Have you got outdoor drains that are blocked or clogged? Is this causing bad odours and inconveniencing your family? Let’s take a look now at the best way to clean your outdoor drains.
Having a clogged drain in your home can be disturbing. Furthermore, dirty drains attract bacteria, houseflies, and may even put you at risk of getting a disease.
It goes without saying that it is super important to clean your drains to ensure they are safe.
Sewers located outside the house or office are susceptible to clogging with a number of different things, including tree roots, mud and leaves.
What’s more, its virtually impossible to control what others throw into the drain, especially if you are sharing the drainage system with other people.
Clogged drains tend to cause stagnant water which in turn causes a bad odour. In a worse scenario, the pipes may even burst.
Many drains can be fixed quickly, especially if the right equipment is used. Below is some of the equipment that can be used to clean outdoor drains.
1. Coat Hanger
Sometimes, you don’t need to use complicated and expensive equipment to clean your drains effectively. You should consider starting off using a regular wire coat hanger that just about everyone has laying around their house.
To use a hanger to unclog your drain, you should straighten it as much as you can, and then bend one end slightly to make a small hook.
You should then push the hanger starting with the end that has the hook down the drain. You are advised to use some force to do this.
As the clog is unlikely to go away with one or two strokes, keep pushing the hanger in and out until the drain unclogs.
Using this technique, you should be able to remove or dislodge most of the nasty obstructions out of the drain. You should then finish this process by pouring some hot water into the drain to clear things up.
2. Use The Drain Snake
If the coat hanger doesn’t work, you should consider getting a drain snake. Drain snakes are operated manually or mechanically, depending on how severe the blockage is in your outdoor drain.
It also has blades that are rotated several times which helps to unclog any obstructions. To use a drain snake, you should start by pushing the end of the snake into the drain opening.
From there you need to turn the handle that is connected to the snake while pushing the snake further into the drain until you feel some resistance.
Continuous rotation of the snake, allows it to pick up all the materials that were causing the blockage. This is also able to remove solid objects as the auger head of the drain snake entangles even the most stubborn materials.
You should pull the auger out of the drain if the twisting motion is not smooth. Once you detach the materials from the auger, the process should continue until there are no more blockages.
3. Use Water Jetting
The other option you should consider when it comes to unclogging the drain when all else fails is water jetting. High-pressure water jetting has been around for more than 150 years having first been used in the mining industry.
Similar techniques as those used when it comes to cutting stone cutting are also used to push large objects through drains. However, as effective as it is, it’s not suitable for all drain blockages.
There is a fine line between unclogging your drain and preventing damage which is something that takes skill and experience. Read more about five key benefits of hydro-jet cleaning your drains and sewer lines here.
Therefore, it’s important to use the correct equipment, at the right pressure, to prevent any damage to the pipes.
What’s more, you should use a professional when it comes to this technique as it requires a lot of experience and expertise.
That is why water jetting should be used as a last resort, particularly when it comes to smaller drains and relatively small blockages.
If the wire coat hanger and drain snake don’t work, then water jetting may be your only option.
If you have blocked drains that require water jetting, please call us today on 0419 577 441 or contact us through our website https://www.pressureworks.com.au/contact/