=The House Drain= under ordinary circumstances receives waste water from sinks and baths, rain-water, and the discharge from the closets.
SHOWING DEPTH OF FLUID AND CONSEQUENT FLUSHING FORCE OF THREE DRAINS CONTAINING AN EQUAL QUANTITY OF SEWAGE.]
We may consider drains under the following heads: material, form, joints, gradient, ventilation, trapping. The first essential is that they should be water-tight, so that their contents do not percolate into the surrounding soil. _Socketed glazed stoneware pipes_ and _iron pipes_ best fulfil this condition. The best material for making stoneware pipes is Devon or Dorset, or similar fine clay, which makes a very strong pipe. Tested pipes free from cracks and flaws must alone be used. The pipes should be laid in straight lines, each pipe being arranged with the spigot and not the socket end directed towards the flow of sewage. The fall should not be less than 1 foot in from 40 to 60. If the fall is less than this amount, artificial flushing from the upper end of the drain is necessary. Usually branch drains are made 4 inches in diameter, the main house-drain having a diameter of 6 inches. A larger size than this is seldom necessary. Thus if A, B, and C be three drains with an equal fall and conveying an equal amount of sewage, the rate of travel and therefore the flushing force will be greater, because the depth of the fluid is greater, in A than in B, and in B than in C. Small drains are more completely self-cleansing than large drains. The water-tightness depends on the character of the joints. In this respect _iron drains_ present the great advantage over earthenware that there are fewer joints and that these can be rendered permanently water-tight without difficulty by being run with blue lead and well caulked. To render an earthenware drain water-tight, (_a_) it must be laid on a solid bed of cement concrete at least 6 inches thick, so as to prevent sinking, and under the house it should be covered with an equal thickness of cement concrete (I, Fig. 29). (_b_) The joints must be made with extreme care, the best Portland cement being used for the purpose. Clay is inadmissible, as the fibrils of tree-roots easily find their way through it. The inside of the joint must be raked by the workmen, before the next pipe is laid, to make sure that no fragments of hard cement are left projecting in its interior. Such projections are not uncommon causes of subsequent blockage. Various patent joints have been used, but they are no better than the above when properly laid. Just before the drain leaves the curtilage of the house and near its junction with the sewer, it is trapped, and on the house-side of the trap (E, Fig. 29) an inlet ventilator is provided. The general arrangement should be studied in Fig. 29.