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Lebanon Plumbers, home

Drain & Sewer

Sewer Camera Inspection

The cheapest hour you can spend on a drain problem. It turns a guess about what is buried in your yard into a measured fact.

(717) 000-0000Request this service

What is included

What this service covers

What we actually do on this job, and what you can expect us to deal with while we are there.

  • Inspecting laterals, main lines and larger branch lines
  • Identifying pipe material, diameter and condition
  • Finding breaks, offsets, sags, root intrusion and collapses
  • Measuring the exact distance from the access to the defect
  • Locating and marking the position on the ground above
  • Pre-purchase inspections on older properties
  • Post-repair verification that work was done properly

Signs to look for

You may need this if you are seeing any of these

  • A drain that has blocked more than once in the same place
  • Sewage smells outdoors with no obvious source
  • A soft, sunken or unusually green strip across the yard
  • Being quoted for a sewer replacement without anyone looking first
  • Buying a house built before the 1970s with original drainage
  • Slow drainage across the whole property rather than one fixture

Why it happens

What usually causes it

01

Symptoms that several faults share

Roots, a sag, an offset joint and a partial collapse can all produce the same recurring backup. They need completely different repairs at completely different costs, and no amount of experience distinguishes them from the surface.

02

Nobody knows what is buried

Records for older laterals in this county are patchy or nonexistent. Material, depth, route and whether there is even a cleanout are frequently unknown until someone looks.

03

Repairs quoted on assumption

The gap between an eight foot spot repair and a full replacement to the street is large. Quoting without footage means pricing the risk, and that risk gets priced into your bill.

Our approach

How we handle this job

Specific to this work rather than a generic checklist bolted onto every page.

  1. 01

    Find or create access

    We work from a cleanout where one exists. Where there is not one, we will discuss the options before doing anything, including whether fitting a cleanout is worth doing as part of the visit.

  2. 02

    Run the camera the full length

    The camera goes down to the connection rather than stopping at the first thing it finds. A line often has more than one issue, and knowing about the second one now is better than discovering it mid-dig.

  3. 03

    Locate and mark the defect

    The camera head transmits its position, which is tracked from above ground. We mark the spot and note the depth, so any excavation goes to one place rather than hunting.

  4. 04

    Show you and explain it

    You see the footage and get a plain explanation of what it shows, including the distance and what it means for cost. If the pipe is fine, we will tell you that.

Why this comes before a quote, not after

There is a reason we put a camera down before pricing sewer work: the same set of symptoms can be produced by four different faults costing wildly different amounts to fix.

Recurring backups in a Lebanon city rowhome might be roots at a clay joint twelve feet out, a scaled cast iron section right at the foundation, or a collapse under the sidewalk. From the basement they look identical. On camera they are unmistakable, and so is the distance to them.

Once that distance is known and marked on the ground, excavation becomes one targeted hole instead of a trench searching for the problem. That is where the money is saved.

A plumber opening an exterior sewer cleanout in a front lawn

What the footage actually tells you

More than most people expect. Pipe material and diameter, the condition of the wall, whether joints have opened or offset, whether there is a low section holding water, how deep the run sits, where it changes direction, and whether there is an accessible cleanout anywhere on it.

It also frequently finds the thing nobody was looking for. A line inspected for roots at thirty feet turns out to also have a sag at fifteen that explains the pattern of blockages far better.

A sewer inspection camera feeding a colour monitor during a drain survey

Before you buy an older house here

A standard home inspection does not look inside the buried drainage. On the pre-1970s housing that makes up a large share of Lebanon city and the older borough cores, the lateral is often original, and original in this context means clay or cast iron that has been in the ground a very long time.

A failed lateral discovered after closing is entirely your problem. Discovered before, it is a negotiating point. It is a small check against a large downside.

Questions

Camera inspection questions

Specific to this job. Every service page here has its own, none repeated.

General FAQ

Common questions

Can you tell what my pipe is made of from the camera?
Usually, yes. Clay, cast iron, Orangeburg, PVC and ABS all look distinctly different on camera, and material tells you a lot about likely failure mode and remaining life. Clay comes in short jointed sections and fails at the joints. Cast iron scales and rusts rough. Orangeburg, a bituminised fibre pipe used in some mid-century construction, deforms into an oval and is generally at the end of its life wherever it turns up.
How do you know where to dig afterwards?
The camera head carries a transmitter. We track it from the surface with a locator and mark the position on the ground, along with the depth. That is what turns a sewer repair into one targeted excavation instead of a trench following the pipe until the problem appears. It is the single biggest cost saver on the whole job.
Is a camera inspection worth it before buying a house?
On an older property, it is one of the better value checks available. A standard home inspection does not look inside the buried drainage, and a failed lateral is a five figure problem that becomes yours at closing. Around here that matters most for anything built before the 1970s, and particularly for the older Lebanon city housing where clay and cast iron laterals are common.
What if the camera cannot get all the way through?
That is itself a finding. A camera that stops at a fixed distance usually means a collapse, a severe offset, or a blockage solid enough to need clearing first. We note the distance, and often the sensible sequence is to clear the line and then re-run the camera, because a clear pipe shows its own condition far better than one full of debris.
Will you give me the footage?
Yes, and you should expect that from anyone doing this. You are entitled to see the evidence behind a repair quote, and it is worth having if you are getting a second opinion, making an insurance claim, or negotiating on a property purchase. Be wary of any contractor who describes what they saw but will not show it to you.
My line was cleared and it blocked again. Is that enough reason for a camera?
Yes. One blockage can be bad luck or something that should not have gone down the drain. The same line blocking twice in the same place means something down there is catching material every time, and clearing it repeatedly is just paying for the symptom on a schedule. A single inspection usually costs less than two more clearances.
Do I need a camera inspection if my drains are fine?
No. There is no reason to inspect a drainage system that is behaving, and we are not going to suggest one. The two exceptions are buying an older property and planning work like a driveway or an extension over the run, where knowing the route and condition beforehand is much cheaper than discovering it afterwards.

Related services

Where we cover for this

All service areas

Ready when you are

Need camera inspection in Lebanon County?

Tell us what is going wrong. We come out, look at it properly, and give you the price before anything starts.

  • Licensed and insured
  • Residential and commercial
  • Price agreed before work starts

Talk to a plumber

Tell us what is going wrong and we will arrange a visit.

(717) 000-0000

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