janeowit's Journal: When life gives you a bathtub filled with orange water

Don't drink it.

Just call me jane, unsuccessful girl plumber! Yes, I fulfilled all my Mario and Luigi dreams by attempting to fix my bathtub. The faucet for hot water hasn't been able to turn off since I moved in 15 months ago, so I am used to hearing this dripping noise coming from my bathroom. Yesterday afternoon I noticed that the drip was a little louder, a little more resonant, so I went to investigate and lo and behold I found my bathtub half filled with water tinted with a greasy orange substance and the bottom of tub covered with particulate matter.

I began with the standard methods, unscrewing everything that had screws and poking around for a clog, and then plunging like there was no tomorrow. I finally managed to get the tub to start draining slowly and headed off to buy some super toxic chemicals that would work magic. When I got back, the tub was drained, and I cleaned it out and the crap on the bottom was disgusting, but little did I know it would get worse. I dumped half of bottle down, and watched as it bubbled back up with more disgusting pipe crap. The pipes threw up into the tub a couple more times, and I couldn't even tell you what was coming up. Possibly paper, maybe bark, lots of sandy stuff, yellow goo.

Today I filled the tub with nice clear water and opened the drain and it took about an hour to empty. I thought things were better. But I went back in an hour ago to a few inches of smelly dirty water, and I'm all out of chemicals. Plunging didn't help. And I haven't bathed in days.

If I have to be here for someone to fix this, I'll be so not happy. But I've decided that it can't just be my problem, because that wouldn't explain the random backing up. So it's probably a whole apartment thing, right? But why hasn't it affected any other plumbing, why is my sink just fine?

But here's a little news tidbit to make you shift uncomfortably in your seat, Mike Tyson, convicted rapist, is going to be a prostitute.

Plunging, etc ..

[tomhudson]

Plunging won't work if you don't block off the overflow. I had a really slow bathroom sink, and even plunging while blocking the overflow didn't work - but running a hose to it and running hot water through it at high pressure did the trick so well that I also used the same technique to cure the kitchen sink of its sluggishness ... environmentally friendly, cheap, quick, safe.

If it's bubbling up...

[Iamthefallen]

Then most likely it's a block somewhere past your bathtub (ie one of the drain mains on the floor) that several fixtures feed into. Since the bathtub drain is the lowest point, it will start to see the backup well before the sink sees it. If it was simply the bathtub drain that was clogged, you shouldn't really see anything come back up.

If you want to get your hands dirty (Not so figuratively speaking), go to your local Home Improvement Mart and find a 50' (or so) auger (aka Snake) to feed into the pipe to

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[Ethelred Unraed]

Even if you live in a rental, I'd say an auger/snake is a good thing to have. Better than cooling your heels waiting on the super or the landlord to do it, and they don't cost much.

If it backs up a lot (which if you have long hair and wash it a lot, it probably will), I use some Drano gel from time to time, like every three to six months. You can also get bacterial drain gel if you want to be more environmentally friendly. I've tried it and it works fairly well, though not if it's already blocked.

Cheers

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[janeowit]

I don't have particularly long hair, and I wash it daily. But my hair comes out in my hands when I wash it, during the lathering part. And I don't know why I would send it down the drain when I already have it in my hands. So I rub my hands together, make a little hairball, and stick it to the wall and throw it in the trash when I'm done. Sometimes I leave a few days up on the wall to compare. I'm sure a few stray hairs escape, but for the most part I catch it.

Are you trying to tell me other people don't sa

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[Ethelred Unraed]

I try to save my hair as well (I use a hair scrubber and we have a plastic sieve in the drain), but inevitably some gets through -- and nothing gums up drains over time like hair. It gets sticky in the drain, catches on rough spots inside the pipe, and then catches other stuff on it, creating a sort of greasy slime that builds up exponentially (excess soap especially does this, which in turn attracts more hair and skin flakes, etc.).

Thus the more you prevent hair from getting in there, the less it will cl

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[TechnoLust]

Eth showered at my house once, and I pulled a wookie from the drain! ;-)

The best thing I've ever used to unclog a drain (although mine was a toilet some chick flushed a feminine product down) was something I found at Lowe's. It's a plunger with a pressurized Chemical blaster. You attach a can of pressurized chemical to the handle and the plunger head and submerge it, then when you press down, the plunger head seals the drain and the chems are blown into the pipes at high pressure. The chemical loosens

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[Ethelred Unraed]

Eth showered at my house once, and I pulled a wookie from the drain! ;-)

Heh. Back when I had long hair, that would have been very believable. In fact it actually happened!

Cheers,

Ethelred

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[TechnoLust]

And there you have it folks... Chewy's back story. ;-)

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[Some Woman]

I do that too. We have a hair catcher thingie over the drain, but if hairs come off in my hand, I put them on the shower wall and grab them off with some TP when I'm done. (Because that's the easiest ways to ensure that they'll make it into the trash.)

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[Some Woman]

I think that would be the same Apartment Maintenance SuperCrew that let her go for 4 months without a working stove/oven after numerous complaints.

Janeowit- you can come shower at our place any time you need to.

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[Ethelred Unraed]

Janeowit- you can come shower at our place any time you need to.

You can shower at our place, too!

Cheers,

Ethelred

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[janeowit]

I might have to take you up on that.

When washing up this morning I noticed that when I emptied the full sink, a bunch of crap bubbled into the tub. And then I washed my hair, and the tub had risen a little higher! Also, when the people upstairs use their sink... guess who's drain starts spitting up crazier and crazier things? Mine! You know those helicopter leaves, I might have one of those, or it's a giant insect wing.

I've been checking my voice mail between every class, and I haven't heard anything from m

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[Marxist Hacker 42]

Helicopter leaves? Check the overflow on the roof as well- could be a tree dropping stuff into it to clog up the whole system...plus I didn't realize this was a rental. Perhaps the best thing to do is file a complaint with your city's rental omsbudsman.

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[nizo]

If hair in the tub is an issue, they sell drain covers and such to catch all the hairballs before they clog your plumbing. Plus the ones that lay flat work great in the tub.

Maybe someone upstairs is disposing of a body in their bathtub?

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[janeowit]

Maybe someone upstairs is disposing of a body in their bathtub?

Again? The big brown moldy stain on my bathroom ceiling stopped growing a month ago.

Other warning

[Marxist Hacker 42]

I had these symptoms a while ago- and it turned out to be an 18-year-old disintegrating hot water heater was at fault. I stupidly ignored them- did much as you are doing- and ended up with quite the flood when it finally rusted through.