Hydro Jetting in Phoenix

When the cable keeps working for a few weeks and then the line closes again. A cable opens a hole through the blockage. That gets water moving, but grease stays coated on the pipe wall and root hairs stay in the joints, so the next clog starts on day one. A jetter runs a hose with a rear-facing nozzle up the line; the water jets pull the hose forward and scour the full circumference of the pipe as it comes back. The pipe ends up clean wall to wall. See jetting versus snaking a main line and what hydro jetting is.

The usual Phoenix candidates are a restaurant lateral lined with grease, a house main with root intrusion at the joints, a cast iron drain built up with scale, and a soda or ice-well drain with syrup sludge. For a one-time stoppage, the cable usually gets it done; see Phoenix drain cleaning.

Phoenix Water Services names grease and roots as the two main causes of sewer backups, and grease as the most frequent. Grease poured down a drain cools and hardens further along, and every layer catches the next. Roots go looking for water and find any crack or loose joint, then mat up inside the pipe. Cutting a root ball with a cable leaves the root stubs in place, and they grow back. Jetting removes the mat and the hair roots in the joint, though a joint that lets roots in will let them in again.

Phoenix's housing adds to it. About 40 percent of the city's homes were built before 1980, and older lines have more joints that have shifted.

Phoenix's grease manual says kitchen grease that gets past your interceptor raises the need for routine jetting and can lead to downstream damage the business is back billed for. It also bans enzymes, bacteria and solvents that dissolve grease, because they only move it further down the line. Mechanical cleaning is what is left, and jetting is the thorough version.

For kitchens we jet laterals from inside and run the main to the city sewer, usually before opening or after close, and the work inside is typically one to two hours. Soda and ice-well drains get a jetting pass with cleaning solution. Accounts on a maintenance schedule get each visit logged on the account, which is the kind of record a Phoenix grease inspector or a landlord asks to see. Phoenix's 2024 code amendment requires a two-way cleanout on the discharge side of all hydromechanical grease interceptors, and that cleanout is where the jetter goes in. If your interceptor has none, adding one makes every future cleaning faster. See restaurant lateral line jetting and scheduled drain maintenance.

At houses, the common reason is roots in the main, especially where mature trees stand near the sewer line. The city's advice is to keep new trees and shrubs away from the cleanout and the line, and to watch for slower flow when they are already close. A jetting pass followed by a camera tells you whether the line is just rooted or has a crack the roots are using. If it is cracked, jetting on a schedule is buying time, and a spot repair may be the better long-term answer. We'll show you the footage and let you choose.

We jet the private line from your cleanout to where it meets the city main. City Code 28-27 says no one may open into, use or disturb a public sewer without a Water Services permit, so the main and its manholes are the city's to clean. If the camera shows the main surcharging or blocked at your connection, that is a Water Services call. Cleaning a line needs no permit in Phoenix, so there is no paperwork on a jetting job.

Do not jet a pipe that is already broken. Water at jetting pressure in a collapsed section, an offset joint or a badly deteriorated cast iron or clay pipe can make the damage worse, which is why we camera older lines first when we suspect it. Read can hydro jetting damage old cast iron or clay. If the line is broken, the answer is a repair; see sewer repair. And if the clog is a single toy or a wad of wipes, a cable is faster and costs less.

Call with the address, how often the line clogs and whether there is a cleanout. We offer same-day service, 24/7 emergency service for backups, free estimates and upfront pricing before work starts. A camera run after jetting shows what the water left behind; see camera inspection after jetting and the Phoenix service area page.