How To Clean Clogged Kitchen Sink Drain

Since leaving college, Paul has worked in a variety of roles, including: painter and decorator, general handyman, and freelance writer.

Learn the different steps you lot can take to articulate your clogged kitchen sink.

Brett_Hondow

Unclogging a kitchen sink drain is often much easier than most people think, and avoiding the cost of calling out a plumber is always a proficient thing in my experience. While y'all may need to invest some time and endeavor fixing the problem yourself, it's usually worth it.

Nigh clogs can be resolved by employing some relatively elementary and straightforward techniques and tools. One time you lot have unclogged the sink, information technology is then time to work on minimizing the chances of the problem reoccurring - see the section at the end of the article for advice on prevention.

8 Ways to Unclog a Kitchen Sink Drain

1. Remove all standing water.
2. Check the garbage disposal (if you accept one).
3. Utilize a plunger to dislodge the clog.
4. Clean the P-trap.
5. Use a plumbers' snake (also sometimes chosen a "toilet jack" or an "electrical eel").
6. Use baking soda and vinegar (the natural alternative to chemicals)
7. Use cleaning chemicals.
8. Telephone call a plumber.

In my feel, unclogging a kitchen sink drain can require a combination of more than one of these methods.

The whole process could take y'all anywhere from ten minutes to more than an 60 minutes to clear a chock-full bleed, depending on the nature of the blockage. The task tin can exist messy and care must be used if chemicals are involved, as splashes tin burn skin or worse.

Apart from calling a plumber, most of my suggestions are relatively inexpensive or cost zero—they use tools and materials you should already have in your house. Below, I will go into more item nigh each method.

A clogged kitchen sink drain requires urgent activeness. Blockages can be caused by a variety of things, just typically involve foods such equally coffee grinds, fatty from meats such as salary, and starchy foods like rice and pasta.

one. Remove All Standing Water From the Clogged Kitchen Sink

Continuing water happens when water has connected to run into the sink subsequently the clog has occurred. You should put on your rubber gloves and bail out the backlog h2o with a jug, cup, or other container, so that yous take clear access to the drain. And so you should should clear what waste you tin in and around the bleed by hand.

If there is a garbage disposal do not put your hand or fingers nigh the blades (see #2 below). Sometimes immigration the waste matter by hand tin be all it takes to set the trouble, but more often it takes further action.

2. Check the Garbage Disposal

If your kitchen sink has a garbage disposal, then y'all volition need to check it for clogs. They can easily get blocked up with $.25 of food. To determine the source of the clog, switch off the disposer first. If you stick anything down the drain, then y'all will also desire to switch off the power.

Yous tin can utilize a flashlight to look down the drain and try to decide the nature of the blockage: where it is and what is causing information technology. This will determine your tools and arroyo.

The likeliest crusade of the clog is pieces of food that are stuck betwixt the blades—if it is something more substantial or valuable, such equally jewelry, then you may wish to telephone call a plumber. If it is nutrient, effort breaking up the debris by manually turning the disposer blades.

The manual operator is unremarkably at the bottom of the disposer and is operated with an Allen key. Refer to disposer manual for full instructions.

Employ pliers to remove whatever loose nutrient debris. If the disposer is still clogged, so you will need to use a plunger. It may be possible to remove the disposer entirely for inspection. Be sure to compression whatever connections to dishwasher outset, yet.

Read More From Dengarden

Don't apply chemical cleaners with a disposer as these can cause it damage. If the problem turns out not to be the disposer or you don't accept ane fitted, you will need to explore other methods.

Caution

Never stick your hand inside the garbage disposer, as the blades are sharp and can crusade serious injury.

3. Utilise a Plunger

In that location are 3 types of plungers: the classic flat-bottom sink plunger, the accordion plunger, and the toilet plunger, which has an boosted bell-end at the bottom. Y'all are better off using a flat-bottomed plunger for this job.

How to Unclog Your Kitchen Sink Drain Using a Plunger

• Run a few inches of water into the sink to aid suction and begin plunging.
• If you have a garbage disposer, attempt running it again afterward. Be careful not to overheat the disposer, as that can crusade impairment.
• Run some h2o into the sink. If information technology drains okay, and so you're all prepare.
• If it doesn't run, so yous will have to plunge some more or move onto another method.

4. Clean the P-trap

The P-trap is the elbow-shaped pipe under the sink. If this gets clogged with food and/or grease, then you may want to accept information technology apart and clean out the gunk that is causing the blockage.

How to Clean the Kitchen Sink P-trap

• Earlier you starting time, brand sure that you take a saucepan placed under the P-trap to grab the water that is backed up in your sink.
• Y'all volition and so demand to unscrew the connections to the pipe and wall.
• Remove the P-trap and inspect it for debris.
• If the blockage is not in the P-trap, then you volition demand to try unblocking the drain with a plumbing snake.

If the clog is farther downwards your drain, you lot may desire to use a plumbing snake to dislodge whatever it is clogging your sink.

5. Use a Plumbers' Snake

If neither plunging nor cleaning the P-trap works, you lot may need to use a plumber's snake to go rid of the clog.

This tool consists of a coiled screw snake, typically effectually 1/four-inch thick, with a handle at i terminate. The coil is used to attain down into the drain, then the handle is cranked, dislodging and pulling up the clog. Some snakes are manually cranked, while others are electrically powered for extra strength.

Yous Tin Employ a Wire Glaze Hanger If You Don't Have a Snake

If you don't have a plumbing serpent on hand, you can also utilize a wire coat hanger to fish out the clog. This is a cheap, easy method that almost anyone can do—all you demand is a wire coat hanger and a pair of pliers.

1. Unwind the wire looped around the neck of the hook and straighten out the hanger as much as possible. You might have to apply pliers to do this.
2. Use the pliers to create a minor, one-inch-long claw at one end of the wire. Make sure it is narrow enough to fit through the drain.
3. Insert the hooked end of the wire downward the drain and gently jerk information technology effectually a scrap, trying to find the clog. Do not push button downward also roughly, as this might push the blockage further downwardly the pipe.
4. If you feel anything at the end of the wire, pull it up and out of the drain. You lot might not be able to remove the whole clog all at once, then effort once again to see if anything else comes up. Turn on the hot water from your faucet to make sure you got everything.

If you effort this trick and fail to find the blockage, it could be that the clog is further down the drain than the wire is able to reach. In this case, try 1 of the other methods listed in this commodity.

vi. Use Blistering Soda and Vinegar

This method avoids the utilize of chemical cleaners. All you need is one cup of baking soda and i cup of vinegar.

How to Unclog Your Kitchen Sink Drain Using Baking Soda and Vinegar

• Offset, pour boiling water down the bleed. So push the blistering soda down the sink bleed, using a spatula if necessary. Allow it to sit down for 5 to 10 minutes.
• Next, cascade vinegar into the drain. Put the stopper into the sink, pushing the vinegar toward the clog and blocking off the mixture from coming back up.
• Finally, flush the bleed with humid water again.

This method doesn't ever piece of work, but it is worth trying.

Baking soda and vinegar in combination can sometimes piece of work when it comes to unblocking clogs. The baking soda is added first, followed by the vinegar. The stopper should so be pushed in to contain the resulting reaction.

7. Should I Use Chemicals, Such as Drano, to Unclog My Kitchen Sink?

If your sink has a garbage disposer, I would seriously recommend that you practise NOT use a chemic cleaner, equally they can ruin the blades and spray back into your sink.

I would as well Not recommend using a liquid chemical cleaner if yous take a consummate clog rather than only a problem with slow draining. Whenever you utilize chemicals there is ever a chance that the the toxic chemicals will get backed up in the sink, along with stagnant water, and crusade a potential health hazard.

The blazon of cleaner yous get can depend on the type of matter yous suspect may exist causing the clog. Generally speaking, clogs acquired by biological matter crave a more than acidic cleaner, whereas greasy clogs are better dealt with by using alkali metal cleaners.

Ever read the label advisedly and use the cleaner exactly equally instructed. Chemical cleaners can be harmful if misused.

eight. Call a Plumber

If the higher up methods fail to piece of work, or yous believe that the problem is simply out of your league, then y'all should call a professional plumber. This is the to the lowest degree affordable option, simply it can relieve fourth dimension and trouble when naught seems to work and you don't want to start messing effectually with the plumbing.

The cost of a plumber tin can range from $175 to $450 depending on how long the job takes to fix, and then be certain to endeavor the other options first if you lot're price sensitive. If y'all're not worried about the cost, still, it may exist the least troublesome to just become someone else to fix the problem.

A clogged kitchen sink drain can bring a household to a virtual standstill. Near clogs can exist dealt with using common household items; even so, if none of these work, you may have to phone call a plumber

The Main Symptoms of a Chock-full Sink Drain

The showtime problem that you are likely to notice is boring drainage: When you lot turn on the faucet, the water will be tedious to go down the bleed. After a fourth dimension, if this is not resolved, the h2o will begin to back up and drainage may eventually finish birthday. Therefore, the sooner that y'all tin can unclog your sink, the amend.

Standing water is unhygienic, makes things messy, and tin can brand information technology more difficult to ascertain the nature of the blockage.

What Causes a Kitchen Sink Drain to Become Clogged?

If your kitchen sink has a garbage disposer, information technology'southward very probable that the nutrient residual from washing dishes caused your clog. Although nearly food types are in theory capable of causing clogs, there are some foods that are much worse offenders than others. Rather than putting them down the garbage disposer, it's a much better idea to compost them, throw them away, or otherwise dispose of them responsibly.

Foods that tin can cause clogs include:

• Meat or grease (such as bacon fat) which can coagulate and then catch other foods.
• Coffee grounds, which can form into hard, compressed lumps if non properly tuckered.
• Starchy foods, such equally rice, potatoes, pasta.
• High fiber foods, such equally certain greens, corn husks, and celery.
• Basic from meat and poultry.
• Banana peels and pits from fruits such as mangos, plums, peaches, and apricots.

Besides nutrient, there are plenty of other things that might inadvertently cause your kitchen sink to become clogged, such as napkins, paper towels, medications, food wrappers, bottle tops, pilus, or jewelry.

Will Bleach Unclog the Sink Drain?

My communication is to Not attempt to employ bleach to clear the clog.

Firstly, bleach is a very toxic substance that tin cause all sorts of issues, including reacting with other substances inside the pipes.

Secondly, although a loving cup of bleach poured downwards the drain, followed by some some hot water might sanitize a blockage and reduce bad smells, information technology won't practice much to suspension upward the grease, nutrient matter and other things that generally cause clogs in a kitchen sink.

Can Coca Cola Unclog a Drain?

Coca cola is caustic, so in theory tipping a bottle of this soda downward the drain could potentially clear a clog. Some people swear by this method. All the same, in my experience, the success rate about goose egg - it is not every bit good as baking soda and vinegar, and certainly nowhere nearly as effective equally commercial cleaners.

How to Prevent a Kitchen Sink Drain From Clogging

Prevention is almost always better than cure, of grade, so it's of import that you lot don't abuse your drain. Be sure non to let the foods listed above downward your drain.

However, effect can and practise happen, so you may also wish to invest in a good sink strainer to terminate the sink bleed from getting clogged upward with food pieces (run across below for my recommendation).

It's also wise to accept some bones tools on paw, such as:

• An adjustable wrench
• A pipe wrench
• Pliers
• An Allen wrench
• A Plunger (A bong-less, flat loving cup-way by and large works best for nigh kitchen drains.)
• White vinegar and baking soda

As mentioned above, a plumbing snake or drain auger tin can be a very useful tool to have around too. It can be used non only for sinks but also for unclogging shower drains. And, in case none of these methods work, it wouldn't injure to have the name and number of your local plumber on manus.

The OXO Good Grips silicone sink strainer

What'southward the Best Sink Strainer For Preventing Clogs?

At that place are many bully products out there that can reduce the amount of clog-forming debris that goes down your drain, but if you lot want me to highlight just ane it would be the Oxo Good Grips Silicone Sink Strainer.

The features I like most this strainer include:

• It does its job finer, catches the sink debris before it tin enter the bleed and clog things up.
• It's very easy to make clean. The nature of its job ways that information technology collects lots of waste, only the design means that you tin can invert it to remove droppings when cleaning it by manus. Y'all tin can besides put information technology in the dishwasher.
• It'south designed to fit well and it strains without interrupting the flow downwardly the drain.
• It has an attractive appearance and doesn't have a tendency to get stained like can happen with some strainers.
• It'due south reasonably priced. I ordered mine online and paid less than 9 dollars.

This article is accurate and truthful to the best of the author's noesis. Content is for informational or entertainment purposes but and does not substitute for personal counsel or professional advice in business, financial, legal, or technical matters.

© 2022 Paul Goodman

EILEEN on March 19, 2022:

I'm no longer scared of tackling this. . .Thanks from Mississippi !

Tung Tran from Ho Chi Minh City on September 29, 2022:

Very good advice after nosotros figure out the tools. Thankyou!

Dora Weithers from The Caribbean on February 28, 2022:

Very good advice after we figure out the tools. Thanks for your list of essentials.

Source: https://dengarden.com/home-improvement/How-to-Clear-a-Clogged-Kitchen-Sink-Drain

Posted by: sanchesaborecturs1970.blogspot.com

Share this post