Pipe Bursting in Santa Ana

The oldest sewers in the county

Santa Ana was the county seat before there were suburbs, and its historic districts, French Park, Floral Park, Wilshire Square, Washington Square and the streets around downtown, were built between the 1900s and the 1930s. The lateral under one of those Craftsman or Spanish Revival houses is vitrified clay in short jointed lengths, laid shallow, with a cast iron run under the house and sometimes an original connection to a sewer that is itself a century old. The post-war blocks that fill the rest of the city, from the west side to the neighborhoods south of Warner, were built in the 1950s and 60s on clay or early bituminous-fiber laterals, and a great many of them have since had a second unit, a garage conversion or an addition built over the sewer line.

Clay joints admit roots and shift with the soil. Bituminous-fiber pipe goes oval and delaminates. Cast iron under a slab channels out along the bottom. And a lateral that now runs under an addition or a converted garage cannot be reached by an open trench at any reasonable cost, which is the defining Santa Ana sewer problem.

Clay soil and old trees

Santa Ana sits on the floodplain of the river that shares its name: alluvial silt and clay that swells in the winter rains and shrinks all summer. Decades of that cycle open clay joints and offset pipe. The historic districts have the county's oldest street trees, camphors, magnolias, palms and deodars planted a century ago, and root intrusion at clay joints is the most common finding on a Santa Ana sewer camera inspection, followed closely by offsets where a driveway or an addition loaded the pipe.

Sewers and permits

The City of Santa Ana operates the local sewer system through its Public Works Agency, and the lateral from the house to the connection at the main is the property owner's responsibility, including the part under the parkway and sidewalk. On the densest blocks the main runs down the alley rather than the street, and the connection is at the back of the lot.

Lateral repair or replacement needs a plumbing permit from the city, and anything in the sidewalk, parkway or street needs an encroachment permit and an inspection before the pit is closed. The contractor should pull both and say so in the quote.

Which trenchless method fits a Santa Ana lateral

• Sewer pipe lining is the answer for a clay lateral with root-intruded joints and small offsets that still holds shape and slope, and it is the only practical answer for a line that runs under an addition or a converted garage. A cured-in-place liner from the cleanout seals every joint without opening anything above the pipe.
• Pipe bursting is for a collapsed section, a long belly, or a line that needs to be upsized for an added unit. A small pit at each end and a new fused polyethylene pipe on the old path.
• Sectional point repair fixes one crushed joint or one root ball on an otherwise sound line.

Crews doing trenchless sewer repair in Santa Ana see the under-the-addition problem constantly, and a good one will show you on the camera monitor exactly where the line runs before quoting.

What the job looks like

A camera inspection maps the line and marks every defect on the ground with its depth. Hydro jetting clears roots, scale and grease so the pipe wall can be seen and, if the line is being lined, so the resin bonds to clean pipe. Lining runs from the cleanout at the house; bursting needs a small pit at each end of the run. Most residential jobs finish in a day, with water off for a few hours during a liner cure, and you should receive the before-and-after footage. how a trenchless repair is sequenced from inspection to cure is worth reading before the crew arrives.

To compare installers who have been checked for licensing and CIPP training, you can find a verified CIPP contractor through an independent directory.

Pipe Bursting in Santa Ana

How pipe bursting works

A steel cable is threaded through the old sewer line from a pit at one end to a pit at the other. A cone-shaped bursting head, with new high-density polyethylene pipe fused to it, is pulled through by a hydraulic unit. The head splits the old clay or cast iron outward into the soil and the new pipe follows in the same alignment at the same depth. The result is a single fused length of pipe with no joints for roots to find.

When bursting is the right call

• Collapsed sections — a liner needs a host pipe to hold its shape; a collapsed run has none.
• Bellies — a low spot that holds water stays a low spot after lining. Bursting lays new pipe on a fresh bed.
• Undersized lines — bursting can upsize a 3-inch lateral to 4 inches; lining slightly reduces diameter.
• Badly deformed pipe — Orangeburg that has flattened, or cast iron with most of its bottom gone.

What the job looks like

One pit at the house or cleanout, one at the property line or the street connection, each a few feet square. Utilities that cross within a foot or two of the sewer path are located and potholed first. The pull takes an hour or two; the whole job, including fusing, connections, inspection and backfill, is usually one day.

Permits and the street

If the downstream pit is in the sidewalk, parkway or street, a right-of-way permit and restoration to city standards are required in addition to the plumbing permit. If the connection at the main is replaced, the city inspects it before the pit closes. Confirm who is handling this before work starts.

ZIP codes served in Santa Ana

Pipe Bursting is available throughout Santa Ana, including ZIP codes 92701, 92702, 92703, 92704, 92705, 92706, 92707, 92711, 92712, 92725, 92735, 92799.

More trenchless services in Santa Ana

Questions we hear in Santa Ana