Will fixing the lateral tear up my whole yard?

Usually not. Relining and bursting are both done from a small pit, and the new lateral takes shape below ground while the yard above stays put. That counts on Valley lots where the pipe passes beneath a driveway, a patio or a big tree. When the video shows a single bad section, one small excavation over it may finish the job.

How can I tell roots from a broken pipe?

The video makes it obvious. Roots show up as a mass of fine strands pushing in at a joint; cutting them helps for a while, but they grow back. A break looks different: an offset where one section has dropped, soil visible through a crack, or water standing in a dip. Older laterals often show both, and the broken part has to be replaced.

Copper or PEX for a repipe?

California code allows either. PEX bends, so it can travel through an attic or a crawl space with few fittings, which means fewer joints hidden in the walls. Copper is stiff, has been used for generations and gives a tidy look wherever pipe stays exposed. You see a written figure for both, then decide.

Who owns the sewer pipe under the street, me or the City?

In the City of Los Angeles, the owner does, from the property line all the way to the main, roots included; the Bureau of Engineering calls that long-standing City policy. Work in the street needs an S-Permit and a Bonded Sewer Contractor.

Sewer Lateral Repair and Repiping, San Fernando Valley

Valley laterals and water lines at fifty and older

The numbers explain the calls. On the Valley side of Los Angeles the 1950s were the biggest building decade, with 24 percent of today's homes, and 57 percent of all housing went up between 1950 and 1979. A lateral that old has had decades for roots to find its joints and for the ground to shift under it. What we do about it depends on the video. A single cracked section gets cut away and a new piece is clamped in with a rubber coupling at each end. Pipe that is cracked along its run but still round can take a resin liner that hardens into a pipe within the pipe. Where the old line has come apart, a bursting head shatters it and drags fresh pipe along the same route from one or two small pits. In the City, lateral work needs a Bureau of Engineering S-Permit under LAMC 64.12, and anything in the street or sidewalk must be done by a Bonded Sewer Contractor, so if the camera puts your break under the pavement, you hear that before any price is written.

Supply piping wears out on its own schedule. LADWP maintains the service line and the meter; from the meter to the last faucet, the pipe is yours. Rusty first draws, low flow at the farthest bathroom, leaks at threaded fittings and a water bill climbing for no reason are what owners usually notice. If your house sits on a concrete slab, as many postwar California tract houses do, new lines usually run through the attic and drop down inside the walls, so nobody breaks the floor. A house on a raised foundation can often be repiped from the crawl space. In a condo, one riser may feed several units, so we confirm which pipe is failing and bring in the association before a shared wall is touched.

You see the footage with the plumber first. Then an itemized written estimate comes for your approval, and we pull the permits, from LADBS and the Bureau of Engineering in the City or from your own city elsewhere, and carry them through final inspection. When a same-size underground water pipe is replaced on an LADBS Express Permit, the old pipe stays uncovered until the inspector has seen it.

With each lateral and repipe job

CSLB #1131308 (C-36 Plumbing), with the $25,000 bond the state lists for it
24-hour emergency response once wastewater is backing into the house
Line-by-line written pricing, approved by you before a shovel or saw comes out
Our written workmanship warranty on each lateral repair and each repipe

Signs the lateral or the pipes are failing

Sewage surfacing in a tub or shower as soon as a toilet flushes
Toilet water bubbling as the washer pumps out
Sewage odor outdoors, or a strip of lawn that stays soft and sinks
Drains slowing again only months after roots were cut from the line
Rust-colored water first thing in the day, or a weak trickle at the far end of the house
Drips at threaded joints, one warm patch of floor, or bills climbing while use stays flat

Video and a locator

We send the camera from a cleanout, or through a pulled toilet, all the way to the main. A locator then marks each defect on the ground above it and notes how deep it lies.

The smallest repair that will hold

The footage picks the method: a spot repair in a small hole, relining, bursting, or a full trench when the old pipe can support nothing else.

Permits and utility marks first

We pull the permit from LADBS or your city, add the Bureau of Engineering S-Permit when City lateral work calls for it, and have buried utilities marked before a shovel goes in.

Tested, buried, put back

We test the new section with the trench still open. Where a cleanout will make the next service visit easier, we add one, then put the lawn, concrete or plaster back as the estimate describes.

How we handle laterals and repipes

Two different systems live on this page: the lateral that carries wastewater out to the main, and the water lines hidden in your walls and floors. Working from Canoga Park, we follow four rules on all of it.

Trenchless whenever the pipe allows

Relining or bursting is the first thing we price whenever the existing lateral can accept it, because either one leaves driveways, front steps and mature trees in place.

A repipe route planned in advance

We map each new copper or PEX line, fixture by fixture, before cutting into drywall. Over a slab the lines go through the attic; over a crawl space they go underneath. Either way, wall openings stay few and small.

Permits pulled and closed

In the City we file with LADBS, add the S-Permit for lateral work, meet the inspector and close everything out, which keeps a future sale clean. The other cities run their own process, and Westlake Village goes through the County.

Restoration written into the estimate

Concrete, sod, sprinkler lines and drywall patches are itemized from the start, so putting the yard and walls back never arrives as a surprise bill.

Why one sewer or repipe job is bigger than another

For a lateral, three things drive the scope: the length of bad pipe, its depth, and whatever now stands or grows on top of it. Lawn is easy to dig. A driveway, a large tree, a flight of steps or a block wall is not. Lots in Hidden Hills mostly run an acre or more, so laterals and service lines there are long, and hillside homes south of Ventura Boulevard can mean steep, deep runs. A break under the street brings in the S-Permit and a Bonded Sewer Contractor. Clay that has collapsed will not hold a liner, so that stretch gets dug up.

A repipe grows with the house: square footage, bathroom count, the pipe you choose and the number of wall openings needed. A slab house routes differently from one over a crawl space, and a condo may need the association's approval before work starts.

One written estimate lists the permits, the inspections and the restoration, and work waits for your approval.

Sewer and repipe work across the county

We are based in Canoga Park, and we take lateral and repipe jobs on the Valley side of Los Angeles, in the cities west and north of it, and in every other city of Los Angeles County.

Canoga Park and the west Valley

Homes from 1913 to 1939 in Canoga Park's old Owensmouth core, and the postwar ranch tracts of Winnetka, Reseda, West Hills and Chatsworth, where any original laterals and supply lines would now be 60 to 70 years old.

Across the rest of the Valley

Panorama City, planned in 1947 with more than 4,000 homes, Granada Hills, which grew by 1,000 percent in the 1950s, the tracts of North Hills, Mission Hills and Northridge, and the hillside homes of Encino, Tarzana and Sherman Oaks.

Hidden Hills, Calabasas, Agoura Hills and Westlake Village

Owner laterals running to County-maintained mains, street portion included, plus the backflow preventer and cleanout Hidden Hills recommends. Where a County-reviewed septic system fails within 200 feet of a public sewer, the fix is a sewer connection, not a septic repair.

Malibu, Santa Clarita and beyond

Malibu homes on septic under the City's own program, where the drain line to the tank is still plumbing, and Santa Clarita, where the owner keeps the lateral even when the trouble sits under the street. The rest of the county is covered too.

Sewer and repipe questions

Three or four leaks in the supply lines of one house are a pattern, not bad luck. The pipe is thinning everywhere, and a repipe ends the cycle instead of chasing the next pinhole.

Trenchless work needs only an access pit at one end, occasionally a second at the other. Relining leaves a resin pipe cured in place inside the old one. Bursting splits the old pipe outward and draws new pipe into the opening. The lawn, the walkway and the roots above are left alone.

A repipe comes with a schedule that shows which rooms are affected on which day and when the water will be off.

Most families stay at home during a repipe. Patching the openings is the last step, and it was in the written estimate from the beginning.

Copper and PEX are both allowed for drinking water under California code. We stand behind the installation with our written workmanship warranty; the manufacturer's terms apply to the pipe.

24/7 Emergency Plumbing

Burst lines and sewer backups, with the phone picked up around the clock.

Drain Cleaning & Hydro Jetting

Rooted laterals jetted clear, then checked again on video.

Water Heater Repair & Installation

Tanks repaired or replaced, with two seismic straps and the city permit.

Leak & Gas Leak Detection

Slab leaks and gas piping leaks traced, fixed and tested.

Sewage in the house after dark

A person answers all night, on weekends and on holidays. Wastewater backing into a home in any city of Los Angeles County gets our 24-hour emergency response, and we come from Canoga Park.

Sewer Repair & Repiping