Hydro Jetting in Phoenix & Scottsdale, priced before we start.
A car tire runs at about 35 PSI. A drain jetter runs at up to 4,000, more than a hundred times as much, through a nozzle not much bigger than your thumb. The jets point backward, so the same force that strips the pipe wall also drags the hose upstream. It doesn’t punch through a blockage so much as peel the pipe from the inside out, until the original bore shows again.
Compare that with a drain cable, the tool most service calls end with. A cable is a spinning steel coil with a cutter on the tip. It bores a passage through the clog about as wide as the cutter and drags some of the debris back out. In a pipe that has spent 15 years collecting grease on its walls, that passage is a tunnel through a much narrower pipe than the one you paid for. Water flows again. The coating stays, and it starts catching food that same evening.
Several conditions common in the Valley make jetting the right tool more often than people expect. Mineral scale builds on the inside of older cast-iron drains, and a cable can’t shave it off. Roots from mesquite, palo verde, and ficus work into lateral joints looking for the only steady water in the yard. Kitchen grease sets fast once it reaches pipe under the slab, which runs cooler than the kitchen above it.
The calendar usually tells you which kind of problem you have. A drain that clogged once, after a holiday dinner, is a cabling job. A drain that clogs every four to six months no matter who clears it is coated or rooted, and each cable visit rents you a few more months. If you have kept the receipts, count them. That count is the case for jetting, or against it.
The caveat matters as much as the pitch. High-pressure water will find a crack and make it bigger, so a pipe that is already failing should be repaired, not jetted. That is why every jetting job starts with a camera inspection, and why the honest answer is occasionally that your line needs a sewer repair rather than a cleaning.
When the cable isn’t enough
Clogs on a timetable
If you could put the next backup on the calendar, the pipe wall is the problem. Cabling keeps buying the same few months at the same price.
The kitchen line, especially after the holidays
Grease doesn’t stop in one spot. It coats the full length of the branch, so there is nothing for a cable to hook and plenty for tomorrow’s dishwater to stick to.
Roots came back within a year
A cable trims roots flush with the pipe. A jetter with a root-cutting nozzle takes them back to the joint where they got in, which buys noticeably more time before the tree tries again.
Old cast iron with a rough, narrowed bore
Decades of scale and corrosion shrink the inside diameter and texture it, so paper and food catch everywhere. On camera it looks like a cave. Jetting takes it back toward smooth, provided the metal underneath is still sound.
Is the whole house slow, not one sink?
Several drains sluggish at once, with no single hard stop, usually means a main narrowed along its length rather than blocked at a point. That is jetting territory.
Before a remodel ties into old drains
New fixtures draining into a 40-year-old line inherit its problems. Cleaning that line to bare pipe before a bathroom remodel closes the walls costs less than lifting new tile later.
The order of operations
- 01
Camera before pressure
We look first. A crack, a separated joint, or cast iron worn paper-thin changes the plan, because 4,000 PSI makes any of them worse.
- 02
The nozzle, matched to the mess
Grease, roots, and scale each want a different head and a different pressure. One nozzle for everything is how pipes get hurt.
- 03
Out from the cleanout, scouring on the return
The nozzle travels away from the access point and cuts on the way back, drawing loosened material along with it instead of packing it farther down the line.
- 04
Then the camera again
Same pipe, before and after, on the same screen. If the after picture doesn’t look clearly better, say so and we’ll run it again rather than argue about it.
- 05
What happens next, if anything
Some lines need nothing more for years. Some with roots need a scheduled pass. A few need repair, and you have the footage to show anyone you want a second opinion from.
Typical residential range
$350 – $900
A single residential line with a working cleanout sits near the bottom. Long runs, roof access, heavy root masses, or a line that needs two passes push it higher. The camera passes before and after are included, not billed on top. Restaurants and other grease-heavy kitchens run on a different schedule, covered under commercial jetting.
Financing is available on larger jobsMost drains never need the strongest tool on the truck. The skill is spotting the one that does, and having the footage to prove it.
Hydro Jetting: questions we get asked
Straight answers, the same ones we give on the phone.
