A Forches drainage engineer,
on call 24/7 with a clear price before we start.

Forches is a residential area on the eastern edge of Barnstaple, sitting in the EX31 postcode about three miles from the town centre. The housing is mostly post-war and 1970s semi-detached and terraced stock, with some later infill and a handful of bungalows. We get called out here regularly for blocked drains, slow-clearing gullies and the occasional collapsed section of older pipework. It's a straightforward run from the A39 and we can usually be on site within twenty minutes.

We come in off the A39 via the eastern approach, which puts us on site quickly. The housing in Forches was largely built in phases from the 1950s through to the late 1970s, meaning a lot of the underground drainage runs in clay pipe with push-fit or mortar joints that are now well past their best. Some properties share lateral drains that run under back gardens, which causes confusion when a blockage affects more than one household. Mature garden trees are common here and root ingress into cracked clay joints is something we see time and again.

Most common Forches jobs

• Clearing blocked toilets and slow-draining sinks in 1970s semis where the original pipework has never been touched
• CCTV surveys on shared lateral drains between neighbouring properties
• Root cutting and joint repair where garden trees have worked their way into clay pipe runs
• Unblocking surface water gullies that back up after heavy rain
• Tracing which section of drain belongs to the homeowner versus Wessex Water's responsibility

Services we run from Forches