Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with clog

Kitchen drain maintenance?

exhilaration — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 11:35:21 -0800

How do I keep my kitchen drain from clogging? I already have a good strainer, but I keep getting these grease clogs. Is there some safe chemical or homemade concoction I can use on a regular basis? After living in my house for 4 years, my kitchen drain clogged, then again 6 months later (last week) - not a total clog, but like 30 minutes-to-drain slow. Drano etc. didn't work, neither did a snake - it went right through the gunk, I even rented a motorized one from Home Depot! What did work was this crazy, dangerous chemical (417841 on the Home Depot website) that I have to go into the basement, unscrew the pipe, and carefully pour in with a funnel and tube (wearing eye and hand protection). I let it work overnight and my drain is perfect in the morning. So I guess it's a grease clog - how can I keep it from coming back?

Plumbing fail - clogged kitchen sink

wongcorgi — Tue, 12 May 2009 14:28:50 -0800

Clogged kitchen sink, what can I try next? I have a clogged kitchen sink. I've snaked the drain starting under the sink with a 6ft length and a 25 footer with no luck. I've done it about 5 times with some chunks coming back but still have 0 flow, each time filling the drain up with boiling water. The last two time using drano, waiting a few hours then the water.

My plan is to get a longer snake, but how long do I need? I'm thinking that if I can just keep pushing, the clog will just fall into a larger pipe (?) If my thinking is wrong, please let me know. I just don't want to have to keep buying progressively longer tools (I bought the 6ft and 25ft so far).

Or if anyone has any other ideas...? I've also tried a wet vac blowing as well as vacuuming with no luck as well as spirited plunging of the above drain.

I'd rather not call the a plumber ($$).

I want new non-Dansko Danskos

Foam Pants — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 21:52:57 -0800

After years of being an enthusiastic Dansko fan, I now am seeking a similar clog from someone other than Dansko. I bought a pair of brown oiled leather clogs about seven years ago. I wore them into the ground and they still look great. I also bought a pair of black and loved them just as much. When both pairs hit the 6 year mark, the sole split all the way through. Considering the beating I put them through, I was a VERY satisfied customer and decided to buy again.

This is where things went wrong. I bought the same sizes and styles. This time around, the black pair is so tight across the top of my foot that I can only wear them for short periods of time. If I walk to work in them, my foot falls asleep before I get there! The brown pair fit a bit better but they are pretty much unwearable. When my sock rubs against them they squeak... really badly. I work in a library/museum so you can hear me coming in my farty shoes. They are so bad that just shifting my weight causes this horrid noise. Also, they look crappy after only three months of wear with a thin coating of gloss worn off over sides and the toe gone almost white. My seven year old shoes look better.

I love the way Dansko clogs work with my clothes. All of my pants are hemmed to accommodate the heel. Obviously, Dansko doesn't make shoes the way they used to. Are there similar clogs that I would like more? I want a similar heel and a similar boxy toe. I have tried Noat and didn't like the way they looked.

How is my kitchen like the Internet?

Who_Am_I — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 08:08:47 -0800

Should I be getting a break on my rent because my kitchen pipes are clogged? Last Wednesday evening, my kitchen sink backed up pretty bad. Then I noticed that the cabinet area under the sink had some (~1-2 liters) standing water, and that the carpet next to the kitchen was getting wet from underneath. We stopped using the sink and dishwasher, aimed a fan at the carpet, and my roommate called our landlord the next morning. Nobody came out Thursday, and when he called back Friday they said that somehow they hadn't got the work order in and now it would be Monday before anyone could come out.

Plumber came out Monday and has been working on it since. He said it is a very bad clog, broke his plumber's snake trying to clear it, and now is excavating part of our building to get at the pipes from underneath. So it is being worked on, but now it has been more than a week since we could really use our kitchen. Basically all of our dishes are on the kitchen counter, and I've had to eat out most every meal, as we've run out of clean dishes to cook with. On top of that our carpet is still damp and a bit discolored, and our apartment has started to smell.

Now if this were our fault of course we would suck it up and be glad that they were fixing it, but I don't think that's the case. Neither me nor my roommate put much of anything solid down the drain, and it all goes through the disposal. Our kitchen shares pipes with (at least) our neighbor through the wall, and we are suspecting that it is his fault (gross: when the sink backed up a bunch of rice came with the water, which neither me nor my roommate had made for months). A few people have mentioned that we should not be responsible for all of our rent this month because of the state of our apartment. Does this seem like a reasonable thing to request, or is this just one of those things that happens? If it is appropriate, what would be a realistic reduction to seek?

What should I try before I take the plunge and bring in a plumber?

Artw — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 09:58:56 -0800

My toilet blocks repeatedly, what to do? I'm a new home owner so I'm new to this sort of thing, so forgive me if I'm being dumb here. Just recently my downstairs toilet has been getting clogged about once a day. A quick application of teh plunger sorts it out but it's getting a little tiresome. My currnet theory is that there's some kind of partial blockage further down the pipe that is causing clogs to become more common. Is there something I should try doing about this before bringing in a (presumably expensive) plumber?

Needed: Functional Garbage Disposal ASAP!

MasonDixon — Wed, 14 May 2008 18:59:23 -0800

Help! We're drowning in orange rinds, onion skins, and a mishmash of left overs! It is a deep and vexing mystery, but the drain cover to our garbage disposal has disappeared and will not run without it. Where can I get another one?

It is an Insinkerator Model/Series 17. The drain cover functions as a "key" of sorts that is placed in the drain and turned a half-turn. The drain cover then locks into place enabling the disposal to run.

My google-fu has not been able to find a place that sells this particular replacement part and the pool of brown, foody broth in my sink is unbearable.

Thanks!

Who keeps clogging the toilet, and why?

dubold — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 12:57:59 -0800

[ToiletMysteryFilter]Why would someone clog a public toilet with paper every day? I work in an older building in NYC. The offices do not have individual bathrooms; there is a restroom for each gender, and each office has keys.

After I arrive at work, I go to use the facilities. For the last several months, every day, sometime between 9:30 and 10:00, the left-most stall has a great deal of toilet paper in the bowl. It is usually in a distinctive layout - it looks like it was being used to prevent contact with the seat, as well as wadded up and tossed in the bowl. I am estimating 1/5th to 1/3 of a roll is used per visit. It also looks as if there is urine in the bowl. If there is feces in the bowl, it is completely covered and not visible. Attempts to flush the toilet usually result in blockage and overflow.

I suspect it is the same person every time for two reasons. One: it's the same approx quantity and dispersal of paper every time. Two: It's about the same time every day. If I'm there before 9:30 or so, the toilet is empty. Between 9:30 and 10:00 it is plugged.

So why do I care? It's mildly inconvenient for me - only one other stall and the urinal is usable - but I would imagine terribly frustrating for the cleaning staff. For a couple weeks a plunger was left in the restroom, but that's disappeared.

I had thought about just leaving a note - something along the lines of "Hi, please stop putting so much toilet paper in the bowl".

The only thing that prevented me from leaving a note right away: there are a lot of different folks from various countries in the building. From previous Metafilter threads, I have ascertained that not everyone has the same toilet practices - is there some cultural/regional thing that I should be aware of here?

A couple years ago, we were finding water all over the floor of the bathroom, and it turned out that a couple men in the building were observant Muslims who used the sinks to wash before prayer. Obviously this is a slightly different condition, but if there's some cultural practice at work, I'll just bite my tongue and deal with it.

Before this started, I was talking to another tenant in the building, and he told me that someone was clogging a toilet on his floor daily. He described a similar condition. About 2 months later, it started on this floor.

Anyone have any clue as to what's going on here?

OH NOEZ! MAH SMILEY BALL IZ STUCK IN DA TUB DRAIN!

4ster — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:29:58 -0800

Suggestions needed for getting a rubber ball out of a tub drain pipe. Will Drano or Liquid Plumr dissolve it? Are there other DIY options? I was bathing my daughter last week when her toy smiley-face rubber ball went down the drain. This ball is probably 1/8" smaller than the drain itself and is now far enough down the drain that I can't see or feel it.

So far, I have tried poking with a coat hanger and removing the two screws that hold the round disk that holds the lever that closes the drain. As it turns out, that round disk is there purely for cosmetic reasons, as the lever isn't connected to anything.

The ball is made out of the same material as rubber duckies. Would Drano dissolve it? Any other suggestions other than calling a plumber?

Thanks in advance.

Number 1 all fun - Number 2 don't do!

bitteroldman — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 17:43:53 -0800

FlushFilter:Toilet has a lazy flush (i.e. going down slowly) - I think the problem might be a clog that is bulding up, but a plunger and closet auger (i.e. a snake) don't seem to do the trick. What now? - I get a "lazy flush" - that is the water goes down rather slowly.
- When it does eventually get down, it gurgles or burps repeatedly but slowly, rather than quickly
- The water level in the tank is as high as it can be
- I tried the 5-gallon test several times, but I don't get any siphoning action, although the bowl doesn't seem to overfill either.
- this toilet is on the 2nd floor. We have another toilet in the basement that seems to be in the same place (i.e. it might be using the same pipes), and it flushes properly
- the other drains are draining well

All of these symptoms are making me think that a clog is building up in the upstairs toilet - however I tried a plunger; it didn't work. Then I tried a closet auger - that didn't work.

What else can it be? What else can I try before I need to call the plumber?

major drain woes

mandlebrotz — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 17:06:48 -0800

any ideas for a drain clog emergency? so i'm having a few friends over in about 10 minutes. a couple of hours before they were due to get here, the kitchen sink backed up. we plunged, and it filled with black gunk, but nothing was moving. in a panic, we poured about 3/4 bottle of drano down there.

now, the sink is still stopped up, but with an acidy drano mix. the whole kitchen is filled with fumes that kind of sting the eyes a little. we're afraid to do anything else because we don't want to get the drano on us, but we're worried about the fumes and the mess and the drano eating through our pipes.

any ideas as to what we should do? apologies if i didn't do a thorough enough search -- i tried to look but i'm super pressed for time!

(also, no lectures on the evils of drano please. we feel horrible enough as it is!)

thanks so much -- if you can help, you're my hero.

Help unclog our sink

The Michael The — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 07:31:34 -0800

I need some plumbing help. The drain from our kitchen sink is clogged, and we're trying to fix it DIY-style. BACKGROUND: A bunch of crap made it past our garbage disposal on Friday night and blocked up the pipe. I managed to track down the clog, and it's past all of the accessible pipes under the sink and in the pipe that heads straight down into the floor and then bends into the wall. I've tried Draino (helped a *LITTLE*) and another Enzyme-based pipe cleanser (helped more, but still no real dice). I've also tried plunging, which doesn't work because one of the pipes under the sink is a length of PVC tube. The end of that tube is cut very roughly and fits into a rubber elbow tube clamped with a hose clamp but without any caulk or sealant. The rough end has a deep score from the edge along the long dimension of the pipe that runs about 2 inches, which provides a nice exit point for air and water and to relieve pressure that could be breaking up the clog.

SO: Will getting a new, well-cut length of PVC to replace the old one, in hopes that that will enable plunging and enzymatic cleansing? Or should we just call the landlord and get a plumber?

How Hard is it to Use a Drain Snake?

Taken Outtacontext — Sat, 20 May 2006 12:16:58 -0800

ShowerDrainFilter: Every six months or so our shower drain clogs and we have to call a plumber to snake it out. That costs about $125 each time. We asked him the last time if we could buy our own snake and do it ourselves and he strongly cautioned us against that. Was he telling us that so we would continue to call him or is there a chance we could wreck our pipes by doing it ourselves?

If you think we can do it ourselves what should we know about using the snake to go down our drain? How much does a snake cost?

Toilets without Tanks: How Do They Work? Do They Clog?

WCityMike — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 15:10:25 -0800

PlumbingFilter: Help me understand my new tankless toilet with no shut-off valve. What do I do if it clogs? In my new apartment, I have a toilet that doesn’t have a tank and has a forceful jet-like ‘ka-WHOOSH!’ flushing action, which seems in all ways identical to the toilets you see in office buildings and most outside-the-home venues.

Please tell me, or guide me to resources about, how this system works. (I must not be using the correct search terms, as my Google-fu fails me. I located information about the systems airlines use -- vacuum drainage systems -- but I don't think this is the same, given that airline systems are, to the best of my recollection, nearly waterless and require the lid be closed.)

I’m interested in a general comprehension of how a tankless toilet system works, but also specifically interested in whether it could clog and overflow in the same way a toilet with a tank could, given the same circumstances (too much toilet paper or … er … ahem … material).

If so, in such a circumstance, how could I prevent the major flooding and water damage without access to the water turn-off valve one sees with toilets with tanks? Or do these toilets operate in a way in which overflowing becomes less likely or impossible? Or, in such a case, would I just be screwed? (And if so, why would they create a system with such an obvious design flaw?)

Boyfriend = plumber

mdpc98 — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 10:27:19 -0800

GirlfriendFlushedHerTubeOfDeodorantDownTheCanFilter: Toilet clogged. As the statistically significant other, I have been enlisted to fix the problem. One stick of solid deodorant or anti-perspirant... I'll update the thread when I find out which one it is :) Floor-drain toilet. Will flow, but very slowly--definitely impeded. Other drains on the same level flow fine, so I assume the clog is still fairly local to the toilet. I can't reach the clog with my hand.

The options I am considering:
a) trying to suck it back into the bowl with a plunger
b) pull the toilet off and investigate

Does anyone have experience/information that would help?