped, water must be pumped out of the pipeline.

If the sewer pipe is straight, then you can use a straight plastic, metal-plastic or metal pipe. solid pipe it is preferable to use, since they can even destroy ice in the sewer.

But what if there are turns in the frozen sewer pipeline?

Then you need to use a flexible hose, but such that he would not be afraid high temperature. Polyethylene hose will not work. A hose may come up, for example, from a water level (a water level is sold in stores). The same is true with a funnel. Suitable as a filling funnel, for example, a medical device - Esmarch's mug.

This hose is tied to a metal wire at some intervals using tape or electrical tape. The wire must protrude in front of the hose, and its end must be bent back. Such a device will bypass obstacles and fit into the configuration of the pipeline.

Is it possible to mechanize the process of heating a frozen pipeline with water? Oh sure. But then you will need a continuous supply of water (connection to a pipeline or pumping unit), very powerful heater, nozzle at the end of the pipe. In fact, this will be the steam generator.

How to melt ice in a drain pipe with electricity

There is another option for heating a frozen plastic sewer pipe with water. But this time, the water will be heated by electricity directly in the pipe near the ice jam.

To do this, an electric water heater is fed into the sewer pipeline, which is frozen. The pipe is filled with water so that the heater is immersed. And they supply electricity. The heater heats the water directly at the ice and it slowly thaws. The method is slow, but you do not need to constantly supply boiling water, but only occasionally try to push the heater forward.

Such a device for heating frozen sewer pipes is easy to make on your own. The main thing is to exclude direct contact of the heater with the wall plastic pipe. To do this, the heater must be protected by a strong lattice sheath made of mesh (wire), which will rest against the ice. Such a grill around the heater will have to be made independently.

To electrical cable a U-shaped heater is connected, and the cable is passed through a rigid plastic pipe that will be fed into the frozen pipeline.

The heater is fixed with electrical tape at the end of the pipe. At the end of a rigid plastic pipe, a heater guard is fixed with electrical tape. This design is fed all the way into the ice. Water is poured into the sewer pipeline (the pipe has a slope in the direction from the house). The heater must be submerged in water. Then it connects 220V.

And then wait, not forgetting to move the structure and move it slowly forward. It may happen that the water in the pipe overheats. Then you need to turn off the voltage. Boiling water can only damage the pipeline (), but the speed of progress from this will not increase much.

Why does the sewer freeze?

If the sewer pipeline is frozen, this means that the depth of its laying is insufficient. It is located in the zone of freezing soil. But, as a rule, it is often simply impossible to increase the depth of laying. Here the height mark of the drain point plays a role, which is simply very problematic to make lower. We will have to deepen septic tanks, etc.

But the sewer pipeline can be insulated. For the insulation of pipelines, special polystyrene foam insulation is sold, in the form of several parts that tightly compress the pipeline. This is optimal choice insulation. You can also insulate with rolled glass wool (but it must be carefully waterproofed) or more expensive - with basalt thermal insulation.

Also important role plays the amount of temperature and the amount of water passing through the pipeline, which determines how much heat is supplied to the pipeline. After all, even an insulated pipeline can freeze if water flows into it drop by drop.

The sewer pipeline freezes as follows. It is usually not completely filled - in best case by 1/3. Here in the lower part, the water clings to the walls, which have a temperature below 0 degrees. A puddle is formed. The puddle freezes. With the subsequent inflow of water, the height of the ice increases. And the process is repeated until the ice covers the entire section.