Clearing Blocked Shower and Bath Drains

Slow draining or blocked shower and bath drains commonly affect properties across London and the Home Counties. That’s why our engineers are often called to clear them.

Shower and bath drains usually clog up when hair and soap collect within the drainage system. The soap mixes with the tangled hair, creating a sticky mess that struggles to go through the system. The build-up of limescale in hard water areas can also slow down the flow of water, and it may even cause your shower to block up completely.

A plunger can sometimes help you dislodge clumps of hair and grease, especially when used correctly. If the hair clump has fixed to the drain cover, then you could remove it by hand. You’d only need to unscrew the cover or try to hook the hair out. To catch hair before it goes into your drain, invest in a shower screen that rests over the plughole.

Some showers fail to drain properly because of shallow trays. Your tray might not have been installed in the right position, and as a result, the gradient isn’t steep enough – making it even easier for a blockage to happen.

Chemical products are widely available for helping to clear blocked shower and bath drains. However, you should always take care when using them. It’s possible to damage your pipes if you use them too often, and you must never mix different chemicals together.

Using a mixture of bicarbonate of soda and vinegar can sometimes be effective, as long as the bath or shower blockage is just a short way into the pipe. Simply pour a cup of baking soda down the drain, leave it for a minute, then pour a cup of vinegar after it.

The two reactions that take place help to break down the grease and limescale causing the blockage. After leaving it in for an hour or so, you can wash the remaining debris away with boiling water.

Hard water leaves many properties around London susceptible to blocked shower and bath drains. This is because the mixture of hard water and soap creates two insoluble compounds that can build up, reducing the pipe’s flow capacity.

After you wash with soap in a bath, it’s easy to see the calcium and magnesium compounds left as residue. Removing this ‘soap scum’ with a detergent and some elbow grease is relatively easy. However, it’s not so easy to clean this scum from inside the pipe where it can’t be seen!

Remember that using a plunger won’t clear these compounds from your blocked shower or bathtub, nor will it remove limescale from within the drains.