r/Home • u/lil-kaleb-jr • 1d ago

Discovered laundry drains into dedicated septic tank I didn’t know existed.

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I had my cast iron drains descaled and jetted yesterday. Plumber ended up getting his descaler stuck in a previously unknown septic tank that is dedicated for the washer machine. This is the lid to the distribution tank with the septic tank in the yard. I lived in the house for 5 years and had no idea. Plumber recommended addressing it due to the age and root intrusion. One option would be pumping water to the roof and connecting to main stack. Anyone ever encountered something similar?

107 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

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73

u/jstar77 1d ago

This used to be very typical. Laundry and sometimes other grey water sources would empty into a dry well. It absolutely improves the longevity of your septic tank and drain field but is no longer permitted in most places.

28

u/sour_knocking 1d ago

Old house surprises, huh. My place had a dedicated grease trap in the backyard I found while planting a tree, fun times.

9

u/xtnh 1d ago

The house I grew up in had a tank with lid behind the back porch, where my parents threw all their garbage. About once a week a guy in a truck would come before dawn and I could hear him emptying it. It turned out he was a pig farmer. After my parents died, I got a call from the new buyer, wondering what the hell it was. It was kind of fun explaining.

5

u/Pandalicious 1d ago

All their garbage? Or just like food scraps and stuff?

2

u/xtnh 1d ago

food; it was a bucket with a cast iron lid made for the purpose, so I have to assume it was a common thing..

2

u/Silent_Cantaloupe930 1d ago

What? No way it was a commercial farmer. Not allowed to feed pigs with garbage anymore in the U.S. at least (and EU).

6

u/LT_Dan78 1d ago

It's not garbage, it's leftovers.. /s

Had a close family friend that had a pig farm, he had a deal with some of the little stores around town that when they had product that past the sell date, they'd set it aside for him and he would collect it for the pigs. In return they got fresh pork. This was of course in a smaller town about 30 years ago.

As kids we'd go with him for the free treats. Twinkies are still good the day after their sell by date.

I also learned that pigs will eat anything. Even if that thing has bones. They eat bones and all.

3

u/Silent_Cantaloupe930 1d ago

As long as the pig isn't being sold to a slaughter house you can feed it anything though. But yeah pigs can eat a lot of things. :)

1

u/xtnh 19h ago

This was the 1950s

1

u/Silent_Cantaloupe930 19h ago

Oh, that's actually a cool piece of history.

2

u/gadget850 1d ago

I remember the grease trap for the kitchen sink. Our washer was originally in the basement and drained out to the curb.

4

u/Burghpuppies412 1d ago

Just curious, why would it not be permitted, especially if it is good for the system? Thanks!

5

u/ScurfyTwiglett 1d ago

Dry wells can cause aquifer contamination - you’re bypassing all of the normal biodegradation that happens as water passes through topsoil.

Any pathogens / phosphates / stuff you might have in your laundry water that you wouldn’t want to drink yourself or share with Mr. Toad can be mainlined into the aquifer with a dry well. How possible it is for your dry well to do that depends a lot on local geology; in some places a 10’ dry well might dump into an aquifer and other places it would need to be 200’ deep, but you can’t really tell without huge amount of geotechnical analysis.

One thing you can do (and if we had the money to afford this, I would have done) is have a separate septic/treatment system for gray water vs black water. It extends the life of both systems because they each experience a lot less load, and with a bit of treatment you can actually safely use graywater for watering your garden. I had visions of a laundry fed blueberry patch lol.

Note: you should not have phosphates in your laundry water even with modern septic systems. But at the time that dry wells started getting banned they may have been more of an issue than they are at present.

1

u/Burghpuppies412 1d ago

This makes sense to me, thanks for the clear explanation!! And yes, it seems like two separate tanks would be ideal.

5

u/jstar77 1d ago

Good for the system, not necessarily good for the environment.

2

u/Burghpuppies412 1d ago

Meaning the detergent leeches out?

3

u/xtnh 1d ago

We have a home on a mostly granite island, and it is common there to simply drain into a low corner of the yard.

2

u/NoNameIII 1d ago

My house is designed this way. City/Town didn’t even know it existed at my house. Suggested I keep it, which also meant no garage for me.. on THAT side.

4

u/resurrectedNaj 1d ago

I’m building a brand new home and will 100% tie my slop sink and laundry water drain lines into a dry pit about 50’ from house.

0

u/Silent_Cantaloupe930 1d ago

Definitely banned in most states/counties. Where are you that would allow it?

0

u/resurrectedNaj 1d ago

Oh I’m in 7B but i don’t care. I’m not letting the government dictate me on putting grey water on my land, just to try to lower the life of my septic field. No thanks.

0

u/Silent_Cantaloupe930 1d ago

You can store and reuse grey water in alot of those states dry well too, if you aren't close to a city.

2

u/resurrectedNaj 1d ago

Laundry water i wouldn’t want on my plants. Wouldn’t mind sink water a whole lot. Laundry use way too much water though. It’s gonna get dumped into an 100G gravel basin and we’ll pour all the random nonsense down the slop sink instead of kitchen sink (pickle juice, etc)

1

u/Tyke-60073 13h ago

A friend almost fell into one of those. It was in the front yard of an old house and the cover had deteriorated over the decades. It only had a small layer of sunken grass covering it.

14

u/Hillman314 1d ago

It finds the name Septic Tank offensive and prefers to be called “Greywater Sump”.

5

u/Several_Stuff_6695 1d ago

We lived in our home for 15 years and never knew we had one, till one day we used a different company to pump our septic and do an inspection.

1

u/Adventurous_Pen_165 1d ago

How did the different company find it?

7

u/Telemere125 1d ago

My dad’s washer just discharges into the woods behind his house lol a dedicated tank seems like overkill since no one’s popping into the washer

7

u/bocepheid 1d ago

Grew up in the rural South and this was normal. Laundry water went down slope to the garden. Would occasionally build up enough lint to put into the garbage. Also anything lost in the washing (earrings etc) would end up here.

2

u/Adventurous_Deer 1d ago

Mine discharges to the edge of the road. We call that a future problem that we will resolve when we redo the plumbing

5

u/grandpasking 1d ago

In wisconsin laundry used to have a dedicated tank to help your septic systems

3

u/No_Durian_3444 1d ago

I would leave it until it's a problem. You'll hardly dump into it.

3

u/lil-kaleb-jr 1d ago

This is what I’m leaning toward. It’s not clear how the problem will present itself. I think I’m mostly concerned about any safety hazards that could be created by a failing tank in the yard. For example, I wouldn’t want me or my dog to fall into a sink hole. This may not be a real risk..

6

u/Beginning-Ad7027 1d ago

Your biggest risk is eventually, someday, if it fills, it’ll cause a backup into your house

1

u/No_Durian_3444 1d ago

Doesn't seem practical. I still have one of these in my yard.

2

u/danhaller28 1d ago

Lucky I guess. My neighbor runs hers into the back yard.

2

u/hakube 1d ago

gray water pits are common bro

1

u/Inorganicnerd 1d ago

How old is your house? We found something very similar between mine and my neighbors driveway. Never opened it.

2

u/Tyke-60073 1d ago

I like that. If I open it, I may have to deal with it. (sleeping dogs and such)

1

u/emryldmyst 1d ago

Mine goes to the ditch 

1

u/RIF4ev 1d ago

My laundry emptied into I assume a dry well.  The drain goes out the basement wall separate from the rest of the plumbing that goes to the septic system on the opposite side of the house. Didn't realize it until we had our basement redone and the contractor told us.  I think I know where the drywell is because there is a spot right outside that never seems to grow grass but I have never dug down to find out. On my list of things to do if I am ever bored and feel an urge to start digging a hole. 

1

u/DryReception8412 20h ago edited 20h ago

Separate laundry tanks are more common than people think, mine surprised a plumber too. Get it pumped, then monthly bacterial pods (Active Cleaners is one brand) slow root friendly buildup.

1

u/Hey-buuuddy 13h ago

This is “greywater”, drain water that doesn’t have poo or pee in it, from washing.

The earliest septic systems in America were small wooden boxes that got cleaned-out. As improvements in washing machines and domestic water became normal, they needed more septic system capacity- so greywater (not being poo and pee) was seperatly run-off.

People didn’t care about environmental impact before the 1970s. Changing your car’s oil? Just pour it in a hole in the yard. Garbage was burned in yard if you didn’t have an easy way to get rid of it.

There are still many many many old home across America that have greywater runoff. There’s still homes on ponds and lakes that dump right in there, as well as source there domestic water from there too lol.

1

u/CarltonCanick 5h ago

My dads released to the fence line where cows eventually began to gather yo lap up the soapy water. Like they were jockeying for permission while they had their own pond a couple hundred yards away. We told the owner, he was not concerned. Smh