Drains & Sewers

Drain Cleaning

A kitchen sink that will not empty, a tub standing full, or water coming up in the basement floor drain. We clear the line, then work out why it blocked.

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One slow fixture, or the whole house

Two very different problems both get called a blocked drain. The first is a fixture blockage: one sink, one tub, one toilet, and everything else in the building runs normally. The restriction sits in the trap or in the branch between that fixture and the stack, and it is usually hair, soap scum, grease, or something that got dropped in.

The second is a main-line blockage. The tell is that more than one fixture is affected at the same time. Flush an upstairs toilet and water rises in the basement floor drain. Run the washing machine and the shower base fills. Floor drains are the lowest opening in the system, so a main-line restriction shows there first even though nothing is wrong with the floor drain itself.

The distinction decides the job. A fixture blockage is often twenty minutes with a hand machine. A main line means opening a cleanout, running a machine out toward the street, and then deciding whether the line needs more than a cable. In the older parts of Toronto, where clay tile laterals run under sixty-year-old silver maples, the answer is frequently roots. Roots come back.

Cabling and jetting are not interchangeable

A sectional or drum machine drives a steel cable down the pipe with a cutter head on the end. It is the right tool for most blockages, and with the correct head it will cut roots back to the pipe wall. Cable size matters more than people expect. A 5/16 inch cable belongs in a lavatory arm and does nothing useful in a 4 inch lateral, and a heavy sectional cable will wreck a small trap arm.

Hydro-jetting works on a different principle. High-pressure water, commonly in the 3,000 to 4,000 psi range through a nozzle that pulls itself up the pipe on rear-facing jets, scours the pipe wall rather than punching a channel through the debris. That is what grease-loaded kitchen lines need, along with soft sludge, sand and silt. In a restaurant, cable opens a hole through a coating that closes again within weeks. Jetting takes the coating off.

Jetting also has requirements. It needs an accessible cleanout and somewhere for the water to go, and it is the wrong choice for cast iron that has already scaled paper-thin or for a lateral with an open break, where the water will wash soil straight into the pipe. Both methods clear blockages. Neither repairs a pipe. If a drain blocks because a joint has dropped or a section has collapsed, the cable restores flow and the pipe is still broken.

The camera goes in after the line is open

Once water is moving, a CCTV drain camera shows what a cable can only guess at: what the pipe is made of, where the joints sit, whether roots are entering at a joint or through a fracture, whether the line holds standing water in a belly, and where the offset or break actually is. The camera head carries a sonde, so we locate the fault from above ground and mark its position and depth on the driveway or the lawn.

That marking is the difference between two very different quotes. A spot repair at 2.5 metres under a front lawn and a full lateral replacement under a driveway are not the same conversation, and nobody should be pricing excavation off a guess.

Some things the camera settles in five minutes. Others it will not. A line packed with roots hides the condition of the pipe behind them, so occasionally we clear, camera, and then camera again after the next heavy rain to see how the line behaves loaded. And some laterals turn out to be past repair. We would rather show you that on the screen than have you find out with a trench already open.

What actually blocks drains

Wipes are the biggest change in this trade in a decade. The package says flushable, and they do flush. They leave the toilet, reach the first offset or root mass, and stop, and then they collect everything that arrives behind them. They do not break down. Paper towel, cotton pads and dental floss behave the same way.

Chemical drain cleaner deserves its own warning. It is caustic or acidic, it sits on top of a blockage doing very little, it does nothing at all to roots, and it will finish off an old cast iron trap arm or a rubber gasket that was already thin. It also has to go somewhere. When we pull a trap or lift a toilet, that liquid comes out onto our hands and forearms. If you have poured something down the drain, say so before we start. Nobody will be annoyed, and it changes how we set up.

Wipes, including everything sold as flushable
Congealed cooking grease and fat in kitchen lines
Tree roots entering at clay tile and cast iron joints
Hair and soap scum in tub and shower traps
Sanitary products, cotton pads and paper towel
Sand, silt and drywall slurry after a renovation
Scale and rust flaking off the inside of old cast iron

Questions

Drain Cleaning, answered.

Why does my basement floor drain back up when I flush the toilet?

Because the restriction is downstream of both of them, in the building drain or the lateral out to the street. The floor drain is the lowest opening in the system, so it is where waste water surfaces first. The floor drain itself is almost never the problem. That symptom means the main line needs to be opened through a cleanout, not the floor drain snaked.

Does snaking fix a drain permanently?

No. Snaking clears a blockage, which is not the same as repairing a pipe. If the line blocked because of grease or a one-off obstruction, clearing it may be the end of it. If it blocked because roots are entering at a joint, or a section has dropped or cracked, the cable restores flow and the defect is still there. A camera tells you which case you are in.

Do I really need a camera inspection?

Not for every blockage. It earns its cost when a line blocks repeatedly, when you are about to spend money on excavation, or when you are buying an older house and want to know what is under the front lawn. Any quote for digging should be based on a located, measured defect rather than an assumption about where the trouble is.

Is hydro-jetting safe for old pipes?

It depends on the pipe, which is why we look first. Jetting is excellent in cast iron and clay that still has wall thickness, and it is the right answer for grease. It is the wrong answer in cast iron that has scaled down to a shell, or in a lateral with an open break where the water will pull soil into the line. If jetting is not appropriate we will say so and cable it instead.

Should I try a chemical drain cleaner first?

We would rather you did not. The active ingredient sits above the blockage instead of moving through it, it has no effect on roots, and it attacks old cast iron and rubber gaskets. It also stays in the trap, so whoever opens the line afterwards is working in it. If you have already used some, tell us when we arrive so we can set up accordingly.

Do you handle after-hours drain emergencies?

Our hours are Monday to Friday, 9 to 5, with Saturdays by appointment. We do not advertise 24-hour service. If you have an active backup, call rather than fill in a form so we can talk through what is happening and get you on the schedule. Messages left outside business hours are returned the next business day.

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Send the details through the quote form and we will come back to you with next steps. For anything urgent, call the office. A phone call always beats a web form.

Call the office(742) 688-3747 Request a Quote

Mon–Fri 9:00am–5:00pm · Saturday by appointment. We do not advertise 24-hour emergency service. Messages received outside regular business hours are returned as soon as possible on the next business day.