Basement floor drain won't unclog

[Carp104]

I'm at my last straw with my basement floor drain. I have a drain that sits right next to the furnace and AC unit and the pvc Condensation pipe off the unit drains into this floor pipe. Yesterday i found a huge pool of water in this area and saw the floor drain was completely full. I cleaned it all up and tried a cheap snake with no luck. I've had to keep the AC off in the mean time to keep a huge puddle of water from forming again.

Today I rented a 100ft electric snake and hauled the 200lb unit down the stairs only to find it will not advance down the pipe at all. I assume it gets hung up at a 90 degree bend or turn a few feet down. So I hauled the thing back up the stairs and exchanged it for a 50ft smaller snake with a half inch cable. I had trouble getting this down the hole as well but eventually got it past the bend. I spent a good 1.5 hours working that electric snake thru the pipe little by little as it would get hung every foot or so. I eventually got all 50ft thru the pipe and it still did not unclog it. All I got out of this whole ordeal was a huge mess of sooty dirty pipe water all over my basement floor and a workout hauling these units up and down stairs.

I have no clue what to do at this point. After running the 50ft snake through the pipe it still has nasty dirty water sitting in it.

Please help!

 

[frodo]

call a plumber with the correct equipment,


sump pump or city sewer?

 

[ExtraMilePlumbing]

3/8 cables are what we use to quickly get thru a ptrap. With 11/2 blades, keep the drain full of water so you can see if it fluctuates.if it fluctuates you're line is congested and has to be worked slowly were it fluctuates.

 

[Carp104]

Frodo,

Clearly I'm trying to avoid a steep plumbing bill by doing this myself.


Extra mile,

Thanks for the suggestion. After working it for some time last night now when I pour water into the drain the water level appears to remain the same and does not get higher. I'm guessing there is supposed to be some standing water in the bottom a foot or two down to prevent odors from entering the basement? Am I in the clear now?

 

[frodo]

if you want to do it right.

go outside, dig up where the sewer enters the building.



cut a hole in the top of the pipe or cut in a clean out tee...

if the water is standing in the pipe...rod towards the street

if the pipe is mostly dry. rod into the house

if using a small cable, wire a rag on the end of cable, . to push the clog


push the cable up the pipe till you "FEEL" the clog.. then run the cable thru it, pull back, thru it..etc

 

[ExtraMilePlumbing]

And yes there is supposed to be water in the pipe that's from the p trap

 

[Carp104]

I thought I got it after dumping a lot of water into
The pipe after all my snaking efforts. The water level never rose and all seemed well finally. But today when I walked down into the basement there was a large puddle of sludgy water all around the pipe,
Which clearly came out of the pipe, but the water level in the pipe seemed to be where it was when I stopped snaking. So apparently at some point after all that, the water level rose inside the pipe and dumped that puddle on my floor then went back down.

Any idea what in the world could be going on here? Are my pipes sludged or broken underground? It was difficult getting the snake through and I had to do it foot by foot, it just felt sludgy the whole way (75ft)

If the pipe is completely full of sludge underground what can I do?

 

[ExtraMilePlumbing]

Cabling it slowly is the best way, you can try sticking a blow bag on there and let it fill up for 15 -20 min , just install a vacuumed breaker on you're hose bib

 

[CT18]

How steep would a pro be. You have rented machines hauled them up and down the stairs. How much time have you put into it and it is still backed up, throw in the towel man. Get a pro in there with the right equipment and a camera and find out what is going on. It could be anything in there and everyone could guess what it could be. I would suggest finding a good reputable company and do it right.