Pipe Bursting in La Palma

Dairyland to a finished suburb in ten years

La Palma incorporated in 1955 under the name Dairyland, to protect the dairies from the subdivisions spreading out of Los Angeles County, and like its neighbor Cypress it gave up within a decade. The cows left, the name changed in 1965, and between about 1965 and 1975 the entire city was built: the tracts along La Palma Avenue, Walker, Moody, Valley View and Crescent, and the streets north toward Coyote Creek and the county line. Nearly all of it is slab-on-grade with cast iron under the house and, because it was built a few years later than the tracts to the south, more early ABS than clay from the foundation to the street. The few pockets built since the 1980s, including the newer homes on former dairy and business-park land, are on ABS and PVC.

With a housing stock this uniform the failures are uniform too. Cast iron under the slab channels out along the bottom over fifty years, so the camera sees a clean crown and misses a pipe that is nearly gone underneath. Early ABS cracks at glued fittings and bellies where the soil settled. The clay that does exist opens at the joints and takes roots.

Clay, the creek and ficus trees

La Palma is flat alluvial clay on the edge of the Coyote Creek floodplain. The clay swells in the winter rains and shrinks all summer, and five decades of that cycle has opened joints and worked every ABS fitting under most streets. Toward the creek on the north and west sides the water table is shallow and rises in a wet winter to the level of the laterals; groundwater enters at open joints and rust holes, carries fine soil out, and leaves voids that let the pipe settle and belly. The parkway trees planted with the tracts, mostly ficus, carob and liquidambar, are now large, and root intrusion is the most common finding on a La Palma sewer camera inspection, with channeled cast iron and cracked ABS fittings close behind.

Sewers and permits

The City of La Palma operates the local sewer collection system, and the lateral from the house to the connection at the main is the property owner's responsibility, including the part under the parkway and sidewalk. Lateral repair or replacement needs a plumbing permit from the city, and anything in the sidewalk, parkway or street needs an encroachment permit and an inspection before the pit is closed. The contractor should pull both and say so in the quote.

Which trenchless method fits a La Palma lateral

• Sewer pipe lining fits nearly all of the city: channeled cast iron under a slab, ABS with cracked fittings that still holds its shape and slope, and clay with root-intruded joints. A cured-in-place liner from the cleanout seals every joint, crack and rust hole in one pass and never touches the floor.
• Pipe bursting fits a collapsed section, a belly where the soil washed out, or a line that needs to be upsized. Two small pits and a new fused polyethylene pipe on the old alignment.
• Sectional point repair handles one crushed section under a driveway or one failed fitting on an otherwise sound line.

Crews that handle trenchless sewer repair throughout Orange County, La Palma included see the same 1960s cast iron and early ABS week after week, and a good one will tell you from the footage which method fits before quoting one.

What the job looks like

A camera inspection maps the line and marks every defect on the ground with its depth. Hydro jetting clears roots, scale and grease so the pipe wall can be seen and, if the line is being lined, so the resin bonds to clean pipe. Lining runs from the cleanout at the house; bursting needs a small pit at each end of the run. Most residential jobs finish in a day, with water off for a few hours during a liner cure, and you should receive the before-and-after footage. The diagnostic step that decides the method is described in what the inspection video reveals.

To compare installers who have been checked for licensing and CIPP training, you can find a verified CIPP contractor through an independent directory.

Pipe Bursting in La Palma

How pipe bursting works

A steel cable is threaded through the old sewer line from a pit at one end to a pit at the other. A cone-shaped bursting head, with new high-density polyethylene pipe fused to it, is pulled through by a hydraulic unit. The head splits the old clay or cast iron outward into the soil and the new pipe follows in the same alignment at the same depth. The result is a single fused length of pipe with no joints for roots to find.

When bursting is the right call

• Collapsed sections — a liner needs a host pipe to hold its shape; a collapsed run has none.
• Bellies — a low spot that holds water stays a low spot after lining. Bursting lays new pipe on a fresh bed.
• Undersized lines — bursting can upsize a 3-inch lateral to 4 inches; lining slightly reduces diameter.
• Badly deformed pipe — Orangeburg that has flattened, or cast iron with most of its bottom gone.

What the job looks like

One pit at the house or cleanout, one at the property line or the street connection, each a few feet square. Utilities that cross within a foot or two of the sewer path are located and potholed first. The pull takes an hour or two; the whole job, including fusing, connections, inspection and backfill, is usually one day.

Permits and the street

If the downstream pit is in the sidewalk, parkway or street, a right-of-way permit and restoration to city standards are required in addition to the plumbing permit. If the connection at the main is replaced, the city inspects it before the pit closes. Confirm who is handling this before work starts.

ZIP codes served in La Palma

Pipe Bursting is available throughout La Palma, including ZIP codes 90623.

More trenchless services in La Palma

Questions we hear in La Palma