OK - so we've bought a house in rural NSW that's at least 100 years old, and has had bits added and taken away from it over a long period of time. It's going to be a labour of love, and needs a lot of love, but should look great in the end.
So, issue no. 1.
We are planning on putting a garage in the back yard, and in the planning process have to ascertain where the sewer, drain, and water lines go. Water is easy - the termite inspection company put a hole in the main pipe to the house so we know where that is. However, the most recent sewer/drainage plans we got from the council were 1976, and there are some things missing from it.
a. an outside toilet that seems to have been there for a while doesn't appear on it at all.
b. 1, of not 3, brick lined pit drains (?stormwater, ?septic pits) don't appear on the plan
c. a rectangular brick lined, concrete covered trench at the back of the yard doesn't appear on the plan.
Add to this that we've discovered ceramic ?stormwater pipe 5cm below surface that doesn't appear to be connected to anything except the trench at the back and the fact that the council plans appear to be entirely wrong, and we're in a bit of a jam. We think we've found the main sewer/drain line from the house, about 600mm deep and ceramic with concrete ?anchor points, but it (again) doesn't match the plan.
Our options at the moment are excavate the entire back yard to see what we have, what is connected to anything, and what is redundant, hire someone who may be able to do this faster, or maybe go back to council and ask if they have any other ideas about how to find out what goes where and what works.
So the question is - what has been the experience with clay sewer/drain pipes, what has been the experience with sewer/drain lines that don't match what the council have, and how much should we be excavating to try and unravel the mess?
Many thanks
Kathy