Hi,
I recently moved in to my first house a few months ago. Over those few months the stopper in the main bathtub gradually stopped being able to stay in the up position to allow water to drain. Currently the stopper won't stay up at all. The stopper is the type (from what I've gathered by reading stuff online) that you can simply can push down with your foot or pull up with your hand to let the water begin to drain.
The problem is I can't find anything in the mechanism of the stopper that would allow it to stay in the up position. There is nothing there to catch it from what I can tell. I unscrewed it and simply found a short metal rod that had a threaded hole in it. I can't tell how long the rod is but it is in a hollow housing that allows it to move up and down. The rod is almost round but it is flat on 2 sides (rounded on the other 2 sides).
On the side that is closest to the water faucet in the tub there is a screw that goes in from the side. Without a 90 degree head for a screwdriver I can't do anything with this screw and I can't tell whether something should be done to it. The previous owners didn't live here and only bought it to fix it up (including this bathtub). Since I can't really tell what the mechanism is for making the stopper stay up I'm hesitant to go out and attempt another; I doubt this one is defective in any way. But does anyone have any ideas on what to do to fix this issue? Should I attempt to screw the screw in more so that it causes more friction with the rod when I move the stopper up and down?
My ASCII art is horrible but I gave it a shot. Below is my drain as if you were looking down into it. The "X" made by the slashes are simply the supports for the part that holds the hole for stopper to screw in to. The "O" in the middle represents the threaded hole the stopper goes into. The