A backed-up drain
Prevent and Clear Blocked Drains
Clogged drains and blocked drains are more than just an inconvenience, they can quickly cause expensive damage to your home. If you have running water in your home, here are a few essential things you need to know about your drains!
Signs of Blocked Drains
When your sewer is plugged or your septic tank needs pumping, here’s what could happen:
- Water backs up out of your tub drain when you flush your toilet.
- When you empty your bathtub, the water stops flowing and bubbles back at you or bubbles into the toilet.
- When you empty your kitchen sink, the sink water backs up into the toilet.
- When you flush your toilet, sewer water backs up through an outside downspout, patio drain, driveway drain, or the lowest floor drain in your house.
- When you run a load of laundry, soapy water comes up into a toilet, shower, or floor drain.
How to Unclog a Drain and Prevent Clogs
- Let plenty of water run down the drain by keeping the faucet open for up to half a minute each day.
- Sink lines commonly plug because not enough water is flushed through them, especially after the garbage disposal is used. Run the faucet for about five seconds after you turn off the disposal. This helps flush the line.
- Never pour hot oil or grease down the sink—whether or not you have a disposal.
- About once a month, fill the sink to the top with very hot water. Using a fork or other kitchen utensil so you don’t scald your hand, remove the sink’s plug. As the clean hot water swirls down through the sink line, it takes much of the grease buildup with it.
- Drain-cleaning chemicals, if used improperly, can solidify in a drain line and aggravate the blockage. If the chemical doesn’t eat through the blockage, therefore not flushing down the drain, the chemical sits in your sink line. It crystallizes, and then there is no way you can easily clean a sink line after chemicals harden in it. Always be sure to follow the instructions
- It’s a good idea to keep a simple plumbing snake in your home. The snake can help you unclog your sink, bathtub, or shower drain if hair and other gunk happens to block them. A simple plumbing snake can be bought at your local hardware store or online for only a few dollars.
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To Keep a Toilet from Clogging
- Don’t put anything foreign down the toilet except toilet paper.
- Items such as dental floss, Q-Tips, baby wipes, feminine hygiene products, or any other paper product cling to the roots in the sewer and cause an immediate blockage.
- Always have a plunger on hand, and don’t wait until you need one to buy one—by then, it’s too late!
More Helpful Household Hints:
Catherine Boeckmann
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You might check your drain vent, if you have one. This is usually a tube visible on the roof, and a few helpful youtube videos are out there describing how to fix the issue. Basically, the drain vent provides a passage for air, to help leverage the movement of water through your pipes. If that air doesn't come, then water through pipes creates pressure and (surprise) water can flow backward, coming out of drains elsewhere in the home.
After flushing my Toliet. The tank & bowl fills up. Then the water in the to let bowl drains out. The tank is still full & everything is flushing out of the toliet. Back to back bathrooms & both are doing this. This Morning I Was Running Water down the tub drain and my toilet started gurgling. What's going on. Help please!
I am in an old rental house and the plumbing has always been slow. Now when I try to flush the toilet, the bowl fills with water and slowly drains out without actually flushing.
Water from the tub and sink drain into the toilet and will cause an overflow unless the water from the toilet has drained enough to hold the new drainage.
I was loading my dishwasher and noticed that my sink on both sides were backing up. I turned off the water and my boyfriend went into the laundry room (going out to the garage) and noticed that water, dirt and food were wall over the laundry room floor. We can't figure out where the clog is. He snaked the kitchen and the laundry room drain. The bathrooms are just fine, nothing is backing up. Has anyone else had this problem?
We just purchased a home that has been empty for over two years. There is a septic and also a gray water line the we can not find (per the neighbors). we had heard bubbling sounds from washing machine to kitchen sink and bathtub and vice verse, but no noise in the toilet. My husband placed a mini vent on the kitchen sink. That seemed to cure the issue for a week. Then today, we are all backed up, tub and kitchen sink is full of the washing machine water. It does not smell like sewage nor does it look like sewage. It smells like laundry soap with little chunks of dirty dish water. We do not want to hire a plumber... we are broke since we just purchased the home. please advise.
After using the toilet or taking shower or using the sink I have water leaking into my garage. I have a tri level home and two bathrooms upstairs and one in downstairs. I need help and advice on what may be the problem. The leak drains around a pipe in my garage
The drain in my garden has been flooding out dirty foul smelling water into my garden. I noticed that when i ran kitchen tap the drain in garden started over flowing. What would you suggest? Can i deal with this myself?
Thanks in advance
My bathtub drains okay until almost finished. It stops draining for a few seconds and the toilet begins bubbling. The tub then finishes draining and the water bounces around the pipes (very loud rushing water) until it finally gurgles out the main exit pipe. Our septic was pumped less than a month ago. No problems with any other drains in the house. No septic smells. Could this be a partial blockage or venting issue?
Please help. We're having problems in our house. There's water coming out from the first floor floor drains. We already called a professional for it but it doesn't change at all especially when we're using the washing machine. Thank you!
We had gurgling from both (back to back)bathroom toilets. Sewage started backing up into both bathtubs. This is on the 23rd floor of a condo (3 floors below the penthouse). The condo dates 1975. A plumber was called, removed both toilets & found ''the cause of the blockage was tampons and baby wipes. I pulled out many on the end of the sewer machine.'' (What ever that is) Current female occupant is beyond menopause and there has not been a female nor baby in the unit since the summer of 2011. Could this waste date back 4 years? There have been no issues in those 4 years. Any ideas?
