After the sewer line leaves your home from through or under the foundation, how do you access it outdoors? You use a cleanout, a vertical pipe that connects at a right angle to the sewer line beneath. You’ve likely walked over the tops of cleanouts on yards, sidewalks and elsewhere without being aware of it. Some stick up out of the ground more than others, but they all serve the same functions.

How They Help

A cleanout can be very useful during a blockage. Opening up the cleanout allows for waste to flow out into the yard rather than back into the house. If you are ever in this situation, remove the cleanout very carefully because the waste that comes out may be under pressure and will come out fast. The cap of a cleanout can generally be removed with a special cleanout wrench, but some cleanouts have gem caps, which require no special tools to remove.

Additionally, cleanouts help make diagnosing and correcting problems along the whole sewer line easier. A plumber can run a snake through a cleanout, hydro jet through it or run a camera through it to look for blockages. The alternate entrance would be inside the home, which is generally worse, especially if the plumber is using heavy machinery that does not belong indoors.

Cleanouts are used more and more in new plumbing. In fact, regulations often require an outdoor cleanout every 75 feet and every change of direction. In new construction, indoor cleanouts are also being placed more frequently in basements close to sinks and other fixtures.

Find Your Cleanouts

Of course, you have to know where your cleanouts are before you can use them. If you know where your sewer line leaves your house, look along its path outdoors for a metal cover or cap. If you don’t know where your sewer line is, start looking in your yard near a bathroom, roughly 3 to 5 feet out. Sometimes cleanouts are inside a house, especially in the basement, and it is a good thing if this is the case.

Once you’ve found a cleanout, first make sure that the cap is on tightly. If it isn’t, tighten it. Additionally, make sure that it isn’t covered with dirt, or vegetation because you want to be able to open it quickly if you need to.

Plumbing problems outside of a structure in the sewer line can be a nightmare to deal with. And the nightmare would be even worse without cleanouts. They are very much there to help you and your plumbing team. If you live in La Crosse, WI or a surrounding area and need sewer line services, make your first call to K & H Plumbing.