When it comes to problems related to your house or apartment, the telltale signs are all around you. For instance, when it comes to the signs of drain clogging, the pooling water in the shower, or the slow sinking water in the kitchen is a sign that your main drain is taking up a serious amount of clogging. While you can put off the chore of unclogging your drain for months after the signs start to show, you will eventually have to start working on a fix, or it would end up costing you a small fortune in repairs. If you have been experiencing some water drainage problems lately, try out these smart ways to unclog your drain right away.
1. Baking Soda And Vinegar Cleaner
If you are out of any abrasive cleaner that can get your blocked sink in the kitchen clean right away, you can make one at home with some vinegar and baking soda. While this cleaning solution may not work if you need to unclog severely blocked drains, it will most definitely work in case of less than 100 percent blockage. This is considered one of the most effective homemade remedies to unclog a drain in less than a minute.
· Take a pot of water and bring it to boil, then pour it down the drain which has been clogged by debris. Meanwhile, leave one more cup of boiling water for later use.
· As soon as you have poured the boiling water down into the clogged drain, dump about 1/3 cup of baking soda into the drain and let it sit there for about 15 minutes.
· In another pot, mix a cup of vinegar with the cup of hot boiling water, and pour this mixture into the drain.
· As the mixture starts to ooze out of the drain as fizz, wait for 20 minutes and then pour another pot of boiling water to completely unclog the drain.
2. The Wire Hanger Snake Drain
The drain in the kitchen and in the bathroom gets clogged over time, and there is no substantial way to completely avoid it. Most of the time, physical debris such as hair and disposable items cause the clogging, and you need some kind of drainer to remove the physical debris. If you have a spare wire hanger at home, you can use it to effectively unclog the shower sink and the bathtub drains.
· Remove the drain cover if there is any, and clean it up for putting it back in its place later on.
· Straighten out the wire hanger by unwinding it completely. After making the wire hanger into a straight metal wire, curve one end of the wire hanger into a hook.
· Use the hook end of the wire hanger to fetch out the debris from inside the drain. Use the hook to pull up the stuck hair and other debris from within the drain.
· If you do not have a wire hanger, you can use a crochet hook, or even make one out of metal clips by straightening them out.
3. The Milipede Cleaner
While a wire hanger is great for cleaning the clogs that are just under the drain cover, for all those deeper blockages that you need to unclog, you need something better. The millipede cleaner curls up just like the insect, and can reach the twisted corners of the drain with ease. Available at any local store, just uncoil the stick, old down to one end of the millipede and push the grasping end of the stick down the drain you need to unclog. Once the stick it completely in, crank and twirl it around a few times and then pull it up. All the nasty debris come out stuck to the other end of the millipede stick, unclogging your drain for good.
4. The Wet/Dry Vaccum
Most of your bathroom drains will be usually clogged by hair and other debris, which are fairly easy to clean with the wire hanger and millipede cleaner. But for more stubborn blockages that won’t come clean easily, you need more power to pull out the bad stuff. The ideal tool to show your drain that you are the boss, is a wet/dry vacuum cleaner that comes with special attachments to unclog drain.
You can buy a wet/dry vacuum or purchase the unclog attachments for the one you already own. Since there are different variations and models available, it is best that you follow the manual given with the vacuum to unclog your drain. However, the functioning should be as simple as removing dust from an empty pipe, since the machine creates a powerful suction to pull up the stuck debris from the drain.
5. Toilet Bombs
If you have had an embarrassing incident where you end up clogging the toilet, you will love this fun and effective method to unclog the toilet drain. Easy to make, you can have a bunch of these ready in the bathroom if your toilet tends to clog frequently.
Ingredients:
· ¼ Cup Epsom Salt
· 9 Tablespoons Liquid Detergent
· 2 Cups Baking Soda,
· Cupcake liners
· Cupcake Tins
Mix the baking soda with Epsom salt, and place the cupcake liners in the tins. Slowly stir in the liquid detergent into the mixture of baking soda and Epsom salt, one tablespoon at a time. Once the mixture is ready, scoop it into the liners and let the mixture sit overnight at room temperature.
To use the toilet bombs, take out one from its liner and drop it into the bowl, while pouring a pot of boiling water into it. Let the chemicals react and wait for about 4 hours before flushing the toilet. These cheap and effective toilet bombs will make sure that you can unclog your toilet any time.
6. Zip-It Stick
Does your bathroom sink start to pool in just a few seconds, or does the shower drain water rise up often? The single time use plastic stick will help you get all the mess out is less than a moment. Crafted with upward facing barbs of plastic, the hair and other debris from the sink will entangle with the stick, and come right out when you pull the stick out of the drain.