Sewer Camera Inspection in Loveland, CO

A sewer camera inspection is a video survey of the pipe that carries everything from your house to the city sewer. A small, waterproof camera head with its own lights sits on the end of a stiff, flexible push cable. The provider feeds it into the line through an access point, and a monitor at the surface shows the inside of the pipe in real time while a counter on the reel tracks how far the camera has traveled.

Most sewer cameras also carry a radio transmitter, often called a sonde, in the camera head. When the camera stops at a problem, the provider walks the yard with a locator to find the spot on the surface and how deep it is. That turns a vague diagnosis like somewhere under the lawn into a mark on the ground and a depth.

The point is to see before anyone spends money. A slow or backed-up drain can have very different causes: a soft grease clog that a cleaning will clear, a root mass at a single joint, a pipe that has sagged into a belly that holds water, or a section of old clay or fiber pipe that is falling apart. Each one calls for a different fix, and they look completely different on camera. A good inspection ends with a recording and a plain explanation of what it shows.

A camera inspection is also the step that comes before most other sewer work. It is how a provider confirms a line is clear after cleaning, how they plan a repair and how they check whether a trenchless method can be used. If you are comparing options from more than one contractor, a clear recording you can share is one of the most useful things you can have.

Roots. The City of Loveland counts roughly 25,000 public trees, and ash makes up about 20 percent of that canopy. Emerald ash borer was confirmed in Loveland in 2024, and the city has been removing ash trees for years. Roots from living trees push into any joint that leaks a little moisture, and roots from trees that have been cut down can rot and leave voids around a pipe. Both show up on camera.

Ground movement. The Colorado Geological Survey calls expansive soil the state's most significant geologic hazard and lists disrupted sewer lines among the damage it causes. Clay soil that swells when wet and shrinks when dry can shift a pipe joint out of line or create a sag where water and solids settle. On camera, an offset joint looks like a step or lip; a belly shows as a stretch of standing water.

Old pipe materials. Older Colorado neighborhoods often have vitrified clay pipe. Boulder's sewer program, for example, notes that clay pipe from the 1940s to the 1960s cracks as soils shift. Orangeburg pipe, made from wood fiber and coal tar, was used until the 1970s and has about a 50-year life at best; on camera it often looks blistered or flattened into an oval. Cast iron can corrode and scale on the inside.

Grease and wipes. The city warns that fats, oils and grease can plug sewer lines and cause backups that damage homes. A camera shows grease as a coating or a lumpy buildup along the bottom of the pipe, often with wipes caught in it.

A camera earns its keep any time the answer will change what you do next. That includes recurring main-line clogs, a house purchase, a remodel that adds a bathroom or basement bath, a line that backed up after heavy roots were cut, and any time a contractor recommends digging or replacement. Seeing the pipe first is how you avoid paying for a full replacement when a single bad joint is the problem, or paying for repeated cleanings when the pipe itself is broken.

It is less useful for a single slow sink or a tub that drains poorly while everything else in the house works fine. Those clogs are usually in the fixture's own drain and trap, and a provider can typically clear them without a camera. A camera also cannot see through a line that is completely full of water; if the main is backed up, it usually has to be opened first.

After a cleaning, a quick camera pass confirms the job. If roots were cut or grease was cleared with hydro jetting Loveland, the footage shows whether the pipe walls are clean and whether there is damage underneath that will cause the problem to return.

A camera inspection is a planning tool, but you may be reading this because a floor drain is overflowing. Stop running water in the house first: no laundry, dishwasher, showers or flushing. If sewage is coming up in a basement, keep people and pets away from it and turn off power to the area only if you can do so without standing in water.

Call (970) 693-9705 and say the line is backing up. The provider you are connected with will usually clear the line first and then run a camera once water is flowing, so the inspection can see the cause. If you think the backup may be coming from the city's main rather than your own line, for example because neighbors are reporting the same thing, call Loveland Water and Power at 970-962-3000 as well. Until the line is open, keep water use to an absolute minimum.

Camera footage can be hard to read the first time. A healthy pipe looks like a smooth, round tube with water flowing along the bottom. Joints appear as faint rings at regular intervals on older clay pipe. A crack shows as a dark line, a broken section as missing wall, and an offset joint as a step where one section sits higher than the next. Standing water that covers the camera lens usually means a sag. Roots look like hair or a brush poking in at a joint. Ask the provider to pause at each finding and explain it.

The findings point to the next step. Light grease or a few roots often call for cleaning and a follow-up check. A single broken or separated joint may be a spot repair. A long run of cracked clay or deformed Orangeburg points to sewer line repair Loveland or a larger project, and many of those can be handled with trenchless sewer repair Loveland if the pipe's shape allows. In older neighborhoods such as the historic core, our page on Downtown Loveland drain cleaning explains the pipe materials you are most likely to find. If trees are the issue, read about ash tree roots in sewer lines before deciding on a long-term plan.

Before any repair work, confirm the contractor's Colorado license. Plumbers in Colorado are licensed by the state's Examining Board of Plumbers at the Division of Professions and Occupations, and plumbing contractors are registered there too. You can look up a license on the state's DORA license lookup. Calls to (970) 693-9705 are answered by independent local providers who set their own prices, so ask for the price before the camera goes in.

A camera look often comes after a clog is cleared; the drain cleaning Loveland overview explains how the services fit together.