| DRAIN
CLEANING |
|
|
Checking
the clean out
|
 |
When your toilet and tub are
backing up together, your main sewer would be clogged like
right side picture. You can understand this situation by checking
your clean out in front of your house. If your clean out is
backing up, you need to clean your main sewer line. |
|
 |
 |
 |
|
| Normal clean out |
It is already clogged. Inside
sewage was overflow drain |
When you open the cap of picture
#2, you can see sewage backing up |
|
|
|
You need to open the clean
out cap very carefully because sewage will come up like a
fountain due to water pressure. The right side picture is
showing the sewage comes up as soon as loosening the cap. |
 |
|
| Main
Drain Backs Up |
|
| If
your main sewer line is backs up, your tub, shower
pan and toilet will be back up but kitchen or lavatory
seems no problem. Sometimes, the kitchen sewage would
go to the tub. All of these symptoms come from the
level of each fixture. Tub, shower and toilet are
lower than kitchen sink or lavatory. That’s
why you can’t see kitchen or lavatory backing
up in case of main sewer line backs up. If you have
no clean out, you need to pull a toilet and snake
the sewer line because size of sewer line is normally
over than 3” and other drain lines are less
than 3” except toilet line in the house. |
 |
|
|
 |
| Kitchen
Drain Backs Up |
 |
Kitchen
drain is clogged by the grease. Even if you don’t
throw away any grease in the drain, grease in the kitchen
drain will be developed by the soapy water.
Clogged situation caused
by the grease will be like right side upper picture
and after snaking, lots of grease will be removed but
some will be remained on the surface of the pipe inside
like right side lower picture |
| |
|
 |
This remained grease will get harder and harder and
finally it will become like a stone. You can see the
solid grease inside of the pipe in left side picture.
We have to use a chisel to remove it. However if you
use kitchen drain, sewage will still remain between
the grease like above picture. And this remained sewage
will corrode the pipe. The left side picture is showing
the corroded pipe due to inside grease. It will be
finally leaking.
|
| |
The left side picture is showing the leaking. To
prevent this leaking problem, I would like to suggest
to clean the kitchen drain line by high water pressure
regularly. Recommendable time would be once in every
2~3 years.
|
 |
 |
|
|
|
| Laundry
Backs Up |
|
If your laundry drain is clogged or reduced its internal
size by the grease, your wash machine sewage will
back up. Occasionally, when your main drain clogged
partially, the sewage of wash machine will back up
too. When your kitchen line is clogged, your kitchen
sewage backs up to the laundry sink because they are
using one drain line and the laundry sink is lower
than kitchen sink.
|
 |
|
|
| Toilet
Backs Up |
|
 |
If main
sewer is clogged, toilet will be backed up with the
tub or shower pan. But sometimes, you can meet toilet
itself backing up without any relation with the tub
or shower pan. You need to clean the toilet P trap.
This P trap is clogged by unexpected stuffs like children’s
toy or other materials. Your strong and thick human
waste can be the cause of clogging. |
|
|
|
| Tub
Drain Backs Up |
|
Major reason of clogging are
hair stocking except main sewer line clogging. If you clean
the rag in the tub, the debris of it will stock in the tub
drain and the cause of clogging. There is no chemical to remove
hair or rag debris. You need to remove the hair by the snake.
|
 |
| The
right side picture is showing the hairs after snake |
 |
|
|
| Shower
Drain Backs Up |
| Shower
drain is clogged by hair except main sewer line backing up.
There is no chemical to remove the hair except snake. If there
is any chemical to melt hair, it will remove the pipe itself.
Also, I am recommending not to clean the rag at the shower
pan. If you clean the rag at the shower pan, your shower drain
will be clogged immediately. |
 |
| The
right side picture is showing the hair after snake. |
 |
|
| Slow
Lavatory |
|
Most of lavatories are clogged by the grease and the hair.
Even you use soapy water only, grease is built up. Snake will
be done like purple arrow mark in the following picture but
if your lavatory is back to back like the picture (there are
two lavatories between the wall), you need to pull both P
trap to snake without breaking of next side P trap.
|
 |
| If
you try to snake back to back vanity without removing the
P trap, the snake cable will go to directly instead of going
down because of it’s tension and brake the next P trap.
So you need to put cable to the downward by the hand. |
 |
| This
picture is showing the downward cable after pull the both side
P trap. |
 |
|
