Drain Unblocking Drenthe

Drenthe: sand on the ridge, peat around the edges

At heart, Drenthe is a sand province. Running its length is the Hondsrug, a sandy ridge from Groningen to Emmen, flanked by smaller ridges with old villages, village greens, dolmens and heathland. Between the ridges, streams such as the Drentsche Aa flow through low, wet valleys. Around the edges the picture changes: in the south-east around Emmen, Klazienaveen and Nieuw-Amsterdam, and around Hoogeveen, lie the peat colonies, with straight canals and ribbon development on excavated peat. In the south-west, near Meppel, the province slopes down to the low country of northern Overijssel.

For drain unblocking in Drenthe, that means two worlds. On the sand of Assen, central Emmen, Beilen, Rolde and Roden, rainwater soaks away quickly; the sewer is rarely overloaded and a blockage almost always starts indoors, with grease, hair, wipes or roots growing into an outside drain. On the peat around Hoogeveen and in the colony villages the ground sinks slowly, giving house connections (laterals) a kink where dirt settles. Then there is the building period: converted farmhouses with drains that come from far off, cul-de-sac estates from the 1960s and 1970s with vitrified clay pipes, and new-builds with plastic pipework and inspection chambers.

Sewer unblocking by town and region

Assen

Assen has a compact centre around the Brink, ringed by spacious housing estates. Marsdijk and Peelo date from the 1970s and 1980s; Kloosterveen is younger and lies to the west on lower, wetter ground. The older districts often still have vitrified clay pipes under the gardens, their joints shifted over the years; in Kloosterveen the pipework is plastic, but drains run slower because of the high groundwater. On the sand of the centre itself we mostly see kitchen pipes clogged with grease and shower traps full of hair.

Emmen and the peat colonies

Emmen is the largest town in Drenthe and grew mainly after the war. Emmerhout, Angelslo and Bargeres are generously laid out, with cul-de-sacs, plenty of greenery and long outside drains. The trees planted then have grown tall, and their roots seek out the pipe joints. Around it lie the peat-colony villages of Klazienaveen, Nieuw-Amsterdam and Erica, where the soft ground lets house connections subside. A toilet that keeps flushing slowly and only improves briefly after unblocking is a familiar story there.

Hoogeveen

Hoogeveen grew up around peat cutting and consists largely of terraced houses from the 1960s and 1970s, in districts such as Krakeel, De Weide and Wolfsbos. The peat beneath the town keeps sinking. Over time the pipe between house and street sewer develops a dip, sometimes even a back-slope, where paper and grease get caught. Cleaning with the high-pressure jetter helps, but the camera shows whether a section of pipe needs relaying at the right fall.

Meppel

Meppel lies low, on the Meppelerdiep and the Drentsche Hoofdvaart, with old warehouses in the centre and new-builds on the outskirts. Here the sewer behaves differently from the one on the Hondsrug: in a cloudburst it fills fast, and in older parts with a combined system water can come back into the house through the lowest point. In Meppel, a shower gully or utility-room gully that bubbles up after heavy rain is a reason to have the house connection inspected and consider a non-return valve.

Old villages and holiday parks

In Rolde, Gieten, Borger, Exloo, Zuidlaren and the villages around Dwingeloo and Diever there are many converted farmhouses and detached homes on large plots. Drains sometimes run tens of metres through the garden to the sewer, past old oaks with deep roots. The Hondsrug also has many holiday parks with shared pipes that come under heavy load in season. A blockage in one chalet can quickly put a whole row out of action.

Common blockages in Drenthe

With drain unblocking in Drenthe, three calls keep coming back. Here is what you can do yourself and how the engineer tackles it.

Roots in the outside drain

On sand, tree roots are the main cause of blockages outdoors. They grow into the pipe through a joint or crack and form a web where paper gets caught. You notice it in a drain that slows in summer and a garden chamber that empties slowly. There is little you can do yourself except save water. The engineer cuts the roots out with a drain-cleaning machine or the jetter and checks with the camera whether the pipe is still intact or needs replacing.

A subsided house connection on peat

In Hoogeveen, Emmen and the colony villages this is the most common problem. The tell-tale sign is a blockage that keeps coming back in the same place. Do not use chemical drain cleaner; it damages the pipe and does not fix the cause. The engineer cleans the pipe and uses the camera to measure where the dip is and how deep. With that picture you can decide whether a repair is needed and who should pay.

A sink full of grease in a converted farmhouse

Converted farmhouses in the old villages often have a kitchen where there was never a drain before, with a long, almost level pipe outside. Grease sets in it as a hard crust. Run hot water through, undo the trap over a bucket and see whether the plug is there. If it is further along, the engineer removes it mechanically and flushes the whole pipe through as far as the outside wall.

Our drain unblocking service in Drenthe

As the drain unblocking company for the whole province, we deal with anything to do with blocked drains. The jobs that come up most:

• Toilet that overflows or flushes slowly: toilet unblocking with a toilet auger or small machine, without removing the pan.
• Shower or bath that no longer empties: shower drain unblocking, including cleaning the gully and trap.
• Roots, sand or silt in the outside drain: sewer cleaning with the high-pressure jetter, from front wall to street sewer.
• Recurring problems or suspected subsidence: a drain camera inspection shows exactly where the problem lies.

Who is responsible for which part?

As the owner of a detached or terraced house, you are responsible for the drains indoors and the pipe on your own land, as far as the inspection chamber or rodding point at the boundary. Beyond that the sewer is normally the municipality's; the exact line varies from one Drenthe municipality to the next. If you rent, a blockage caused by your own use is often at your expense, but a subsided or broken pipe is the landlord's. In flats in Assen or Emmen, the owners' association (VvE) looks after the soil stack and the shared pipes. On a holiday park, the park manager is usually responsible for the shared pipes between the chalets. The water board looks after streams, canals and pumping stations, not the sewer in the street. Afterwards, the engineer tells you what he found, so you can report it to the right party.

Drain unblocking in Drenthe: calling, price indication and rates

Call 085 333 4698, day or night. Tell us which drain is blocked, which town you live in and whether the problem has happened before. You get an estimate and a price indication straight away, and once you agree an engineer comes out, usually within the hour.

Clearing a blockage costs from €129. The call-out charge is not included; because Drenthe is spread out, we tell you what it is on the phone. In the evening, at night and at the weekend an emergency rate applies. For larger work, such as cleaning and inspecting a long outside drain at a farmhouse or repairing a subsided house connection, you can ask for a price. Customers give Afvoer Ontstoppen a 5/5 based on 48 Google reviews.

Also in the rest of Drenthe

We do not yet have separate city pages for Drenthe, but we come to every municipality in the province: Assen, Emmen, Hoogeveen and Meppel, Coevorden, Beilen, Zuidlaren, Roden, Gieten, Borger and Dwingeloo, and the old villages and peat-colony ribbons in between. An overview of all towns and provinces with their own page is under our service area.

Do you have a blockage right now? Call 085 333 4698 for drain unblocking in Drenthe. We are available 24/7 and send an engineer as quickly as possible, on the Hondsrug just as much as in the peat colonies.