Having undertaken trials of Vaporooter treatment on main line sewers, Len has witnessed the reduction of sewer chokes and overflows in problematic areas, typically in the older parts of town where clay pipe was laid and the trees planted are now mature and fully grown. The City of Wagga Wagga has decided to extend the scheduled maintenance program of annual mainline foaming to include branch line treatments applied by in house staff.

A Drainchem Minifoamer was purchased in June 2005 and staff were trained in the application of Vaporooter. The ground crew target areas that have a history of failures. As time goes on, less problematic areas will be targeted to ensure that the root problem is kept at bay. Now that in house staff are able to apply Vaporooter, the Council does not have to wait to treat lines that are causing problems now. The treatments can be worked into their busy schedule and if something else more urgent comes up Council can stop foaming and attend to that problem. Similarly, if it is an unusually slow day the Council has plenty of lines that will benefit from a treatment of Vaporooter.

The cost per branch line is significantly reduced by treating the pipes in house. Council will continue to let an annual contract for mainlines, as this has proved to reduce the quantity and frequency of sewer failures. Meanwhile, the branch line program is only in its infancy but the Council is confident that the results will improve customer service standards, reduce operating costs and inconvenient call outs while preserving the condition of valuable assets.

GWMW get results with root foaming procedure

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Another happy Vaporooter client is Grampians Wimmera Mallee Water (GWMW), which has used the RSP Environmental Services chemical treatment process since 1989 as part of their preventative maintenance programs.

The main aim of the GWMW program is to reduce the ever-increasing number of sewer blockages, caused by tree root infestation. GWMW has some notoriously bad areas with shallow sewers and high numbers of street trees located within a few metres of the sewer mains.

Over the years, the authority has trialed several different products and has found the product and methodology used by RSP Environmental Services to be the most effective to date.

GWMW has inevitably experienced failures in the chemical treatment process, but RSP has always honoured its guarantee and returned, sometimes more than once to retreat the failed sections of mains.

RSP Environmental Services are also always willing to work through different strategies with the authority, endeavouring to eliminate these failures including, at their own expense, putting a camera through failed sections to analyse the reasons behind the failure.