Sewage smell every time neighbour flushes Saniflo and pipe hammer

[Sbm496]

Hi, I'm hoping someone might be able to give me some advice. I'm in a semi detached, and unfortunately our neighbour's pipework all connects to ours.
We've been getting a couple of issues with the plumbing ever since he put in a saniflo downstairs 5 years ago (unfortunately he is awful and can't be approached because he's aggressive).

1. We get a sewage smell in our downstairs bathroom everytime our neighbour flushes the saniflo (which is pumped upstairs into his pipework which then connects to ours within our property). We also get a smell up the outside drain.

2. We started getting pipe hammer everytime our neighbour used his taps and washing machine - really loud. We now get quieter hammer when we use our taps as well.

We've had plumbers in and they're a bit baffled. Any suggestions or ideas would be much appreciated - we're at our wits end. Thanks

 

[Keefy]

Hey there, sorry to hear you're suffering this problem - especially as your neighbour appears a bit aggressive. From the information you've provided I'm at a loss as to where or what the problem could be although mentioning the word 'Saniflo' pulls me in that direction.

Might seem strange to you but sometimes plumbers have to ask strange questions like;

*What's the conversation with your neighbour that causes so much friction?
*Is there a specific time of day you notice the problem?
*Does 'downstairs' mean a cellar or ground floor?
*Can you recreate the problem through photos or video?

I love fault finding as do many other professional plumbers here so any further information will be welcome.

Solving your problem can often be helpful to ourselves in future situations.

 

[Sbm496]

Hey there, sorry to hear you're suffering this problem - especially as your neighbour appears a bit aggressive. From the information you've provided I'm at a loss as to where or what the problem could be although mentioning the word 'Saniflo' pulls me in that direction.

Might seem strange to you but sometimes plumbers have to ask strange questions like;

*What's the conversation with your neighbour that causes so much friction?
*Is there a specific time of day you notice the problem?
*Does 'downstairs' mean a cellar or ground floor?
*Can you recreate the problem through photos or video?

I love fault finding as do many other professional plumbers here so any further information will be welcome.

Solving your problem can often be helpful to ourselves in future situations.

Hi Keefy,

Thanks for your reply, I'll try and answer your questions.

*Any conversation causes friction - he doesn't want to contribute to maintaining the shared pipework (we're looking into our legal options because by law it looks like he should pay half for any work on the private sewers). He smashed my car mirror when we lettered him to say we had blocked drains and needed to clear them - now we've had to install cctv.

*We only get the smell when the Saniflo flushes (which we can hear so that's how we know). The pipe hammer is only when either his washing machine is on (which we can hear) or when, we assume, he's using taps etc - worse in the morning and at bed time. On our side it's just when we use the taps. Also if we run the water in our kitchen, the hammer stops while it's running.

*downstairs is the ground floor (our toilet is plumbed in to the outside line - only our neighbour has a Saniflo)

* I'm not sure really how to recreate without having to access my neighbour's property - most the issues seem to come from him using the toilets etc.

 

[rpm]

I`m wondering if, when the saniflo fires up and discharges the burst of water under pressure is somehow sucking the water out of a trap in your bathroom allowing the smells in. It shouldnt but cant think of another reason.

 

[Sbm496]

I`m wondering if, when the saniflo fires up and discharges the burst of water under pressure is somehow sucking the water out of a trap in your bathroom allowing the smells in. It shouldnt but cant think of another reason.

I'll have a chat with the plumber and suggest that, thank you! Yeh the house is very old and there's a lot of things that don't quite work the way they should!