Urgent Blocked drain

[Exhausted]

My drain from the kitchen to the main drain is blocked. It looks like it?s down to hard fat ? AGAIN???.

Last time, I removed the fat by putting on a long glove and putting my hand down the drain and then up the u bend and scraping the fat with a piece of old electric cable from an old shower. This worked, but was especially nasty when I got some of the drain water up my glove. Despite telling swimbo not to wash fat down the kitchen drain the drain is blocked again. Not wanting to repeat the experience I made the mistake of believing the guy in the diy store when they recommended a chemical to pour down the drain to clear the fat, despite several attempts no luck. Subsequently I have added 1KG of caustic soda, still nothing. My problem is now I don?t have the option of putting my hand down the drain. What can I do? I tried jet washing from the man hold last time to no avail. All I can think of is digging up the patio and drilling a hole in the pipe to allow me to put a piece of metal in the pipe to break up the fat.

Any other ideas, apart from replacing the pipe.

Thanks

[meow2222]

[Exhausted]

any others, as not a lot of these are workable due to the caustic soda

[Fredxx]

If all else fails, use heat. A hose pipe connected to the hot tap used in the same way as rodding may shift the offending fat.

[Colin Wilson]

Tell your missus to pay for the a call from a drain company...

It might be worth investing in a set of drain rods with a spiral so you can hack away at the blockage from downstream.

You really will have to be careful as regards the caustic soda though, as I believe the blockage can be prone to clearing quite quickly once breached. Goggles would be advisable as a minimum anyway at a guess !

[Exhausted]

trouble is the fat appears to be at the top of the ubend, so access from the man hole end will not touch it(i.e just below the pipe, and from the drain end its quite a route through caustic soda,

[Vernon]

If it is outside, then tipping in a large bucket of hot water from as high as possible will often clear the blockage, as the hot water goes to the bottom and helps to soften the fat, and also the water pressure pushes the blockage at the same time. Might need a few attempts. Failing that leave it overnight to see if the caustic has worked.

[Exhausted]

forgot to say been running as much hot water as possible , but there is not room for much.about 6L max i guess

[David in Normandy]

What about a plumbers snake? If you undo the u-bend / trap wearing gloves to avoid any caustic, then you could push the snake into the waste pipe and slowly rotate it as you push it in. It should push straight through the fat and hopefully dislodge it, or at least make a hole the caustic soda can get through. After that maybe some very hot water would soften it enough to clear it out.

Wickes sell the plumbers snakes, probably other sheds too and they aren't too expensive. A lot less hassle and cheaper than digging up the drive!

[Clive George]

Heat is good.

Getting rid of all that caustic soda is another good idea - shoving 1KG of it in there was a _really_ bad idea, but with any luck you know that now.

I'd be getting a hose with warm water down there. Flush the nasty caustic stuff out, and be careful about it.

Here's another really bad idea - brick acid. Will react with the caustic soda and get very hot, and start splashing horrible nasty stuff all over the place. OTOH if you're insanely careful, it might work - the heat could melt the fat. But don't slosh it in like you did with the caustic - use tiny quantities, otherwise you _will_ end up in hospital with horrific burns and no sight. Should I mention that this is a really bad idea and should only be attempted if you're prepared to be properly careful in the way you haven't been so far?

[Exhausted]

Nice ideas but the Ubend is in the way hopefully the text drawing below will make things clearer

GROUND[ DRAIN ]GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND[ DRAIN ]GROUND ----------------------------------------- GROUND[ DRAIN ]GROUND [ FAT FAT DRAIN DRAIN eventually man hole GROUND[ DRAIN ]GROUND [ FAT FAT DRAIN DRAIN eventually man hole GROUND[ DRAIN ]GROUND [ DRAIN ]--------------------------------- GROUND[ DRAIN ]GROUND [ DRAIN ] GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND[ DRAIN DRAIN DRAIN [ DRAIN ] GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND[ DRAIN DRAIN DRAIN [ DRAIN ] GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND[ DRAIN ----------------- GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND{ ]GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND--------------GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND GROUND

[Exhausted]

Thanks by the ubend is underground ,can't be undone i.e is not on the sink

[Fredxx]

I would hope sloshing hot water around the fat would eventually melt it. Put the hose as far as you can up along the dran. A hot pipe is very flexible

[Exhausted]

Clive thanks for the idea, I had though about that but mixing acid and alkalis together is too risky for me, for the exact reason you stated

[Exhausted]

Clive, sorry forgot to mention i would live to flush the caustic soda away , but i can't the drain is blocked, To be fair though the mixing ration of the caustic soda was 1KG to 10 L of water, so i don't believe i was too over the top ( well ok just a little)

[Exhausted]

IF i dig up the pipe, and apply heat (blow torch) to the outside of the clay pipe, will it crack, or melt the fat ?

[Clive George]

Haven't you got other places you can put the waste? Is this an exterior drain? Just let it overflow and flush with _loads_ of water. Homeopathy doesn't work for chemistry - dilute it enough and it'll be fine :-)

If it's already dissolved, it'll be easier to deal with than if it were still solid. Since I'm not terribly safety minded about these things I'd have put the caustic in solid - means you get some heat as it dissolves too

Some way of heating the water looks like it might be worth considering. I can think of dangerous solutions involving kettle elements :-) Blowtorch on the pipe will be close to useless though.

[Bob Minchin]

STOP Panicking!

Lay out some hose above ground from the blockage to the first manhole. Mark the hose with some tape at the manhole. Lift the manhole, push the hose back up the drain until the marker lines up with the manhole. Now the end should be at the blockage.

Use the hose like drain rods pushing back and forth; when you can go no further connect the water. Cold to start with to keep the hose stiff. you might see some debris flowing back down the drain with luck. Switch to hot water down the hose and this should start melting the fat. Get your wife involved so she can see why fat must not be put down the kitchen sink but instead left to solidify and then put in the dustbin. We save ours and cook with it for the extra flavouring- I can't remember the last time we bought any cooking fat/oil.

Bob

[Exhausted]

yes its an exterior drain, although we do appear to think alike. I remember i had this element you plugged into the car to boil a cup of water when i was a kid, pity that's long gone. Oh i did add the caustic as granules, i just guessed there was about

6L of water in the drain. Although I was worried about over flowing the drain, and spreading the stuff every where

[Richard Savage]

Does anything else empty into this drain?

Reason I ask is that the U bend in the gulley that serves our kitchen sink collect a fatty deposit at the top of the outlet side of the U bend exactly as shown in your txt drawing.

Now, my office has had some very serious drain lining activity taking place for the last few months and, being nosey, I have been chatting to the blokes doing the work. I mentioned the U bend problem and asked what I should use to clear it - mentioning that I used Caustic Soda solution with apparent success.

Apart from agreeing that Caustic Soda is a good, if not better, than any of the clever products they asked if either a washing machine or dishwasher used the same gulley. The reason being that the soap from these machines can build up in a fat-like deposit - remember that saponified fat is soap - which isn't carried away in the rinse water away because of the low wash temperatures. Our dishwasher shares the same gulley. QED.

The point being that it might not be cooking fat that is blocking the U bend. And it will have to be done regularly - or you can increase your wash temperature

HTH

Richard