A colleague of mine has often said that the most common mistake he has seen around installation of onsite systems is misidentifying soil characteristics, which results in the wrong type of system or the wrong-size system being installed.Here I will briefly explore a few of the common soil identification problems and how they impact system performance. Remember, this is in the context of being able to manage the system into the future.Two major ways the soil affects the system are determining the size of the final soil dispersal and treatment system, and the location of the system in the soil.
