We had a wonderful Christmas week with all of the children and grandchildren visiting.
Kieran, Elodie, and Zoe were a delight.
Of course, no holiday would be complete without the plumbing emergency.
On Christmas Day, the already sluggish kitchen drain slowed down to a clog after I permitted some chopped Kale to slip by the strainer.
On Friday, opening the sink trap revealed a long lost silver butter knife.
While replacing the trap nut, the pipe crumbled in my hand.
It was apparent that all of the pipe work below the sink was in the same state of decay.
Off to the hardware store.
New replacement pipe, a pipe snake, and Liquid Plumer.
After re-assembly of the pipe and lots of plunging, no results.
Janie was preparing her Korean Dinner while I'm doing this.
Dinner was great just no place to wash dishes.
Janie sugested that I call a plumber; but, my DIY middle-age-man ego resisted.
Afterall, it was me verses sludge. How could I surrender.
Saturday was get serious day.
In the basement, there is a clean-out plug at the end of the twenty foot drain pipe.
I knew that this was the solution.
After clamping my adjustable wrench to a 6 foot pry bar using antenna "U" clamps, I was able to get it loose. After ramming a rod and then a 15 foot snake down the horizontal length of drain pipe, I was sure that "victory-over-sludge" was mine.
Now for the wet trial. Close everything up and run the water. The result was the same, still clogged.
Time to call a plumber? Ego aside, why not? John called his plumber friend, Hal. Hal recommended using a bladder thinggie. Off to Sears this time. They had no idea what I was talking about so, I bought a longer flat wire snake. These may work on larger pipes but it couldn't go around the tight turns in a 2 in pipe.
Once again stymied. After several failed snake probes, Alastair, my new consultant, and I decided to get a longer auger snake. We needed to get to the very end of the drain pipe. That would be about twenty feet.
This time back to Lowes. Just above the snakes was an assortment of the bladder devices that Hal talked about. We bought one. We also bought to a twenty-five foot auger snake.
These bladder things are really neat. It's like a 6 six inch ballon made of thick hard rubber. You place it on the end of your garden hose. Then, you insert it in the pipe and turn on the water. The water blows up the bladder and seals the pipe. At the end of the bladder is a hole that allows a stream of water to enter the sealed pipe. As the water enters, the pressure in the pipe increases as the clog resists. Eventually, the clogged pipe will reach 40- 60 psig. In our case, it was well before that when the clog blew out. To make sure, the pipe was clear, we removed the bladder and ran a full flow garden hose in the pipe. Clear! Clear! Clear! A plumbing miracle for $12.95.
The wet test was successful. A full sink drained in seconds. I just needed to clean up all of the black slit on the basement floor. Many thanks to Alastair for his support. John, thanks for calling Hal. Drew thanks for all of the plunger help on day one. Janie was right: call a plumber, even if it is just for advice.
Morals:
1) Get advice form someone with experience.
2) The right tool will do it every time.
Merry Christmas, plus tax.
