How do our toilet pipes that lead to sewers remain unclogged for years on end?
In: Engineering
The pipes in your house or toilet rarely see something that cannot be dissolved with high velocity flowing water. Most of what might get stuck can usually be broken down with chemical treatments like DrainO or a plumber’s snake shoved down the pipe.
Really get something stuck and household pipes can be easily replaced by a plumber.
Once it leaves the house and hits the city lines, the design is very different. Those are very tough to replace and maintain, so they’re designed to last for 50-100 years.
When the city is installing the pipe, they make sure the soil around it is of good condition and pack the area with gravel so it’s even harder for changes in weather or stuff on the surface to break or bend the pipe. They’re also usually made of concrete or steel, unlike household PVC Plastic and are sized to be 4x larger than they need to be at the time of installation.
If your brother’s massive shit made it through your household 2″ line, then it will sail through the 8″ line to the city sewer. Just to make sure, the city will occasionally go through and “slick line” the pipe with a special low-friction coating, so nothing stops for long.
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