Hey all -

We recently moved to a new house in a more rural area, so we're getting used to having a septic system. To be specific, we have an aerobic system that has spray heads. My parents house, where I grew up, has a conventional system, which is my only experience with septic. Here are a few questions that have come up in my mind - I'll reach out to our maintenance company, but thought this board probably has all the info I need and no $$ interest their answers

1. We have no disposal and everything I see says it would be a terrible idea to add one - no problem there, we can live without. My question is, my parents have lived in their house with a conventional system since 1993 - never has been pumped and when growing up, we had (and they still have) a disposal, and water consumption/usage was never even a discussion point. We have a smaller system, so I expect to have to potentially pump annually, but I'm trying to find out how my parents' system has survived so long with a disposal and no pumping?

2. As I mentioned, we have spray heads - does this mean we have no leach field? This may be a dumb question - hard to find good results online as so much out there seems to specifically talk about conventional.

3. Assuming we don't have any leach field, can we expand the size of our tank - would it simply be adding another tank and connecting it all up, or would it need to be a removal and replacement? What type of price would we be talking about (just asking as a ballpark - $5k, $10k, $25k, etc.)

Thanks all - trying to wrap my head around this. We've also got a detached shop and would one day like to build a bathroom in it (already has a sink), but obviously knowing what it would take to expand our septic is important and, as I understand it, may come up if you attempt to do any type of bedroom/bathroom additions.

Never had a standard septic system, but we've had an aerobic system for 20 years. If you're aerobic you don't have leach field, just sprinklers. You should have a settling tank, a treatment tank and a pump tank.
We've had our settling tank pumped twice in 20 years. We also have a garbage disposal, but only use it sparingly.
We just pump the settling tank if things start to back up, but should probably do it every 5 years or so depending on how many people are in the house.
You do need to add chlorine to the pump tank every so often.

Yes - ours has a liquid bleach tank that we fill weekly.

Thanks for the response - that sounds exactly like ours (3 tanks, etc.)

Do you mind me asking what size tank you have - ours is apparently 500 gallon/day which is okay for us now as our kids are small, but that is one of the things driving me to get more informed.

Additionally, it is pretty obvious the folks before us didn't do any pumping for years, but seeing as there were only 2 of them for at least the last decade or so, that may not be comparable (they did raise 2-3 kids here, but they are older now).

You might be over thinking things. I've owned a couple of homes with aerobic systems and I never knew the treatment rate of the systems. They are typically designed based on the square footage of the house and number of bedrooms. I wouldn't worry too much about it unless you start having problems or plan to add on a bedroom. We always try not to run multiple appliances at the same time (i.e. don't run the dishwasher, washing machine, and take a shower). We also try to spread laundry out over the week and not wash all loads on the same day.

No idea what size the tanks are, but we raised three kids in the house and never had any problem with the system - just regular maintenance.

One thing to consider if an older home/system...appliances haven't always been "efficient". Toilets flushed more, laundry used more water, dishwasher used more water.

That may sound great, until you think about the same amount of "stuff" is being used, just less water. The higher concentration of stuff compared to water volume could mean more pumping (less water to dilute during the breakdown process) than would have been expected when designed/installed.

That said, with regular maintenance, a properly designed system should get you 4-6 years between pumping.

Make sure you keep the grass/weeds around your spray heads down so they can actually spray. When we were on septic this meant weed eating around them weekly though I only mowed the "back back" every 3 weeks or so in summer.

Thanks all - this is all super helpful.

I had an aerobic system for 12 years and I have had septic for the rest of my life. I have had and still have a disposal. For my aerobic system I never had it pumped while I owned it and it was 12 years. It never had more than about an inch of sludge according to the annual inspection report. I have rebuilt the air pump twice myself and removed/cleaned the submersible pump once along with relaxing breaks and heads for the spray field. You just have to be smart with the disposal. It's used to chop up food particles so they pass to the system. It's not used to scrape off four pounds of vegetables and the remains of a steak you didn't eat.

So, you have aerobic. You have no leach field. My system took chlorine tablets. Some take bleach if you have that setup.

As for expanding, I can't speak to cost but your tanks are buried. You'd have to dig them up to replace.

Honestly the biggest problem I had was low flow at the spray heads and that was due to lint in the effluent tank which was from the washing machine. It would clog the spray heads and also the submersible pump. I pulled the pump myself to back wash the screen. Its not a job for the "that's gross" crowd. It had to be done.

In 12 years I had never had it pumped and it never had more than an inch or two so sludge according to the inspection reports.

Did you have the tanks inspected when you bought the home? Any idea when last pumped?

If has been a few years since pumping have it pumped anyway. Be there and watch it done. You'll get a better understanding of the tanks and how they work - especially the floats/pump. Have the tech show you how the box works. Make sure the tattletail light works for the aerator. Check that occasionally that bulb could go bad.

One more thing - get a pop out cleanout relief cap for our cleanout line. Look on Amazon for 3" x 4" Sewer Popper Cleanout & Relief Valve Brand: Jones Stephens. This will replace the cap on your cleanout line, it has 3" and 4" threads. The idea is that if your pump fails, tanks fill up and start to back up, this float will pop off the top of the cleanout line. This spot should be lower than your drains, toilets, etc in your house. Make sure the cleanout line is clean and free of grass, mulch etc. Hopefully it is in a flowerbed or near the house where you can view it easily.

Aerobic systems are great with a little PM and know what to watch for.

Thanks bobbunker- we did get it pumped, cleaned and inspected right after moving in. Put in a new compressor about a month later when the one in it failed and couldn't be rebuilt anymore. Also had new floats put in. Basically an entirely new system at this point. Good idea in the clean out - I'll take a look at those.