Sectional Point Repair in Mantua

Mantua's river village and what lies under it

Mantua grew up where the upper Cuyahoga River was bridged and milled, and its core along Main Street, Prospect Street and High Street holds homes and storefronts from the 1830s through the 1920s. When the village sewer system was built, those houses were connected with vitrified clay laterals in short jointed lengths, often with cast iron through the foundation wall. The postwar streets on the higher ground east and west of the center, built in the 1950s and 1960s, may hold clay, Orangeburg fiber pipe or asbestos-cement.

Homes built from the late 1970s on, and the newer lots toward the township edges, generally have PVC laterals. The village is small enough that most laterals are short, but the oldest ones near the river are also the deepest in groundwater, and that combination defines sewer work here.

Floodplain clay, a high water table and river trees

The low streets of Mantua sit on the Cuyahoga floodplain, where silty clay and old river deposits keep the water table close to the surface for much of the year. A clay lateral with open joints in that ground does not just leak out; it takes water in, running half full of groundwater all spring and washing fine soil into the pipe until a void opens outside it and the pipe drops. On the hill above the river the soil is glacial till with a heavy clay fraction, and the frost that reaches three feet heaves it every winter.

Willows, sycamores and cottonwoods line the river and its backwaters, and sugar maples and silver maples shade the older streets. Their roots follow the moisture leaking from every clay joint. A camera run on a lateral near the river usually shows water trickling in at several joints and root curtains at the rest, with a belly or two where the bedding has washed away.

Lining, bursting and point repair in wet ground

A camera inspection and a locate come first. For a clay lateral that is cracked, rooted and infiltrating but still round, cured-in-place pipe lining is the usual recommendation and the one that does the most for the village plant, because it stops the groundwater from entering. The crew cuts roots, hydro jets the line, then inverts or pulls an epoxy-saturated felt liner through the run and cures it with hot water, steam or UV light. The result is a jointless pipe that neither roots nor groundwater can enter.

When the camera cannot pass a collapsed or crushed section, pipe bursting replaces the run with fused HDPE pulled between a pit at the house and a pit near the main. In the floodplain those pits fill with water and must be shored and pumped, which is part of what an experienced crew brings. For a single failed joint on an otherwise sound line, a sectional point repair, a short liner cured over that spot, avoids relining the whole run.

Village permits, the right-of-way and inspection

The Village of Mantua issues the sewer permit and performs the inspection, and a pit in the street or sidewalk requires a right-of-way permit from the village. Along Route 44 or Route 82 the state transportation department may also be involved. Properties outside the corporation line in Mantua Township are mostly on septic and go through the Portage County health district. The inspector expects to see bursting pits open before backfill and the post-cure video on a lining job.

The day of the work and how to choose an installer

Plan on water being off for several hours, a truck at the curb and a crew at the cleanout or a small pit by the foundation. Lining is normally a one-day job; bursting in wet ground can take two once dewatering and restoration are counted. Before signing, get the camera footage, a written method and the product name of the liner or pipe. To compare candidates, find a verified CIPP contractor and ask each one how it handles groundwater at the liner ends and in the pits, since that is the problem that defines sewer work in a river village like this one.

Sectional Point Repair in Mantua

Fix the spot, not the line

A sectional point repair treats a short length of pipe, usually two to six feet, instead of the whole lateral. A short fiberglass or felt liner saturated with resin is positioned over the defect on an inflatable packer, pressed against the wall, and cured in place. The rest of the line is untouched. Where the defect cannot be lined, the alternative is a small excavation at that exact spot, made possible because the camera and locator have already marked it to within inches.

When it makes sense

One identifiable defect, or two or three close together, on a line whose remaining footage is sound: a joint crushed when a driveway was poured over it, a single root-intruded joint under a parkway tree, a break where the lateral crosses another utility trench, or the transition where under-slab cast iron meets the clay or ABS running to the street.

When it does not

If the camera shows the same defect at every joint, or channeling along the whole bottom of a cast iron line, fixing one spot moves the next backup a few feet down the pipe. A full liner costs more today and far less over the next few years.

A fair test

Ask to see footage of the pipe on both sides of the proposed repair. If it is clean for the full run, a point repair is honest and economical. If it is not, ask why a full liner was not proposed.

ZIP codes served in Mantua

Sectional Point Repair is available throughout Mantua, including ZIP codes 44255.

More trenchless services in Mantua

Questions we hear in Mantua