I have tried everything to clear it. Hours of plunging to no avail. Pouring Draino down the drain pipe in the tank, no effect. The last thing I tried was a toilet snake. I thought that would do it for sure, I was wrong.
Now the water just flows out of the bowl extremely slowly(too slow to be used, at least it stoped overflowing). Is there anything else I can do before I have to shell out major cash to a plumber?
Have your septic tank emptied and don’t flush any more industrial grade sanitary napkins or stolen ‘Holiday Inn’ towels.
Go to the rental yard and rent a commercial grade electric (or gas engined) snake. Run it down the main clean-out, then down the toilet vent on your roof.
Hire a plumber before your house is declared a hazardous waste area.
just make sure it is clogged, the water might be backed up due to either a clog much further downstraem or if you have a cesspool and the toilet is on a level under the ground level your cesspool might be full/clogged.
as a test run a sink in that bathroom, if the water in the toilet starts to go up- your clog is further down- you might have to leave it running for a while to notice water going up
And here’s a tip to make sure the plumber, when you eventually do call him, doesn’t end up taking days to fix the thing.
Before you call him, invest in the cheapest camping Porta-Potty you can find at Wal-Mart or K-Mart.
Having an alternate toilet already on-site is the best way I know of to make sure the repair job turns out to be relatively simple. Having no Porta-Potty means he’ll tear it all apart and then leave and not come back for two days, leaving you and your family peeing desperately into wastebaskets.
And dumping and rinsing it isn’t any worse than sozzling out a poopie diaper. I’ve done both. I know.
And if you can persuade your family to put their used toilet paper into a Hefty-sack-lined wastebasket, instead of into the Porta-Potty, you can use it a lot longer before you have to empty it. Toilet paper really fills it up fast, especially if your folks are the type who like to use big wads.
mblackwell, how are you plunging? I had a similar problem a few months ago, plunged the heck out of it to no effect. My father came over and cleared it in about 5 minutes–his technique: push down slowly and then pull up quickly, took about him 3 or 4 tries.
I don’t have a septic tank. My hick town has a sewer system but no water system. The pull-up plunging didn’t help. I tried running the sink and the tub and the water didn’t rise in the toilet. I think it must be a blockage in between the toilet and the main pipe BC the snake didn’t get it.
Do you have any problems with the bathtub draining? If you haven’t tried that, run water in it and sees if it drains. If it does then your clog is fairly localized and if nothing else works then call a plumber. If however the tub backs up, try snaking the line through the tub drain. It should be a lot easier to snake than through the toilet.
The tub draind quite slowly. I guess i will try to take upart the drain valve assembly thing and snake it out. Thanks for the help
You might want to check the vent pipe on your roof and make sure it’s clear before you go through all that.
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Don’t flush tampons either. Those things
can catch and expand and it’s a hell of
a problem. Low volume flush toilets are
NOT able to handle them.
I also think the blockage is in the toilet. Strange things oftern end up there. (paper cups, kids toys, etc…) Anyway,
unscrew the toilet from the floor, lift up, and stick you hand in the toilet from the bottom and see whats in there.
NOTE: you will probably have to replace the wax ring after you do this. You can get one at any hardware store.
Having done a lot of plumbing, this one is rather easy. Go outside, find the drain pipe with the drain cap on it, take off the cap & snake there. That’ll do it.
NOTE: Don’t put drano in the toilet.