Wotcha all,
The asbestos thread yesterday kicked me to finally ask about this (and trying to hijack that thread didn’t work, so I’ll resort to my own.)

I’ve got asbestos drainpipes/rainfixings for some unholy reason, and since they’re knackered and I’m having some work done soon they’ll have to go. I understand from the other threads about how to safely dick around with the nasty stuff, but I’m all of a quandry about how I get them out of the ground, and how I then marry new drainpipes to the drain. These are the bunnies:

[/url]IMAG0088 by spud-face, on Flickr[/img]

[/url]IMAG0087 by spud-face, on Flickr[/img]

So do I just break up the concrete around them and dig down till I find the end, or what?

Thanks for any help hive-mind – This’ll go horribly, horribly wrong if I just ham-fistedly dive into it.

They could be asbestos cement, which has a low risk. Go to your local recycling centre (dump) and ask for the special plastic sheeting for wrapping asbestos sheet. They will probably make you sign it out. Soak everything in water, wear a mask and remove the pipes with the lest possible breakage. Wrap everything up and take it back to the dump. You will be told to put it in a special container. This will be emptied in a landfill and all the contents crushed up by a big machine with spikey steel wheels…. ha ha.

This will be emptied in a landfill and all the contents crushed up by a big machine with spikey steel wheels

You’d think they’d incinerate it to get rid of the stuff?

This will be emptied in a landfill and all the contents crushed up by a big machine with spikey steel wheels…. ha ha.

No it won’t be. It’ll go to a specialist hazardous waste landfill and it certainly won’t be crushed up, at least not in the open air. Lots and lots of controls about this sort of thing.

No point in incerating asbestos, it doesn’t burn, hence its original use as a fire retardant. If you burn asvestos cement, the matrix explodes and releases the fibres that otherwise are quite nicley encapsulated.

No point in incerating asbestos, it doesn’t burn, hence its original use as a fire retardant

*realises he forgot the 😉 on his previous post*

From my post on the previous thread

Do you need to replace them? If not cut them flush with the ground, and make good.
If you do, where do they drain to? To a manhole or soakaway? If to a manhole you need to dig down in the concrete, find the pipe and connect either the downpipes or gully to the existing pipe using a bandseal, a few collars, but of pipe and a few bends. If it’s to a soakaway just dig down to expose it, stick your downpipe in and make good.

Sorry iolo, I just skimmed the chat pages and presumed nobody had added anything since it was so far from page 1. I’m having a mix of insulated render and some brickwork done, so they’d have to come off the wall for all that jiggery pokery. Also, since the new wall’ll jut out x-amount further than it does now, I presume the bit where drainpipe meets earth would have to move out a similar distance. They drain into the house waste pipe (one’s on the back of the old-outhouse that’s now the bathroom, the other on the side of the house (soil pipe runs along the back of the house, then along the side to the front). So if I look up whatever bits and bobs and methods

bandseal, a few collars, bit of pipe and a few bends

are needed for doing this job as though it were normal drainpipe, then add all the PPE and tips for safely handling asbestos, i should be on the right track?

Perfect

magic, thanks very much.

…I’m all of a quandry about how I get them out of the ground…

I’d be surprised if the asbestos went into the ground. Chances are the underground pipes will be clay.

From the photos it looks like there is a clay pipe socket is sticking up out of the concrete, with the end of the down pipe sealed to it with mortar. I would expect that you could pull the down pipe out of this joint fairly easily and then carefully break out the mortar, taking care not to crack the clay pipe, or drop rubbish down the ‘ole. 2nd photo looks like there might be a short length of clay pipe standing inside the socket in the concrete, with the down pipe in the top of that.

There may or may not be a ‘gully’ (like a u bend) under the concrete from each connection. FWIW, I would try to leave the drains where they are, (assuming you’re not taking the concrete up anyway).

You can fit a couple of 135* bends to step the bottom of the down pipe back towards the drain (you can run the down pipe slightly off the original line to help with this if you’re getting new guttering anyway).

If you are lucky, something like this will fit neatly in the clay socket, if not, you could use a clay to 110mm adaptor, then a 68mm downpipe to 110mm adaptor, but it might look a bit crap.

I am not a plumber.

I am not a plumber.

But you are very helpful, thanks for the advice.

as said above reckon will be a clay pipe at the joint near the ground

in Sheffield local tip would take double bagged and taped with address ID

there is always the Chernobyl approach – neighbour sealed his under his concrete garage base – though if I’d have been on holiday pretty sure would have gone under the bit of my drive dug up to build his footings

neighbour sealed his under his concrete garage base

someone I knew tried this with an asbestos garage roof under their new patio.

Got a letter from the council saying they couldn’t stop them doing it but they’d record the site as containing hazardous waste for any future searches. A neighbour dobbed them in. Removing it again was quite tricky…