I recently purchased a 30 yr. old house that has a pit & ejector pump on the output side of the septic tank. It is buried approx. 1 ft. I recently dug it up for the first time to investigate what I thought was a bad/intermittent float valve causing the pump to be operating constantly. My suspicion was confirmed.

While looking at the setup it occurred to me that the pit has no direct vent to the outside. Therefore it has to get vented back through the house plumbing. I believe this is called wet venting. Then it occurred to me that this might be the cause of strange problem we've been having on occasion, which is a lavatory trap that gets siphoned dry (you can hear the "pop-pop" of the siphoning/sucking action). Additionally, when this happens, the water level in the toilet bowl gets lower.

My question is: Does even an outdoor, underground pit need to be directly vented to the outside?

Thanks,
Phil

Being on the downhill side of the septic tank I am guessing you drainfield is on high ground or relocated to a different area. The house drain and venting should be plenty.

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My question is: Does even an outdoor, underground pit need to be directly vented to the outside?

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Yes! The pit's sealed and MUST have a dedicated vent whether it's inside or outside. The tank should have a sealed opening that was designed to run a vent out of. A ejector pit vent should NEVER be tied back into the house venting system.Good luck, Tom

Do research on a lift station. Your situation is more like a lift station than a sump situation.

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Originally Posted by doug238

do research on a lift station. your situation is more like a lift station than a sump situation.

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Doug, A sump pump was never mentioned and a lift station describes a ejector pit, which is what he has. The question was about a vent which has already been answered. Regards, tom

Tom, the situation is a 30 year old home, no vent on pump on downhill side of septic system. It never had a vent because it is a lift station for the septic system. Being on the downhill side of the septic tank it can not possibly affect the lavatory trap on a house system that is vented. He is looking at this like a sump pump situation in a sealed area and that situation simply does not apply. A typical lift station does not require an individual vent.

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a typical lift station does not require an individual vent.

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If it's sealed it does. And a ejector pit's sealed, otherwise it's called a sump pump with a open pit.

Thanks for the responses folks.

I can't really say if the pit ever had a vent in the past or not. When I dug it up, I could see that the pit lid had been replaced with one that was home-made out of 1/2" PVC board material. If it did have a vent before, that person did not put one back on.

The drain field dist. box is approx. 250 ft. from the tank/pit. Our lot is pretty flat so I'm just assuming they had to pump it due to not being able to provide a gravity feed.

For what it's worth, I went ahead & installed a vent pipe in the pit cover before shoveling the dirt back in. The pit is about 15 ft' away from the house & windows. I figured if it started smelling, I'd install a charcoal filter.

Another problem that this system had was the lack of an alarm, which I installed. Also, I determined that the old float switch (which was working intermittantly) was set too high. It's turn on level was up so high that the effluent was allowed to fill the tank (almost to the brim) before turning the pump on. Basically, the effluent would be half way up the pit's inlet opening before things got drained. Maybe this was also part of my lavatory trap problem. It's only been about a week, but so far I haven't seen/heard the trap go dry.

Thanks again.

Phil

If the pit had a wooden cover with dirt on top then it was "kinda sealed" . You did the right thimg in venting it.
Let me know if things are still working OK. Tom

Hi, Equates,
You give good answers but you got to look for the date first, Cheers, Tom