Pipe Unclogging in Alfama

About our service in Alfama

Alfama forces you to change method. A large share of the houses here still have lead runs in the bathrooms and salt-glazed clay drains buried under the floor, left over from installations laid decades ago. Clay is rigid and its joints open as the building settles; lead is soft and wears thin from the inside. In both cases, a rodding machine spun hard does exactly what the customer least wants: instead of opening a way through, it splits the pipe wall and turns an afternoon's blockage into a job that involves taking up floors. Anyone who works this quarter often learns to recognise the sound and the resistance of an old pipe and to stop in time. Our rule in an old neighbourhood is to look before forcing. We feed the camera in at the nearest access point, follow the run and see what is holding things up: fat, limescale, a joint out of line, or a section already broken. With that picture we choose the lightest touch that will work, a small-diameter flexible rod or jetting at reduced pressure, which flushes material along rather than hammering the pipe wall. When the picture shows a collapsed pipe, we say plainly that no amount of unblocking will last there and that what is needed is to replace the section, telling you where it is and how long it runs. Access is the other chapter. In streets no van can enter, we arrive on foot up the steps with portable equipment and run hose from wherever we can stop, which is something to arrange beforehand and not on arrival. We protect old staircases and floorboards, which mark easily. Many homes in the quarter are holiday lets, and in those cases we fit the work between guests checking out and checking in. We work Monday to Saturday, from nine in the morning to eight in the evening, with priority for anyone with sewage coming back into the house.

What our pipe unclogging work in Alfama covers:

Services Included

• Careful clearing of old lead and salt-glazed clay pipework
• Camera survey before any mechanical work is attempted
• Jetting at controlled pressure for fragile pipework
• Unblocking toilets and gullies in homes no van can reach
• Locating broken sections and advising what needs replacing

Areas We Serve

We cover the Castelo, Mouraria, Sé, Santa Apolónia and the Escadinhas de São Miguel.

Work Gallery