No-dig pipe repair on the Lower North Shore.
Cracked or damaged pipe repaired in place in Crows Nest — relining a stack or a shared line without opening walls, slabs or common areas.
No callout fee on eligible jobs · Free quotes
Crows Nest packs one of the busiest eating strips on the Lower North Shore into 0.76 square kilometres, and 61.0% of its dwellings are flats with a further 26.3% terraces. Commercial lines run under trading forecourts; terrace drainage runs under party walls and tight side setbacks. Neither is somewhere an excavator belongs, and both are straightforward to line.
Grease scarring in commercial lines under the eating strip, or joint failure in Victorian earthenware under the terraces. The two need quite different handling.
Because opening up a building is a different order of disruption. This is the part of a drainage repair people do not price until an excavator is already on site.
Commercial hardstand and trading frontage in the centre, party walls and narrow setbacks on the terrace stock. Cutting either means disruption to somebody who is not the customer.
A liner goes in through an opening that already exists. Nothing above the pipe has to move.
At 93 metres across a compact 0.76 square kilometres, five kilometres from the CBD. Density rather than terrain is what makes conventional repair awkward — there is nowhere to put a work zone.
Crows Nest sits in the North Sydney Council, postcode 2065.
Local figures sourced from: ABS 2021 Census QuickStats — Crows Nest (NSW) · Crows Nest, New South Wales — Wikipedia
An 1821 land grant sits under a modern suburb, so the oldest runs are very old indeed. Victorian and Federation earthenware under the terraces, with commercial fit-outs layered on over decades.
No trench, no spoil, and nothing above the pipe disturbed. The whole job runs through an existing access point.
The line is inspected end to end so the damage is located and measured. Nothing is quoted from the surface.
Roots are cut out and the pipe wall is jetted back to bare material — a liner will not bond to a coated pipe.
A resin-saturated liner is drawn into position through an existing access point and inflated against the host pipe.
The resin hardens in hours rather than days, forming a new pipe inside the old one with no joints for roots to re-enter.
Any branch lines are cut back open robotically, and a final camera pass confirms the result.
Not every damaged pipe should be relined, and we will say so. These are the cases where it genuinely wins here.
A forecourt cut costs more in lost trade than in concrete.
Frequently shared, and nothing has to be dug either side.
A liner reinforces the host rather than replacing it.
Relining costs more per metre than excavation. It is usually cheaper overall, and this is why:
| Dig and replace | Relining | |
|---|---|---|
| Excavation | Trench the full length, remove and replace the pipe, backfill | None — the work runs through an existing access point |
| What comes up | Lawn, garden, paving, driveway or slab above the line | Nothing |
| Time on site | Days on a long or deep run | Usually one day for a typical run |
| Reinstatement | Priced separately and often the larger half of the bill | Not applicable |
| Result | New pipe, with joints | A jointless liner inside the host pipe |
| Design life | Depends on material and bedding | 50 years on a correctly installed liner |
The per-metre comparison is the one that misleads. Excavation quotes routinely exclude spoil removal and reinstatement, which is where a dig job gets expensive — and on some properties the reinstatement is simply not possible at any price.
These are typical ranges across the Sydney market — not Voyager’s price list, but a realistic yardstick to judge any quote against, including ours.
| Pipe relining, per lineal metre | $450 – $800 |
| Pipe relining, typical whole job | $4,000 – $10,000 |
| Patch repair, single damaged section | $1,500 – $3,000 |
| Junction reinstatement | $300 – $600 |
| Excavate and replace, per metre | $300 – $600 |
| Driveway reinstatement after a dig job, per sqm | $100 – $200 |
| CCTV drain inspection | $250 – $550 |
| Cutting tree roots from a line | $400 – $1,200 |
Voyager prices by the job, not by the hour, so the number you approve is the number you pay. A camera survey happens before any figure is given — a quote for relining that has not looked down the pipe is a guess.
Most Crows Nest properties that ring about relining need a camera first. We will tell you straight — including when clearing the line is the whole job.
A correctly installed liner carries a 50-year design life, and it cures in hours rather than days — so the property is back in normal use the same week rather than the same month.
A smooth jointless bore also gives grease far less to key into, so the maintenance interval on a commercial line improves as well as its structural life.
Roots come back through joints. A liner has none.
Voyager covers the whole Lower North Shore. These are the closest to Crows Nest:
No. That is the whole point of it. The liner is drawn in through an existing access point — usually an inspection opening or shaft already on the property — and cured in place against the old pipe. It means no forecourt cut, no trading interrupted, and on the terrace stock no trench in a setback that has no room for one.
Across the Sydney market, relining runs about $450–$800 per lineal metre, with a typical whole job landing between $4,000 and $10,000 and a single-section patch around $1,500–$3,000. Those are market ranges rather than Voyager’s price list. Whether the line runs under trading frontage. A forecourt cut costs more in lost trade than in materials, and out-of-hours work is the norm rather than the exception.
Per metre, no — excavation is cheaper per metre. Overall it usually is. A dig figure in a building also has to carry access through occupied lots, common areas out of use and works approvals — none of which appear on the per-metre rate. On some properties the reinstatement is not possible at any price, which settles it entirely.
A correctly installed liner carries a 50-year design life. It outlasts what it replaced because it has no joints along its length — and joints are where roots get in, where ground movement opens a gap, and where old earthenware fails first. For an owners corporation that is the relevant number — one authorised job against another decade of reactive callouts on the same line.
A typical residential run is a single day on site, and the resin cures in hours rather than days. Coordinating building access and notifying affected lots usually takes longer than the installation does.
Most can, but not all — and we will say so rather than sell you something that will not work. A pipe that has collapsed completely, or lost so much of its shape that there is nothing left to line against, needs replacing. In Crows Nest the host pipe is usually a good candidate: grease scarring in commercial lines under the eating strip, or joint failure in Victorian earthenware under the terraces. The two need quite different handling.
Usually. Relining runs through an existing access point, so on the Crows Nest strip the work generally happens outside trading hours without cutting the forecourt or closing the premises. That is the main reason it is used on commercial lines here — the excavation alternative costs more in lost trade than in construction.
The owners corporation, where the line is common property — which generally means any pipe serving more than one lot. We deal with the strata or building manager directly and provide the camera footage they need to approve the work. Where the line serves only your lot, it is your decision.
Camera survey first, a fixed price agreed before the work starts, and no excavation.
Voyager Plumbing · NSW Contractor Licence 476657C
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Page reviewed and updated 20 August 2026
