Not a fosse septique?!?

[Lyndzena]

Please can somebody help us identify our waste system.  When we bought our house in Calvados (Dec 04), the previous owners were adament that it wasn't a fosse septique, but was a biological wastage system.  They indicated that there wasn't a 'tank' as such.  With regards to maintenance they just said not to put any bleech or coffee grinds down the sink / toilet and that there was nothing to empty.  They said that Ariel, Persil, sun were all fine to use.

Since then, we have had sewage water back up into the cloakroom sink and washing machine hose after doing a weekends washing.  We have opened up a hatch in the floor of the back kitchen.  Underneath is a 'mini tank' which is about 2.5 foot by 1.5 foot and has all the waste water (some pipes are diverted into the house just to go through this mini tank) leading into one side from a pipe about 10cm in diameter.  This leads into one side on the mini tank, where there is soil and worms! (And what looks like loads of tissue paper).  There is then a concrete divide where the water seeps through the the other side and the pipe that leads out to under the garden (we presume).  The mini tank smells awful - which indicates to us that it is some sort of filter / initial filter / the biological waste system.

Before we found this hatch, we had a plumber round, who wanted to dig up our conservatory because he thought that the back up of sewage might be due to a brocken pipe - digging up my conservatory was not an option i liked, hence the investigations we did into the hatch (which looked like it hadn't been opened in years).  Anyway this doesn't give me much confidence that the plumber knows much about this system we have. 

Does anybody know what kind of system this could be?  I have searched the forum under fosse and got the impression that the Marie will have the original system plans etc - so that is one avenue we can explore.   If you do know what system it is, can you give me any info on it's maintenance?  From reading the forum - it also seems that we may need to have a fosse septique installed anyway to meet some regulations.  If so does anybody know what a fosse septique costs for a system supporting 4 bedrooms and 1 lounge/diner?  Also how long does it take to put one in?  (We have lots of sloping land, so could position down the land away from the house with a natural fall).

Many thanks in advance for your advice / answers

Lyndzena

[Debra]

It sounds like ours and though I could be completely wrong, I think our estate agent said ours was a bac a sable?  Anyway, ours has a tank like that and then another, larger tank under our drive, and then it drains off into various 'old wells' underground.  It doesn't need emptying and we were told there were no restrictions as to what we could put down it (including bleach) and that it doesn't need emptying.  We were told ours needed no maintenance.....  We were also told that it doesn't conform to the latest recommendations and we will have to connect to the mains sewage system when it comes to the village next year (which should cost around €500), but as the mains sewerage is imminent, we don't have to do anything before then.  Connecting to the mains is apparently quite simple from this kind of system - just a matter of re-routing the main pipe to the mains.  Ours is smelly once in a while and then just clears up on its own.  We're going to leave it until the mains sewarage system is implemented - unless we have any horrible problems like yours beforehand!  You would think your plumber would know the system!  Can you not ask the previous owners?  Or your notaire?  Our notaire highlighted what type of system it was on our final contract, making sure we knew it would have to be changed. 

[Lyndzena]

Hello Debra

 

Thank you for your reply and suggestions.  We are going to ring the previous owners, but i did not think of the paperwork we got when we completed - I will check through it.

 

Many thanks

 

Lyndzena