French drain cleaning, and how to tell if yours has failed
A french drain is perforated pipe in gravel, and it fails by filling with the fine soil it was built to keep out. We camera the line, jet what can be recovered, and tell you honestly when the gravel envelope is silted beyond cleaning and needs rebuilding.
Reviewed
The problem this solves
A french drain that worked when it was new and now leaves water standing above it.
How a french drain silts up
Water enters through perforations, and so does fine sediment. Without a filter fabric in good condition the surrounding soil migrates into the gravel and then the pipe, until the void that used to hold water is packed solid. The surface symptom appears years after the process starts.
What cleaning can and cannot recover
Jetting clears sediment from inside the pipe and often restores useful flow. It cannot rebuild a gravel envelope that has filled with clay, because that void is outside the pipe entirely. The camera tells us which situation we are in before you spend anything.
Why Leon County is hard on french drains
Red clay percolates poorly and moves readily into gravel, and the local canopy adds a constant organic load from above. A french drain here silts faster than the same installation would in sandier parts of Florida, which is why inspection intervals matter more.
QUESTIONS ABOUT THIS SERVICE
French drain cleaning questions
Can a clogged french drain be cleaned or does it need replacing?
Often it can be cleaned. Jetting recovers the inside of the pipe and that is frequently enough. Replacement becomes the honest answer when the gravel and fabric around the pipe have silted up, because no amount of cleaning inside the pipe fixes that.
How long should a french drain last?
Properly built with good fabric and clean stone, fifteen years or more. Built without fabric, or wrapped in the sock-style fabric that clogs, it can be substantially restricted within five. What we find in the camera usually tells us which one you have.
Why is water standing on top of my french drain?
Because water can no longer get in. Either the surface has sealed with silt and organics, or the gravel and pipe below are already full. Both look identical from above, and a camera run is the fastest way to tell them apart.
Get french drain cleaning scoped properly.
We inspect before we quote, so the price answers a defect we can show you rather than a guess.