Very slow flowing shower drain

FreshlyCutFlowers

Apodemus

Thanks, that made me feel much more confident going in. 

So good news I think?
It's a fairly shallow chamber, no water there.

I used my hose to spray water into the hole going towards the street and nothing came back up.

The channel from my house however is completely blocked. A pile of paper and s#it hits the street facing channel side on and instead of floating down just kept mounding up. I don't know how far into the pipe in my house the blockage goes, but the whole thing seems massive.

I thought I'd have to poke it into pieces with something solid but even a medium water stream seems to slowly disintegrate it. It's going to take a long time but this way at least I constantly send water downstream to ensure it doesn't get stuck further down.

Worked it for 30 minutes which chipped away at a bit of it and sendt it downstream. Will have to continue this later..!

Not sure what to do if the channel outside is cleared but stuff still remains stuck in pipes though will see what happens when I get there.


I wonder i this happened because I stopped showering here at winter since the other shower is smaller and easier to keep warm and comfortable so the water flow would have been much less than before. 

Apodemus

FreshlyCutFlowers said:

Apodemus

I wonder i this happened because I stopped showering here at winter since the other shower is smaller and easier to keep warm and comfortable so the water flow would have been much less than before. 

That might have contributed to the problem.   At work we had major issues with paper blockages once they installed water saving devices to the men's urinals.  With the loss of the routine automatic flush every few minutes throughout the day and night, there was no longer sufficient flow to clear the paper from ladies toilets! 

FreshlyCutFlowers

Conclusion for anyone interested:

Saw some stuff I cannot unsee including undigested sweet corn and nastier things. Once the majority of paper was gone the remaining trapped excrement came sliding out and I kept on using loads of water to pour it downstream.

Poor Mr muscle never had a chance. That's it, all fixed! 

I did notice a small crack midway up on the wall of the channel where some water could escape, especially when I pour in so much. However when observing the toilet flushing it didn't quite reach though maybe the high water flow of laundry machine would hit it.. 

Does this need to be fixed? Where would it possible end up if some water escaped there escaping there and who would I get in? 

GrubbyGirl_2

I would get the pros in to unblock it.  I had a similar problem caused by the hot weather last year and trying to save water by using waste water to water the garden.  All that and water saving loos cause the paper to dry out and block the drains.  My local recommended company only charged £90 and they also popped a camera down just to make sure the pipe was ok and in good shape

FreshlyCutFlowers

GrubbyGirl_2 said:

I would get the pros in to unblock it.  I had a similar problem caused by the hot weather last year and trying to save water by using waste water to water the garden.  All that and water saving loos cause the paper to dry out and block the drains.  My local recommended company only charged £90 and they also popped a camera down just to make sure the pipe was ok and in good shape

Without help I would have done the same but given the direction on here I lucked out. The 90 quid are really needed right now. 

It took some time for me but I recommend giving it a try if you have easy access to the inspection lids like I did 😊

breaking_free

@FreshlyCutFlowers do you have a sense of pride from having sorted it yourself? I sure do every time I come on here with a household problem and my fellow forumites tell me how to fix things :-) 

FreshlyCutFlowers

@breaking_free absolutely!
We always lived in rented flats so I never got the experience to learn how to decorate or take care of these types of problems.

So far I've learned to paint walls (poorly), patch up some plaster, fix a leaky toilet, hang up pictures, change a door lock, improve my lawns health and now unclog the sewer. It's not much compared to the people on here who know so much but for me it has been life changing to get these skills.

ThisIsWeird

FreshlyCutFlowers said:

I did notice a small crack midway up on the wall of the channel where some water could escape, especially when I pour in so much. However when observing the toilet flushing it didn't quite reach though maybe the high water flow of laundry machine would hit it.. 

Does this need to be fixed? Where would it possible end up if some water escaped there escaping there and who would I get in? 

Absolutely well done :-)

A daunting task for the newbie, for a number of reasons - all of which you've now experienced. 

As for this crack, it really depends; how big is it? Does it indicate a larger loose section of concrete? Does the water level reach it? 

From what you describe, it seems minor, but a photo - sans sweetcorn - would help.

A toilet flush should be the single largest volume of passing water, so if that doesn't reach it then a w/m is very unlikely to.

You may even wish to advance your DIYing skills by cleaning the crack out and filling it with a mortar substitute - you can get tubes of this (ready made up) and it's very effective.

But photo please : 🙂

FreshlyCutFlowers

ThisIsWeird said:

As for this crack, it really depends; how big is it? Does it indicate a larger loose section of concrete? Does the water level reach it? 

From what you describe, it seems minor, but a photo - sans sweetcorn - would help.

You may even wish to advance your DIYing skills by cleaning the crack out and filling it with a mortar substitute - you can get tubes of this (ready made up) and it's very effective.

But photo please : 🙂

Got ill for a few days and forgot about this but if you're still around, I appreciate the help. Not the cleanest pipe so don't open before dinner.

So it looks like they have had to do a patch job on the left already, going upwards. On the right now there is basically a hole by the pipe. Showering and flushing doesnt seem to put any water in there from what I can see but it feels close- maybe a good idea to just patch it up?
Would water escaping here be a big issue?