Septic Services – Remodeling

Tips for Proper Grease Trap Pumping Maintenance

The Grease Trap is one of the most undervalued devices in your restaurant kitchen. Grease traps enable proper disposal of garbage, making them an essential part of a well-functioning commercial kitchen. For this reason, proper maintenance of grease traps is a necessary activity in commercial kitchens to maintain an efficient and safe working environment. We’ve compiled a list of tips to help you maintain your restaurant grease trap properly!

Kitchen Restaurant

1. Check for Proper Installation

If you’re planning to use a garbage disposal facility in your commercial kitchen, it’s imperative that your installation company installs a waste disposal facility after a grease trap. If the garbage disposal is mounted first, the grease trap can be lined with ground food sludge, which decreases the reliability of the grease trap. You should also check that the grease trap is the right size for your needs before it is installed. The amount of food your kitchen cooks eat, the type of food you eat, your average number of customers, and the number of staff who wash dishes will all help to determine the correct size of the grease trap for your kitchen.

2. Look for Grease in Your Trap

When your Grass Trap is first installed, you should be looking for Grass. After you’ve been using your trap for a few days, there’s a fat deposit in your trap. Little or no grease in your trap may indicate improper installation. If you notice that the grease is pooling somewhere other than your trap, there might be a leak. If the grease is not stored correctly in your trap, you can call a specialist to reinstall the trap. It is important to check the correct installation early to avoid any issues with your trap later on.

3. Install Strainers

To prevent large solids from entering grease traps, you should install strainers in your sinks, dishwashers, and floor drains. When solids enter your grease trap, they can create clogs that prevent them from functioning properly. These problems may lead to serious and even permanent damage. For this purpose, you should stop allowing large pieces of food, rubber gloves, silverware, towels or any other large items to penetrate your grease trap. Installing strainers is the best way to catch these solids to prevent them from entering your trap.

4. Stop dumping grease down the drain

If you spill grease directly down the sink, it can lead to clogging in your drains and grease traps as well as overworked grease traps. You should stop dumping oil down the drain to avoid these problems. Then, dump the oil into a separate container. Your grease trap pumping company will collect this excess grease when it pumps out your trap. Make sure to use a metal bucket or tub that is made of a substance other than plastic, as the plastic can crack when it has a hot grease inside.

5. Disposing food waste

Avoiding dumping fat down your drain is a good start, but you really should try to prevent other things from going down your drain. Although some food scraps will go down your drain and enter your grease trap, you should always scrape the dishes in the trash to minimize the amount of food that goes down the drain. Avoid using garbage disposal when you can and be sure that the strainers in your drain are often empty. While food will eventually invade your grease trap, the less food you eat, the better.

6. Pump Your Grease Trap Regularly

In order to ensure that your grease trap is properly maintained, it is important to set up a regular maintenance cycle with a professional grease trap company. The company will help you determine the correct frequency for your kitchen, but the rule of thumb is that your grease trap should be pumped when it is 1⁄4 full of FOGS (fat, oil, grease, and solids). If your trap is too full of fat, it won’t work properly. Therefore, Grease Trap Pumping on a regular basis is essential to ensure that it performs optimally.

7. Have a good drain cleaner

Occasionally drains in your restaurant can get filled with grease, food build-up, and more. When these cloggings occur, you should call for professional drain cleaning services. A professional drain cleaner is going to jet the pipes, blow them completely clean, totally scraping their walls. A good cleaning of the drain will help keep the pipes dry. Clogs may interfere with the functioning of your grease trap, leading to costly maintenance problems. For this cause, it is necessary to have skilled drain cleaning to prevent clogging and expensive maintenance problems.

8. Avoid DIY Maintenance

When there are problems with your grease trap, you might be tempted to try to fix them yourself to avoid spending money on repairs. However, trying to perform maintenance on your own can lead to unintended damage that will lead to even more costly repairs. Professionals have the right tools for the job and are well trained to deal with maintenance issues. For this reason, if you have any problems with your grease trap, you should call the professionals to avoid costly repairs.

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Septic Inspection & Maintenance

Septic Services / Phillip Obrien

According to the U.S. EPA, about 25% of U.S. residential properties use septic systems to spread sewage and gray water, meaning that nearly four billion gallons of wastewater are distributed under the ground every day.

That’s plenty of water, and if not cared for properly, your septic system can become part of your area’s broader pollution problem, contaminating rivers, drainage, and even drinking water. This is why getting a septic inspection is so important.

Therefore, the most important thing you need to know about your septic system is that frequent inspection and maintenance of your septic system is necessary to prevent ecological problems or more expensive repairs.

In comparison to a conventional city sewer network, septic systems are the responsibility of the property owner to manage rather than that of the government. If and when you go to sell your property, you will have to show your septic system maintenance records and pay for a system inspection.

This means keeping up with septic tank repairs and inspections is smart, as this will save you time, money and hassle when it comes to selling your home or business.

Furthermore, while most municipal sewer systems can allow almost unlimited use of water, septic systems perform much better with low-flow toilets, faucets, and other appliances, and “rest” periods should be provided, ideally for best performance each night. This means that if you run your household on a conventional septic system, delaying dishwasher or other household tasks until overnight may not be the best choice. Replacing older toilets and showerheads with new, low-flow varieties may also be a good idea.

Septic systems are an environmentally friendly, affordable option for many properties with proper maintenance and septic inspections. We will ensure that your septic system is in accordance with your local codes, meets EPA requirements and operates properly as long as you own your home or business.

Warning Signs or Need for a Septic Inspection

Many homeowners and property owners believe that a little draino or roto visit from a plumber will easily fix slow drain sinks or bathrooms. That may be true, but if you’re working on a septic system, it’s important to know that slow drainage can be a sign of septic system trouble or malfunction, particularly if you find this symptom in more than one sink, bath, or drain at home. If more than one of these in your home or business is draining slowly, your septic tank may be backing up or it may impact the outflow tubing.

Sewage Slow drainage may be the first sign of a septic problem, but in some cases, the septic tank problems can skip straight to back up. When you see sludge in your bathtubs, water coming up from your sinks or other septic system backup signs, this is a common indication that your septic system is in desperate need of septic tank pumping or repair.

It’s advisable to keep an eye on their septic system drain field and walk semi-frequently through that section of your property to test for problems. It is a good idea to call for a pumping or septic inspection if you begin to notice standing water, unseasonable humidity or any kind of smell in your yard or drain field. If your drain field does not work properly, your septic tank or drain pipe may also be in trouble.

In your home septic systems, gross smells are very clean and hygienic for your entire family if they work properly. Your house shouldn’t smell bad plumbing, nor should you notice sewage odors in your yard. When you start smelling your septic system in your bathroom, kitchen, or anywhere else that you’ve got a drain in your house, it’s a sign that your septic system doesn’t work properly.

If in your home or business you see or smell any of these warning signs, call Waco Septic Pumping or similar reputable business. Septic specialists are available to assist with any septic system or maintenance situation and are happy to answer any septic questions you may have.

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Important facts about septic tank service

Septic Services / Phillip Obrien

It is significant that we have a dependable source and drainage for our soil and individual waste that is originating from the kitchen and washroom’s toilet in our home. In the event that there is an issue in your septic system, at that point it could be fixed by having a septic tank service come and pump your tank. You should always look for a septic tank service with plenty of experience. There are a few standards and of course laws that each area needs to pursue with regards to having their own septic tank and particularly the upkeep of it. When it comes to your home, you want to make sure that it is done right. So get a couple of quotes.

The location of your septic tank is important. You have to make sure that there is enough space to properly drain and absorb all the wastewater. There could be an exhaustive assessment of the area where you need to have it and obviously, it is critical to have a soil test done there also. After the study, is when the septic company would have an engineer design the system. They take all sorts of information into account. How big is the house, how many bathrooms, how many showers and toilets, and how many people are going to live in the house.

There are licenses and guidelines with regards who can work on and maintain septic systems. You should always use a licensed professionals when it comes to septic. Think about it, they are dealing with human waste so it needs to be done right. It is important to get the pricing upfront. There are going to be some aspects that may change, but you should be able to get a ballpark figure as far as the price. Your septic company should have been doing this for a while so they should be able to give you a pretty close estimate.

If you have a traditional or am aerobic, you should consider getting it inspected annually. There are not a bunch of moving parts with a traditional system, but you need to monitor the level of sludge that is building up at the bottom. It is ok up until the point that your sludge lever is close to 30% of your tank. That is the point that solids could start escaping out to your drain field and cause major problems very quickly. If your system is aerobic, you do have many moving parts, pumps, and controls. All of these components should be checked regularly. You might think what could really happen in a year right? A lot. Think about this – How many times do you flush your toilet? How much water do you use during a shower? The list goes on and on. It is important that your system stays operating at tip-top shape so it will last for decades.

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Conventional or Aerobic Septic System – What Works for You?

Septic Services / Phillip Obrien

Your home’s septic system is just as important as any part of the house. Without it, you’ll end up having a pool of mess not only in the bathroom but also in the kitchen and living room in the long run. Basically, the septic system is responsible for ensuring that all wastewater from your toilet and sink are properly taken care of, keeping your family safe and healthy all the time. There are primarily two options for septic installation – aerobic septic system and conventional septic. Here’s the 411 on the two.

Conventional Septic System

As the most common septic system type, the conventional septic system also referred to as the anaerobic septic system, is mostly found in both commercial and residential establishments. Anaerobic basically means that the oxygen content inside the septic tank is little to none. This septic system consists of a septic tank buried underground which holds and traps waste water from your home.

The conventional or anaerobic septic system works by trapping both liquid and solid wastes. While liquid substances float to the top, the solid ones will start to sink to the bottom of the tank. The liquid waste that forms on top is called scum. During the process, anaerobic bacteria present within the tank starts to break down the waste eventually producing waste water. The wastewater, in turn, will go through the pipes and into the water treatment tanks before it is released to the septic drain field.

Aerobic Septic System

In contrast to the first septic system option, an aerobic septic system more or less involves a complex process consisting of a septic tank, pump tank, and treatment plan in order to efficiently operate. Just like the conventional septic system, solid and liquid wastes enter the septic trash tank before settling into several layers. The wastewater produced will enter the treatment tank. The treatment tank, on the other hand, includes an aerator that effectively circulates bubbles all through it.

Since it is called an aerobic septic system, the air is definitely necessary in order to allow good bacteria to thrive. These aerobic bacteria are normally responsible for breaking down waste quicker and more effective than the conventional septic system’s anaerobic bacteria. As soon as the aerobic bacteria has been broken down, the wastewater will now get into the pump tank for final treatment.

Which one will work for you better?

Both septic system options work to ensure that wastewater is properly disposed of, but there are quite a few differenced to help you decide. Take the cost, for instance. An Aerobic septic system is basically more expensive than the conventional one considering the complex process that the waste has to go through in order to provide a faster turnout. Additionally, regular aeration and septic system maintenance is also necessary to make sure that the septic system will operate smoothly and without any glitch. The best thing about the aerobic septic system is that you only need a small septic drain field compared to the conventional one. This is attributed to the faster and more effective treatment of wastewater. If you have a small home or property, an aerobic septic system will definitely be the best choice.
Aside from a smaller drain field, most modern aerobic septic systems also come with alarms that indicate when the septic system is having some issues or mishaps. This helps the homeowner act earlier and faster in order to avoid more costly repairs in the process.

Knowing about the different types of septic systems is very helpful, especially when you’re thinking about installing one or replacing it. Whether you’d like the conventional one or you’re leaning towards the aerobic septic system more, the important thing here is that you know what’s in it for you.

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