Works, slightly, fer 6-7 wks, then slows down again. I must say, the tub never really drains very well. Even with fresh application of above. Toilet, bathroom sink, kitchen sink, etc, never backed up. Jes the tub.
I bought some Rooto brand drain cleaner from True-Value. I hesitated using it. It's sulfuric acid! I called the company to ask about if it may damage any part of my system. They played dumb. I haven't used it.
Have you tried removing the stopper and snaking it with a closet auger? That usually does wonders for hair clogs, the usual problem. You get the stopper out through the overflow plate hole.
I would go slow with drain cleaners, particularly the acid based ones. They are really aimed at calcium fouling, not hair but sulphuric acid does eat hair, along with copper pipe.
When I moved in here I found a bottle of that cleaner in the shed, when I finally remodeled the bathroom with the "slow tub" I found the pipe was gone. You could poke holes in the cast iron pipes with your finger. I was putting as much water into the sand under the house as in the drain.
I have never used any of those drain cleaners for a sink or tub. I have always gone the route of "mechanical" methods by snaking and/or dismantling.
Luckily for me, I have access to my tub drain through a panel in my hallway.
With three females using that tub - all with long hair - I planned ahead when I replaced the tub a few years ago. I installed a clean out just past the trap and a Fernco coupling where the PVC connects to the cast iron stub on the main stack.
I can take the drain apart get every last piece of hair and crud from the tub to the stack. I can't believe the size of some of the rat-resembling masses I've had to remove.
You may have a trap with a removable cleanout plug under the tub. Maybe not. I've had them in all my houses but avoid opening them. Opening the trap, cleaning it, and snaking from there is probably the "best" way, but that can cause problems with the cleanout plug so I just don't do it. Besides, mine have been overhead in the basement and that can get nasty. Did it once long ago. Keep in mind I have cast iron drains.
Run some hot water through. Not a lot, just to get the drain warm. Pour about 1/4 cup of liquid dish detergent in the drain. Close the drain and run about 2 inches of hot water in the tub. Cover the overflow with a wet rag, open the drain, and pump like hell with a standard toilet plunger. If you're doing it right, you'll some get black drain dirt and hair out of there and into the tub. Push that away from the drain so it doesn't go back in. I've sopped it up with toilet paper and flushed it down the toilet, and I've used paper towels and put it in the garbage.
When I'm getting nothing more form plunging, I run hot water through the drain. You should see the difference already. Then I let the tub empty, and pour another 1/4 cup of dish detergent in the drain and close it. That sets overnight. Then I fill the tub with hot water, open the drain and work the plunger again. Hardly anything comes up, but I want some agitation.
Tub drains good for maybe 5 years before I have to do it again. I think it's mostly built up soap scum and hair that slow tub drains down. Been my experience anyway. The above method has always worked for me. I never use chemical drain cleaners.
The link you provided, didn't say what the active ingredient is. Is it labelled on the bottle?
For clogged bathroom drains, the culprits are usually grease, soap, and hair. As others have suggested, the drain snake is the best answer. Failing that, a hydroxide based drain cleaner is needed. Hydroxide turns grease to soap, and helps move the crud down the drain.
You may also get some short term relief by dumping boiling hot water down, which will help move the clog down the drain.
Christopher A. Young Learn more about Jesus
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Been using red bottle Drano cleaner:
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Works, slightly, fer 6-7 wks, then slows down again. I must say, the tub never really drains very well. Even with fresh application of above. Toilet, bathroom sink, kitchen sink, etc, never backed up. Jes the tub.
I bought some Rooto brand drain cleaner from True-Value. I hesitated using it. It's sulfuric acid! I called the company to ask about if it may damage any part of my system. They played dumb. I haven't used it.
DerbyDad03 wrote in news:jlnodh$7hg$ snipped-for-privacy@speranza.aioe.org:
I don't see why sulfuric acid would harm PVC pipe,but it may attack the tub drain closure mechanism itself,or the metal drain cover. but even the caustic drain cleaners will attack metals.
just don't leave it for too long before flushing.
MANY tub installs have no access to the drain unless you rip up a wall or floor. like apartments or homes on a concrete slab,no crawl space or basement. snaking is no holiday,either.
Or brown, greasy rusty stuff that makes you wonder if you're not getting toilet-related ugga-bugga coming up through the shower drain. )-:
Hopefully now instead of crud coming back up into the tub, you're now pushing it down into the main waste line.
Have you lived in my house? (-: I do the same thing and get a few months between plungings. How old is your drain pipe?
I use chemical cleaners to dissolve all the hair and soap that builds up because the pipe walls are no longer smooth but cratered from corrosion. I did learn, however, you DON'T add drain cleaner unless you're sure there's enough drain flow to wash it down the main stack. DAMHIKT
I bought a device to do that. It's got a garden hose thread on it and a big tapered rubber head that fits into various sized drains and makes a fairly tight seal. If you don't push down hard enough, though, it will spray you good. It works well on the basement slop sink but blew apart the apparently never properly glued drain line under the kitchen sink. I think they press-fitted the connections and then forgot to glue them. Boy, was that ever a frakkin' mess. All sorts of grayish, greasy splooge blown over the insides of the cabinet under the sink. Ever see that scene in the remake of "The Fly" when the baboons get teleported inside out? (-:
My friend, I would not have thought of using a toilet plunger on a bathtube. Neat! You can expect HeBe-ub to give you grief, now. Read the "who is it" thread to understand why.
Christopher A. Young Learn more about Jesus
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Run some hot water through. Not a lot, just to get the drain warm. Pour about 1/4 cup of liquid dish detergent in the drain. Close the drain and run about 2 inches of hot water in the tub. Cover the overflow with a wet rag, open the drain, and pump like hell with a standard toilet plunger. If you're doing it right, you'll some get black drain dirt and hair out of there and into the tub. Push that away from the drain so it doesn't go back in. I've sopped it up with toilet paper and flushed it down the toilet, and I've used paper towels and put it in the garbage.
When I'm getting nothing more form plunging, I run hot water through the drain. You should see the difference already. Then I let the tub empty, and pour another 1/4 cup of dish detergent in the drain and close it. That sets overnight. Then I fill the tub with hot water, open the drain and work the plunger again. Hardly anything comes up, but I want some agitation.
Tub drains good for maybe 5 years before I have to do it again. I think it's mostly built up soap scum and hair that slow tub drains down. Been my experience anyway. The above method has always worked for me. I never use chemical drain cleaners.
My neighbor has 2 daughters and he once asked me to come troubleshoot their= problem tub drainage. The culprit was the little plastic razor cover that= someone had allowed to slip into the drain. It was several inches from th= e drain opening and I had to disassemble the "piping manifold" (I don't kno= w the proper term) behind/under the tub to discover it. So, it's not alway= s hair that causes slow drainage.
Hair pins, barrettes, clips, ties that accidently get dropped in the tub.
Children allow small toys or broken parts to slip down stream, also.
If the problem has persisted, then the problem may likely not be your typic= al drain stopper item, a hair ball.
Tub was SLOW! Bet soon your other items will slow, too.
Tried everything, including a couple of bottles of coke (which I had work in another home once)
I finally gave up. Tried snaking, DIDN't help?! Uh, why not? Seems the drain piping fills with a clear jello like substance that the snake went through, then came out and the jello remained!
SOLUTION - Buy those hose attachments for for pressure cleaning out a drain. They expand inside a pipe as the water is turned on to automatically form a seal. Small one for small vent pipe, large canvas bag type for big vent drain pipe. Don't be surprised at the price of that large one! Get a pair of walkie-talkies, station one person inside the bathroom, the other goes up on the roof and feeds a garden hose down the vent drain pipe to just below where the drain feeds into the vent pipe.Turn on/turn off water and see if safe to proceed. If so, do again, if still safe blast away!
When I did this, the first 'nudge' backed the sink up slightly, luckily the second nudge cleared enough so that the full blast really cleaned the pipes.
Before, the water in the tub ran out faster WITH the plug in, After, the drain speeds were like a wet-n-dry vacuum.
Years later I had to hire pros to clean the jello out from the pipes going from the house to city mains in the street - that's large diameter pipe, too! They snaked twice with pro equipment from the clean-out access beside the house to the street, less than 100 feet away and NEVER CLEARED that jello like substance out. They came back the next day and used something the size of a jet engine mounted on its own trailer, and sounded like it too, to blow the jello into the city mains! Took them half a day using that tool and charged $600! But, it did work permanently, well at least for another 15 years I know of.
Never wonder about that, since that's impossible. But it is nasty looking. Soap residue and hair mixed with iron corrosion. It's the iron that will stain just about anything. But not porcelain is you wipe it right up.
50 years. Puppy cast iron.
Plunging and detergent has worked for me. The problem with tub drains is the built in stopper preventing snake access. I'd rather just use an external flat rubber stopper, but every tub I've had has had the built in internal stopper. Then of course it's all walled in. With clear access a snake would be faster than what I do. At least I've had exposed traps in the basement overheads if I ever need to use a snake. They make flat rubber drain screens to catch hair. Used one when the girls were here. They work if you can get the girls to actually use them. You want one if you have long-hairs in the house. It's hair that screws with tub drains. People think it just disappears down the drain. Nope. My wife likes long hot, relaxing baths. Part of her of her "relaxation" is to count the hairs she's lost from shampooing. So as she soaks she fingers them from the water and drapes them on the side of the tub. After her bath she wipes them off and throws them away. Just one of the reasons she's a keeper. We don't use the strainer since the girls left, and I haven't plunged the drain in maybe 5-6 years.
Saw that already. I'd just wipe it down with Spic & Span and seal it with Bin or Kilz. Wouldn't have thought of using a power washer. Still won't. To be clear, "standard toilet plunger" to me is the most common one, This one.
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That's all I've ever used, and it's always worked. Don't know why anybody would think it doesn't work on a tub or sink.
On 04/07/12 5:00 AM, Robert Green wrote: ...snip..
It's possible that the drain cleaner softened up lot of the crab on the walls of the pipe but that it never got washed down before it hardened again.
IIRC I read about that issue when I was researching one of those enzyme based drain cleaner. It specifically warned about a slow drain turning into a stopped drain if the material wasn't flushed away soon enough.
You know, scrubbint the bath tube with Spic and Span is good. I use simple green, for mine. Mine gets some kind of buildup. I'd never use a power washer in my bath tube. Too much back spray from the tube, or chance of blowing out a drain.
Standard plunger could work.
Christopher A. Young Learn more about Jesus
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I'd just wipe it down with Spic & Span and seal it with Bin or Kilz. Wouldn't have thought of using a power washer. Still won't. To be clear, "standard toilet plunger" to me is the most common one, This one.
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That's all I've ever used, and it's always worked. Don't know why anybody would think it doesn't work on a tub or sink.
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