How To Remove Bathtub Drain Quickly

Safety Considerations

You may require some patience while dealing with the bathtub drain. It usually requires some minutes of unscrewing and swirling the drain basket. If the drain is connected with a long thread, you may have to work on it for quite a few more minutes to displace it completely.

While handling tools like pliers or wrenches, wear protective gloves so that you won’t injure your fingers. Further, it would be better to wear a mask if you are to deal with old and heavily dirty, mold drains.

Tools and Materials Required

Tools

• Screwdrivers
• Pliers
• Adjustable wrench
• Putty knife

Materials

• Sponge
• All-purpose cleaner
• Rag

There are a variety of bathtubs these days incorporated with strainers of some sort for drainage. You may either have separate strainers or combined ones. If it is time for bathtub drain cleaning, you may find your strainer filled with gunk and messy, tangled hair.

The sight of a clogged bathtub drain is intimidating, however, if you follow the right approaches to resolve it, you can get over the problem within an hour. Here’s what you need as an instructive guide to remove the bathtub drain quickly:

Begin by locating the strainer of your bathtub. It is a part of a bathtub drainage system that opens or closes to control the flow of water into the bathtub. You have to identify the type of bathtub drain stopper incorporated, only then you will be able to generate the right procedure to remove it.

After knowing the procedure to remove the drain stopper, carefully work on it to detach the stopper from the drain basket. Removing the strainer is not a complicated task but it may require some time as mentioned earlier.

Once the strainer is separated from the drainage, you have to clean it thoroughly. You may use an unused toothbrush or any appropriate cleaning element like a microfiber cloth, rag, or sponge with an all-purpose cleaner to clean the mess accumulated in the drain strainer.

If you are to work on the strainer with molds, you have to think of some effective and environmentally friendly cleaning ways to get rid of them before you choose to rely on chemical ways like bleach. Make sure to clean the strainer as well as the drain basket properly!

It would be good if you use your fingers to pull any visible clogs from the drain. Make sure to wear cleaning gloves before you lay your hands on the mess. Be mindful to remove and pull away every possible trapped mess from the strainers.

For more tiny particles like that of hair or any debris clogged in the tub drain, using tiny needle-like elements can be more effective in grasping difficult-to-reach clogs. This is the first step to troubleshooting your clogged tub drain, after the thorough cleaning of the strainer.

You have to check whether the issues have been solved or not by allowing the running water to pass through it once you place your cleaned stopper back in its place. If yes, you are off to go but if the issue remains the same, you have more things to do as mentioned below.

Removing and cleaning the strainer may not be enough to get rid of the drainage problem, you may have to detach the drain basket and clean them as well. Your drain basket may have been made up of metal or any form of plastic where the gunk may have accumulated.

Removing the drain basket may not be easy for you. You will require pliers and a wrench to work on it. Make sure to twist and turn the center of the basket, you may require to add torque in the counterclockwise direction.

Putty is often used while installing bathtubs to ensure effective sealing. If your drains are sealed with the putty, above mentioned approach may not prove to be effective because putty has hardened the hardware. In this case, you may have to use a heating element.

Make sure to introduce a heat gun or hair dryer to generate heat around the drain so that putty gets loosened up and may detach from the hardware. This way, you can easily remove them from the attaching surface. Be mindful not to allow the putty to fall into the drain, it may further end up clogging the drain pipe.

Many people also prefer pouring hot boiling water over the drainage to break down the bathtub clog. However, you have to make sure the drain pipe you have installed is made to withstand the high temperature, otherwise, you will end up creating more problems, damaging the whole drainage system.

Be mindful to directly pour the hot water into the drain pipe without causing the hot water to splash. Once you allow hot water to work for some minutes, you have to run the faucet and check if the draining is working fine. Make sure to avoid using boiling water frequently over the drain pipe, it may damage the adhesive property.

Baking soda and vinegar from your kitchen can help resolve your bathtub drainage issue. Make sure to use these elements along with hot water over the drain line and allow them to work for some period.

Begin by pouring hot boiling water on the drain line, followed by ¼ cup of baking soda. End the process by further adding ¼ cup of white vinegar. After allowing the mixture to work for about 15-20 minutes, you have to again pour hot boiling water down the drain.

You should know that this mixture is found to be pretty effective in removing clogs from every drain through the chemical reaction between soda and vinegar. Give this method a couple of tries and you may get rid of the bathtub clogged drain.

Bleaching can work just fine breaking down some of the drain clogs. However, it should be used only then when you haven’t used vinegar or any other chemicals earlier into the drain. This is because bleach if mixed up with vinegar or other chemicals, can produce deadly gas.

Thus, it would be best to avoid this approach of removing the bathtub drain, but it can prove to be effective if you have only used mechanical ways along with hot water. While using bleach, you have to pour ¼ of 1-liter bleach straight into the drain pipe and allow it to work for about 15 minutes. Remember not to use any chemical product or vinegar afterward!

The unwavering question of how to clean out a bathtub drain can be answered through the use of a plunger. The plunger creates a suction pressure on the drainage forcing the clogged item to displace from the trapped position. This would be most effective if your bathtub has standing water.

Make sure to cover the entire top area of the drain with the rubber head of the plunger submerged completely in the standing water and pump the plunger several times. While plunging, begin gently at the beginning and gradually increase the force as you proceed. For more information on using a plunger the right way, you may visit, how to plunge a toilet.

You may have to repeat the plunging process a couple of times pumping for about 20 minutes. Before plunging, it would be good to wear old clothes, you may get splashed with the dirty water while working with the plunger. After plunging for the intended period, take a rest and check if the water is allowed to pass smoothly through the tub drain.

You may also make use of a drain stick having teeth on its sides to pull out the clogs from the bathtub drainage. The drain stick comes up with a significant length, you have to push it deeper into the drain line as much as possible and pull it back. You may end up getting clogs on the stick teeth.

Make sure to use this stick a couple of times until it ceases to pull out tangled clogs from the drainage. But clean the gunk off the stick every time you pull it back and make sure to push it deeper into the drain only after cleaning all the tangled clogs.

A cloth hanger can also be an alternative to a drain stick. To use a cloth hanger, you have to give it a slight bend such that its hook can be made to fit into the drain. It can work to some extent by pulling out the reachable clogs from the drain line.

Make sure to push it deep into the drain line and yank it out after twisting and turning it. Your hanger might come out with gunk that was creating a major drainage problem. In any case, your drain line can be made clean to a large extent with the repeated use of a cloth hanger adjusted to the right orientation.

A drain claw is an elongated metal tool having claws at one of its ends to grasp the drain clogs. Yes, drain claw is popularly used by the plumber and the household to cope with the bathtub drainage problem.

You just have to feed one end of the drain claw having several claws deep into the drainage, simultaneously squeezing the other end so that the incorporated claws get clamped holding the clogged items from the tub drainage. You have to keep on working on the other end to pull out the clawed end.

The drain auger is designed specially to help reach the depth of drainage. It can be used quite effectively against the bathtub clog. You can make the drain auger or drain snake work even further down into the drain than any other above-mentioned manual solution.

You will find a flexible metal wire at one end of the auger, you need to feed it into the drainage while rotating the handle at another end. The rotation of the handle is all you need to do for both feeding inward and yanking outward, make sure to give full rotation until the handle seems tight and pull it backward. The tangled clogs will certainly come out of the drainage.

You will find several chemical drain cleaners in the commercial market that can potentially break down the clogs of your bathtub drainage. However, such chemically enhanced cleaners should be used with proper caution.

Drain cleaners can potentially harm your drain pipeline if used haphazardly. Further, the chemical reaction with the foreign elements may invite unnecessary problems. Therefore, make sure to follow the below-mentioned instructions before using drain cleaners for the bathtub drain.

• Be mindful to purchase and apply only the one intended for bathtub drainage.
• Ask for the user manual and read the instructions carefully. You may seek assistance from the professional or storekeeper as well for the procedure and safety protocols.
• Make sure to protect yourself by wearing protective gloves and glasses, and proper clothing.
• Drain cleaner should not be used if you have standing water in the bathtub. Make sure to remove the water and apply the cleaner directly to the intended drain line.
• In general, drain cleaners may take about half an hour to work, allow the solution to work for the intended period, and flush the drain with cold, clean water.
• Remember not to use chemical drain cleaner before or after using bleach on the tub drainage, you wouldn’t want any harmful emission along the drain line.

• Although this guide is not composed as a step-by-step guide, you have to keep in mind that the bathtub drain removal process should be initiated by removing and cleaning the strainer.
• You have to have a good understanding of the type of drain stoppers adjoined in your bathtub.
• Do not just clean the strainer, make sure to thoroughly clean the basket, its edges, and all the surrounding areas.
• Using a plunger is effective only when you have standing water in the bathtub, you have to initially rely on a baking soda and vinegar strategy as mentioned earlier.
• For deeper clogs within the bathtub drainage, you have to use tools like a drain hanger, drain stick, drain claw, or drain auger. These tools will help you extract the gunk from the drain line.

Even after applying the above-mentioned strategies to remove the bathtub drain, if your problem still doesn't seem to be resolved, you may have some bigger problems with the tub drainage. For the minor and early drain problems, baking soda and vinegar along with hot water have been found to work pretty decently solving the problems of a wide range of households.

Meanwhile, if the problem is further added, or doesn’t show any sign of getting fixed, you should call the nearby professional right away. The bathtub drainage problem should not be ignored. You will get to learn more about the drainage problem solution and get your issues resolved in a short time, though it may cost you some lump sum of money.