Drain Clog Tips Pic

5 Kinds of Cloggers that Won’t Have You Dancing

Drain Clog Tips PicAny home, particularly older homes, can experience drain clog problems in their sinks, bathtubs, and toilets. There are a number of ways to remove these clogs, including unclogging gels, handheld drain snakes, and calling in a professional. None of those will make you feel like dancing, though. So the team at Home Comfort Experts has put together this preventative maintenance list for your home plumbing to help avoid the clogs before they happen.

How to Avoid Drain Clogs

Sometimes, the best form of maintenance is a little preventative maintenance. Why go through the hassle of unclogging a drain when you can easily prevent the drain from clogging in the first place? Here are five common drain clogs and ways to prevent them from happening:

Hair – The next time you’re at the supermarket, take a quick trip over to the hardware section and pick up a drain catcher. These nifty tools fit down into your bathtub or shower drain, or sit on top of the drain, and act as a filter, allowing the water to drain but catching any hair that may get rinsed down the drain and cause blockage. When you’re finished showering, simply remove the hair from the drain catcher and throw it away. This can prevent you from having to use a handheld snake drain to fish large amounts of clumped up hair from your drain later on, which is always gross.

Baby Wipes – Many brands of baby wipes claim to be “flushable” on the packaging, but they don’t actually dissolve properly in water (being designed to be wet and still strong) and so frequently result in buildup and clogging of the drains. So, even if a baby wipe claims to be flushable, always toss them in the trash can instead.

Roots – Roots growing into your underground pipes is a tougher problem that will often result in a professional being called to your home. A good tool to prevent the roots from growing is Obliteroot, an environmentally friendly root killer that targets the roots directly and prevents them from growing, without harming the trees the roots belong to.

Grease – Cooking grease is a frequent problem for kitchen drains. The grease is sticky and coats everything it touches, and becomes a thick, oily layer of gel when it cools, resulting in buildup in the drains and ultimately, a drain clog that’s rather difficult to remove on your own. The proper way to dispose of cooking grease in the kitchen is to pour it out into a glass jar (pickle jars and pasta sauce jars with wide mouths are best for this purpose). Once full, dispose of the grease-filled jar in the trash.

Foreign Objects – Items such as children’s toys, pet toys, sometimes even jewelry or clothing, can fall into a toilet or down a sink drain and cause major blockage. It’s a good idea to get in the habit of keeping your bathroom door closed, your toilet lid down, and small objects like jewelry away from sink drains, in order to prevent foreign objects from clogging up your drains, resulting in a large hassle and/or expensive repairs.

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You can’t prevent all drain clogs, so if you do have a clog, just give us a call and we’ll send one of our drain cleaning experts to take care of it. Contact us at Home Comfort Experts for expert help with your plumbing clogs.