Israeli government

[old man emu]

[Old Koreelah]

Another great Aussie tradition (and lots of jobs) lost.

 

Blame Gough Whitlam, who carried out a promise to bring sewerage to suburban Australia.

 

 

[Marty_d]

Ok, I'm all for a little nostalgia and rose-tinted past-gazing, but are we really saying it's a shame that the job of night-soil man has gone??

 

Personally I'm looking forward to the invention of matter transmission, where you get a little gate implanted in your lower bowel which transmits "the mail" straight to a central processing tank!

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

Ok, I'm all for a little nostalgia and rose-tinted past-gazing, but are we really saying it's a shame that the job of night-soil man has gone?? ...

Absobluddylutely not, Marty! As one who many times had to empty the can from our farm outhouse, I consider extending the sewage network to be one of Whitlam's great achievements.

 

 

[facthunter]

And 40 Pistins (you missed that.) Nev

 

 

[old man emu]

Forty-four door sedans

 

 

[spacesailor]

In the UK:

 

The Tapper-Man

 

Had a long pole with little weights on the end to tap on the upstairs windows to get you up for work.

 

 

[Yenn]

What we need now is to do away with the sewer system and get biologicly treated sewerage in the home. It is possible now and can be done without smell or disease risk.

 

One of the things limiting our growth and population increase is the lack of water. What is the greatest use of water in the home?

 

 

[spacesailor]

Already gone.

 

It was enforced on all new homes in Kurrajong Hights NSW, worked well untill power-outage switched off the system. When system restarted it pumped ALL the raw stuff onto their lawns,

 

big stink about that.

 

spacesailor

 

 

[octave]

Already gone.It was enforced on all new homes in Kurrajong Hights NSW, worked well untill power-outage switched off the system. When system restarted it pumped ALL the raw stuff onto their lawns,

 

big stink about that.

 

spacesailor

Funnily enough, my first house was in Kurrajong Heights (1985-1990) since there was and I would assume now no sewage system in this area we installed an Envirocylce system since absorption trench methods were no longer allowed to be installed. Our system worked very well. It came with a mandatory service agreement.From memory it could go 4 or 5 days without power also had an alarm system. These systems replaced soak away systems which in this steep terrain came with plenty of problems.

 

 

[spacesailor]

Somebody had to pay for the residents to be away from their homes till the stench subsided. ( my supervisor at work had a nice new house there).

 

Not a happy chappie for a few weeks that time.

 

spacesailor

 

 

[octave]

Somebody had to pay for the residents to be away from their homes till the stench subsided. ( my supervisor at work had a nice new house there).Not a happy chappie for a few weeks that time.

 

spacesailor

 

When was this?

 

 

[spacesailor]

Decades ago, when I was working!

 

spacesailor

 

 

[octave]

Decades ago, when I was working!spacesailor

The system we had could store 4 or 5 days without pumping to the irrigation system. Without power, nothing leaves the tank because this relies on the irrigation pump which also requires power. Eventually, the system would overflow I guess but there would be plenty of warning. Apart from that, there is not much choice in this area. The council under the right circumstances will approve composting toilets. Our neighbors who built shortly before we did we allowed to have a soakaway system which did not work very well.

 

 

[nomadpete]

I have had Enviro Cycle system for 10 yrs or so. Good in theory. Very expensive. The first air pump lasted two years. Cost $500. Next time I got a rubber repair kit for only $150. (Air pump is only an oversized aquarium pump). The liquid pump failed every 3 yrs, cost $150 each time.

 

So, after 10 yrs, cost me well over $1500 for replacement parts. That's without paying a certified installer.

 

Added to that, the council requires an annual inspection, which cost about $250 the first time. Once I saw what it involved, I decided to do my own checks on the aeration. It' not difficult to keep it bubbling away happily.

 

So, all in all, the environ take works well as long as you keep on paying. Our next house has an old fashioned passive absorption trench system . But nowadays even that has changed (more expensive than ever). Now these require 60 MTRS of trench set up with plastic covers and prescribed gravels. ( About three times larger than the old systems).

 

They tell me this is progresse

 

 

[Marty_d]

Yeah I'm not convinced by envirocycles either - for the reasons you mention Peter.

 

Our old septic system is still chugging along. Still, different areas have different soils & gradients which will affect the type of system needed. Mate of mine out at 7-mile beach said his block is pretty much sand, so the outflow from his septic is probably clean a metre away from the pipe.

 

 

[spacesailor]

My daughter's septic is surrounded by "pepper trees", plus a "willow tree or two.

 

And thats the only place grass stays green. (40d C at the moment) so septic tanks are good for the environment.

 

spacesailor

 

 

[Methusala]

Always been attracted by the concept of a Swedish style composting toilet. The low energy input could surely be provided from roof top solar. Don't know much about these systems as I'm a plumber so mostly experienced in pipework systems.

 

 

[spacesailor]

Perhaps the "dry composting drop toilet",

 

Natural Parks use them,

 

Great worm farms LoL.

 

spacesailor

 

 

[facthunter]

Grass and tree roots get into you septic runs. Inconvenient and expensive to redo them. Needs a good trencher, with all the mess THAT makes. OK, sort of, if you just have a paddock but a nice garden doesn't like it. Nev

 

 

[Phil Perry]

I love the smell of a kero lantern; always use them on the rare occasion I go camping. It's a very nostalgic, old world smell.

Are you sure that you're using Kerroe and not Jet 1 ?

 

 

[nomadpete]

Does the Israeli government have a problem with its septic system and Kero lanterns?

 

Drifting worse than MH370 wreckage

 

 

[Phil Perry]

I

 

Perhaps the "dry composting drop toilet",Natural Parks use them,

 

Great worm farms LoL.

 

spacesailor

We have used some of those 'Drop Toilets' whilst driving through France. . .they are always there in the little roadside 'Pull -In' rest stops on the Auto Route 'N' highways.. . .along with a little French bloke in an open sided caravan selling frankfurter Hot Dogs and 'FRITES' ( Bloody French Fries ) then there are always around 50 different flavours of mustard, Garlic sauces and mayonnaise to squirt over them too. . . . served in long Fresh French Bread sticks with slices of cheese covering the Frites. . . . . around two feet long ( 60 CM ) Quite nice actually. . . . Last time I had TWO of these things as I was feeling particularly Esulient at the time, . . but I farted Garlic continuously for the next 350 Miles to Bordeaux to the chagrin of my passengers. . . .

 

(Sorry - but I can only imagine distance in Miles,. . . .)

 

 

[Bruce]

Marty, you should have been the local environmental officer when I was forced to do the wrong type of effluent drain for the septic tank here on the farm. The actual guy was a scientific illiterate but he had the power to deem his opinions to be correct.

 

So we put in a short but deep effluent drain into impermeable clay and to this day in really wet weather we have to use a pump to dispose of the excess out onto a paddock. I wanted to have a much longer and shallower ag drain running slightly downhill and dug in to just below the bottom of the topsoil.

 

Yes it could be secretly changed and then it would be illegal but working better. Maybe my pump setup is illegal too.

 

 

[facthunter]

They need very little slope. Just enough to disperse evenly along their length. Got two plumbers in the family. Clay is rather IMPERVIOUS.. Nev