Grease Traps Sydney. Replacement, Repairs & New Installations. Pit Pump Repairs. Maintenance & Cleaning

Sydney is a pretty old place and has had good plumbing principles set out early in the peace. For this reason we have some old grease trap systems that are made from fibreglass and concrete type material. We still have some old brick grease arrestor versions around Sydney City, Eastern Suburbs and the Inner West. Concrete and fibreglass grease traps breakdown and end up collapsing inwards from the pressure caused by the soils inward weight. Since most older grease traps are concrete and have been installed in the middle of a room or area that may be impossible to reach with a crane, only the Plastic grease traps are able to be maneuvered into that space and therefore are ideal due to their light weight and the fact that they are extremely strong.

Older grease traps will generally have either a concrete lid or a metal type lid or cover. The issue that arises with grease trap lids that are aged is that they leak air and smells and therefore drive away customers and annoy neighbours. So then what are the options when you experience these issues.

This no doubt depends on the grease trap cover.

If it is a gatic style lid which is a concrete lid with a metal edge that creates a supporting frame. This may need to be cut out and a new one re-concreted back in.

You may have an above ground grease trap with a metal style lid that is full of holes and a new plastic airtight lid can be installed to prevent the smell from escaping.

In some areas a replacement galvanized metal lid which will not hold the smell back by the way may be able to be installed as it will not affect anybody with the sticky smell that grease traps generate.

All of the grease trap lids we have repaired have all had different needs and therefore each repair is different.

Grease Trap pumps fail. That is the truth. It does not matter which system or brand of pump that install into the grease pit it will at some point in time stop working. The better the sump pump the longer it will last for sure. But in the end all pumps die.

We can service existing pumps and or replace them if they are beyond repair. The reason most pump stop working is that it is in a very corrosive environment and in most cases solids and plastics and other foreign material goes down the drainage system and blocks up the pump and it will burn out and sound the alarm if it is installed.

If your grease trap pump has failed, died or the alarm is sounding and its not working then give me a call and I can sort this one out for you as soon as possible.

This is a very open ended question. Of course the price of any grease trap installation comes down to many factors such as the size of the grease trap and the position in which it will be install such as a in ground or an above ground grease trap. Different properties and businesses may require a grease trap pump station as well. No doubt this will impact the cost and final price of the grease trap installation. There are also parking issues and skip bin and excavation removal issues that can fluctuate greatly.

Sydney Water works on a general rule on cafe, restaurant seats. They base this on that X amount of people create a certain amount of dishwater and fats and oils the run into the grease trap. As an example, if you intend to have a cafe/ restaurant with 80 seats then as a blanket rule Sydney Water will require you to have a 1500 litre grease trap. Sydney Water will expects that 80 people will create so many litres per hour/ day to pass through the grease trap.

So trying to find an exact price guide can be challenging as each business has a whole different set of requirements.

Example: A 5000 litre grease trap installed below the ground with difficult access will be 10 times the cost of a 1000 litre grease trap being installed outside the back door of the local bakery. The bakery could cost for an in ground grease trap tank system between $16000-25000 and the 5000 litre system could be anywhere from $35000-90000. Each job is truly on a case by case bases. These prices or costs should not be taken as too seriously as grease trap jobs vary so much.

Grease Trap Pit Collapsed? Has it got a Hole? Does it Smell Excessively?

Do you need a grease trap repair or replacement seen to due to damaged or it's cracked or leaking?

Grease trap repairs and replacements are very common as most of the Grease Traps installed are made from fibre glass or concrete. These Grease traps are very good but they do have a shelf life due to the nature of the material and the corrosive element of the grease trap contents.

The companies that make the concrete and fibre glass grease traps are solid and reliable and do a great job but the concrete and fibreglass ones just don’t last as long as the poly systems. Having said that, there are many instances that can only be fulfilled by a non poly grease trap system and concrete grease traps are the only way to go.

Aglass make excellent fibreglass tanks and pits as well as grease traps. Not every fibreglass grease trap manufacturer makes good quality tanks. Aglass do.

Mascot Engineering also make excellent concrete products including grease traps and should not be totally over looked as there is still place for concrete tanks sometimes. Their biggest downfall is their weight. You always need a crane or excavator to install them.

The Department of Fair Trading are the plumbing and drainage regulators in Sydney and Sydney Water are the ones who inspect just the grease trap or the trade waste installation.

All Councils and Water Authorities are extremely concerned about grease traps being installed incorrectly. When a grease trap is installed incorrectly the drainage system on the street take the excess of fats and oils and this clogs or causes a blocked drain. They will trace the cause back to a incorrect installation and may impose a drain clearing fee. For this reason only use a plumber with proof of grease trap experience. There are a couple of us. Not every plumber is truly familiar with grease traps and all there rules.

Installing the Grease Trap in Sydney whether above or below the ground with a plastic, concrete or fibreglass is only about 60% of the job completed when is comes to gaining an approval from Sydney Water who are the Trade Waste Inspectors and the Department of Fair Trading who are the Plumbing Code of Australia Inspectors.

Extras in relation to gaining approval for your grease trap may seem unrelated but are 100% required. Some of these requirements are the designing of the drainage and the venting system which is always unique to any grease trap installation, water safety or protection devices or what is called in the industry "Backflow Prevention Devices", and certain floor drainage components such as "Basket Traps and Strainers" among others are also a requirement to gain full approval.

Our aim is to provide you with a quotation that includes all of the requirements that will meet all of the Local Water Authorities approval needs. We do not hide information with the purpose of gaining variations later or misleading you. Variations that may come up are only if you change your plans or if we hit rock or obstacles like electrical pipes that prevent the work from carrying on as per plan during excavation work. These are mentioned in all of our quotations. Our quote total is to gain the appropriate approvals.

We look forward to hearing from you soon. Call us for advice on sizing, diagrams, cleaning, details you require for your cafe, restaurant, butcher or any food related business. We are more then happy to help.

Scooper Plumbing has the experience to install a wide variety of Grease Traps in an array of different property configurations. Grease Trap Systems that you may be aware of are below ground to above ground tanks. We have also installed Grease Traps on the top of a building to others that are just behind the kitchen wall. We can guide you through so your grease arrestor can be installed at your business as fast as possible to the water authorities requirements.

One Grease Trap Instead of Multiple Grease Traps on the One Property

If you need more then one grease trap at your property for your tenants you may be able to glean a little bit of information from this article. This article is based on one of our latest jobs.

Lets say you own a six pack of shops and 3 independent shops require a grease traps. One for the Cafe, another a Pizza shop and a Thai Restaurant. This will cost you say around $60k instead of I perphaps $40k for one big 3000 litre grease trap.

Please Note: Not all Councils and Water Authorities allow one grease trap for multiple shops. The reason for this is that they don't want tenants arguing over who produces the most grease and fats and should be paying more for the scheduled grease trap pump out. In these cases they make a blanket rule to only allow one grease trap per business/ shop.

The benefit of installing one big one whether 3000-5000 litres is that any and all of your shops can be rented out as a food outlet. They yield higher returns as you well know. The Local Water Authority will require an application that will put your building on notice so to speak, but it is the only way to get them to allow you to install one large system. Where you stand right now is that three grease traps are needed. If you install one for the pizza shop the Local Water Authority will need to inspect it. They will want to know where are the grease traps for the other two shops. This puts you in a bit of a corner. It's always best to go to them then them come after you.

Having three separate systems will create a mass of pipes running up the outside wall. It will get messy. One system will allow for each shop currently requiring a grease trap to be connected and provisions will be made for easy connection for any cafe in the future. I believe this is the best long term solution. It also will work out cheaper.

Points to keep in mind. So when dealing with your Local Water Authority you must bring these points across.

The best outcome is one that both you and the Water Authority are both happy with. Most Inspectors and Water Authority Representative are good and reasonable.

This option may only be allowed if space is limited

Potential of having all of your shops as food outlets. Your argument needs to be that 3 of your shops are already food outlets and if another wanted to move in there is no more room in the ground for another tank. You want a maintenance free system and are aiming to avoid using pumps and above ground tanks. Local Water Authorities prefer "gravity systems".

You want to strike a balance between the fact that not all shops will be cafes, restaurants, so you don't want to have to get the biggest possible system which is 5000 litres. 3000 litre should be big enough for the 3 shops with a low amount of water used through the kitchen sink per day. They may want though a minimum of a 1000 litre allowance per shop up to a max of 5000 litres. This is out of our hands and we can not decide on this ourselves. It's their decision. They are reasonable sometimes though.

Your Local Water Authority will send you a letter outlining what they will require and then we can go ahead.

They may want to know who is responsible for the grease trap to be cleaned out. This will need to fall onto your business. You will need to express that the emptying of the grease trap is built into each tenants rent. They will put your grease trap on a emptying cycle. Could be 3-12 months between emptying. The bigger the system the cheaper the cleaning companies charge to empty it per litre.

Keep in mind that grease traps are required only for the cleaning of dishes. Take aways and Cafes with few dishes have a small impact. Sit down restaurants are greater in their need for cleaning. A large shopping centre food court can in some cases have only a single 5000 litre system. The only utensils needing cleaning are the ones used for cooking. No dishes. Something to discuss with the Local Water Authority Rep/ Inspector.

Hope this info helps. Sorry about the bad news. It's not cheap fitting these systems. If you have any questions just send me a email or give me a call.

First of all. Water flows downhill. This is the best place to start. There is nothing wrong with installing a grease arrestor above the ground if it is below the kitchen drainage. This will still be whats called a gravity system. Gravity is always better then relying on pumps.

Lets say though that your kitchen floor and your area for the grease trap are on a similar level or even the grease trap area could still be over a metre below. In ths case to have a gravity system you will need to excavate the ground and install the grease trap in the ground.

If you could not dig it down then you could place the grease trap on the ground level but a pump from the kitchen would be required. This is still a very good option but pumps like any mechanical device have a life span and especially in such a corrosive environment.

Sometimes the costs to buy the pump stations and maintain them in the first 5 years is equal to excavating the grease trap in from the start.

So option 1: Gravity system whether dig in on placed on the concrete but must be below the kitchen floor by 1.6 mtrs roughly.

Option 2: In the ground floor of the kitchen a larger style pump that can collect the floor drainage as well. Pump from the kitchen to the grease trap.

Option 3: Small undersink pump set up that pumps to the grease trap.. This option is not always suitable as it can only collect water from the sinks and not the floor waste drains. Businesses like butchers, bakeries and diary related product business need to collect the water from the floor as well.

Poly Systems are very durable and long lasting and perfect for grease trap repairs/ replacement options.

Once again the companies that makes these plastic grease traps are very good and trustworthy business as well. Plastic grease traps are a little easy to install as they weigh less then the other grease traps and do not always require a crane to lower them into position.

Viking Plastics, CV Plastics, Halgan are my choice when I need to install any plastic arrestor. I use all of them as every job is different and sometimes a slight change in dimensions makes all the difference.

Poly or Plastic grease traps are called Modular Grease Traps. What does this mean?

The plastic Grease Traps come in 500, 1000, 1500, 2000, 3000 ,4000 and 5000 litre tanks.

Lets say you have a large restaurant or its for a food court and you require a minimum of a 5000 litre grease trap. Your space is limited for one large 5000 litre grease trap. If you wanted a plastic modular grease trap you would have to join say a 3000 and a 2000 litre grease trap together via a drainage connection pipe and this would now be classed as a 5000 litre grease trap.

Keep in mind that a single system is the better option but if space is limited then this is an excellent way to achieve the capacity you require.

If your old system has collapsed and there is know way of getting a large concrete or fibreglass system into this same location as the building has been built around or over the grease trap then the modular grease trap system is ideal.

Due to there light weight and the variety of size options you are able to take in smaller tanks through the passages of the building and after joining 2 or more tanks together you are still able to meet the litre requirement. This is just a basic look at your options. Off course not all situations allow for either system to be installed. There is generally always a way to make it work.

How much does it cost to empty or clean out a grease trap? Well that varies on the size but a simple calcuation is $0.20 per litre and a base rate of 1000 litres.

So as an example a 2000 litre grease inceptor will cost you $400 per qauter or $1600 per year.

But why do I have to have it cleaned so often?

As a standard rule all grease trap sizes start on a 13 weeks or 3 month emptying cycle. They Water Authority representative will come out after a 3 month cycle and test the fats and solid level and will adjust your cleaning pump out cycle accordingly.

The size of your grease trap is based on your litres per day that you are likely to run through the tank. If it is higher then the tanks allowance then the fats will not cool and will pass through into the drain pipe. The hot fats need to cool down and separate so they do not pass into the drainage system and cause your drains to clog up. If you business is producing more then the grease trap can handle or somehow the arrestor size is too small you may be requested to increase the grease traps capacity.

Refer to the table below for help. Sydney Water guide.

Keep in mind though that if you are not a business that has sit down customers such as a Take away or a Food Preparation business then you fit into the category of Grease Traps fewer than 69 seats.

A point of caution is that if you have a small Grease Trap and a large water usage then you may find that you have to have your Grease Trap cleaned or pumped out more regularly. As pump outs are over $200.00 each time for the smallest system, then the cost of installing a larger system may be the most cost effective option. Cleaning costs are around $0.20 per litre with a minimum charge of 1000 litres

Deciding to install a Grease Trap at your business is not for those interested in being involved in this business for only a few years, but rather you are expecting be in this business for the long term. With this in mind, a bigger Grease Trap can be Cheaper. Something to ponder over.

Canteens, Cafeterias, Restaurants, Food Courts etc.	Grease Arrestor Capacity	Weight (Kg) Approx.
Discharge up to 1,100L/day, typically up to 69 seats	500 litre	60
Discharge up to 1,100L/day, typically up to 69 seats	1000 litre	80
Discharge up to 3,200L/day, typically 70 to 199 seats	1500 litre	90
Discharge up to 6,400L/day, typically 200 to 399 seats	2000 litre	110
Discharge up to 9,600L/day, typically 400 to 599 seats	3000 litre	150
Discharge up to 12,800L/day, typically 600 to 799 seats	4000 litre	200
Discharge up to 16,000L/day, typically 800 to 1000 seats	5000 litre	300

Grease Traps Sydney. Price, Replacement, Repairs, New Installations. Pit Pump Repairs. Lid Cover Repairs, Maintenance

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