Hydro Jetting in Lawrenceville, GA

Hydro jetting rarely makes the list when a Lawrenceville household plans a new kitchen or bathroom, but the timing of a remodel makes it worth a thought. Once tile, cabinets and flooring go back down, the drain lines beneath them become harder to reach than they will be for years. A camera look and, where buildup calls for it, a thorough cleaning are far simpler to arrange before the finishes are installed than after.

Look at the drains before demolition starts

An older kitchen line may carry a thick coat of grease and food residue, and an old bathroom branch is often lined with hair and soap. None of that shows from the room. A sewer camera inspection of the lines that will sit under the new work tells you whether they are clean, coated or damaged. If the pipe is sound but narrowed, jetting can restore its full opening while the room is still a work zone, so the new sink or shower starts out draining into a clear line.

Use the open walls and floors

Demolition often exposes piping that is normally hidden: the trap arm behind a vanity, a run of cast iron inside a wall, the drain under an old tub. That is the moment to judge whether a corroded or cracked stretch should be cleaned, left alone or replaced. Swapping out a concealed section while everything is open is far less disruptive than cutting into a finished wall a few years later. When the footage shows pipe too fragile to jet, drain repair on that section is usually the more sensible plan.

Keep construction debris out of the pipes

Renovation crews produce material that should never go down a drain, and a utility sink or a freshly set shower drain is a tempting place to rinse tools. Thinset, grout and mortar can harden inside a pipe. Drywall joint compound and plaster settle into a dense paste. Latex paint film coats the pipe wall, and fine tile dust behaves much like silt.

• Cover or tape open drains and stub-outs as soon as fixtures come out
• Set up an outdoor bucket station for washing trowels, rollers and mixing buckets
• Let leftover grout or thinset harden in the bucket and throw it out with the solid waste
• Ask everyone on site not to pour paint water or mud into a toilet

Cleaning up after the remodel

If a drain in the new room runs slowly in its first weeks, debris from the job is a likely suspect. Soft residue such as joint compound, paint film and dust usually flushes out with a jetter. Cement-based material that has already cured is another story; it can bond to the pipe wall and may need a cutting head, or in a bad case replacement of the section where it settled. A camera pass tells the technician which kind of material is in the line before any pressure is applied. If you want to know more about the equipment, our Georgia overview of hydro jetting describes it.

Lawrenceville rules when hidden pipe is replaced

The city code separates clearing a line from replacing it. Lawrenceville's code leaves clearing a stoppage off the list of permitted work, but replacing a defective drain or waste pipe hidden in a wall or floor counts as new work that needs a permit and an inspection. Applications go to the city's Planning & Development Department, so a remodel that includes new drain piping is easier to schedule when the paperwork starts early.

Remodel questions about drains in Lawrenceville

Does moving a sink or toilet in a remodel change the drain plan?

Yes. A fixture in a new spot needs new drain piping and a new connection to the existing line, which is plumbing work in its own right and is planned along with the remodel. The line it ties into deserves a camera look first, since a new drain is only as good as the pipe it empties into.

Could a slow drain in a newly remodeled bathroom be job-site debris?

Quite possibly. Pull the stopper and shine a flashlight into the drain; a gray, gritty film or crumbs of white or gray material suggest grout or tile dust. Skip chemical openers, which do nothing to cement-based residue. If the drain stays slow, have the trap and the first few feet of pipe checked before the material has a chance to harden further.

Can old drain lines stay in place under a new floor?

Pipe that films clean and round can stay. The lines to think twice about are old cast iron with heavy scale or a thinning bottom, and galvanized drain pipe that has narrowed from the inside. Replacing a few feet while the floor is up is far less disruptive than lifting new tile later to reach them.

Plan the drains along with the remodel

Before the old fixtures come out of your Lawrenceville kitchen or bath, phone Alpha Plumbing and Sewer at (404) 409-4448, and we can look at the lines that will end up under the new work.