A blocked drain is much more than a simple inconvenience. If left untreated, a blocked drain can quickly escalate into a damaging and often very expensive problem, not only hurting your surrounding environment but can potentially damaging the very foundations of your property.
With that said, for this blog, we asked our drain unblocking London experts for a breakdown of some of the most common foreign objects found that contribute towards blocked drains – plus a few weird and wonderful things that they’ve found over the years. And while some are obvious, there are some in there that might just surprise you…
Common causes of a blocked drain
You’d be amazed at how many homeowners ignore advice regarding nappies and sanitary products, with many people choosing to flush them down the toilet rather than correctly disposing of them in a bin. The problem is that these products are not designed to break down as easily as toilet paper, and so over time they can become stuck in your drainage system and cause blockages which are exacerbated and ultimately cause a backup of water.
Now, this might seem like an obvious one to many of us – after all, whether you ignore it or not the advice around disposing of rather than flushing these products is clear. However, the same can’t be said of some of the other most common contributors towards household drainage blockages.
Did you know that one of the most common offenders is fat and grease from the kitchen? Whenever you cook something fatty in a frying pan, the chances are that you will rinse that pan off in your sink or pop it in your dishwasher. However, as this fat and grease runs through your pipe network, it starts to solidify and can – over time – create a build-up which eventually grows to become a full scale blockage. The same is true of hair, which gets washed down the shower drain and gets stuck partway through the system – slowing the flow of water and trapping other foreign objects until it becomes an established blockage.
As some of the most common causes of drain blocks, all these issues are normal and can be counteracted with the hands-on support of our London Drainage team, alongside advice on how to avoid such issues in the future. But what about those weird and wonderful blocks we promised you?
Weird and wonderful things we’ve found in drains
How many times have you seen engagement rings and jewellery sucked down into the plumbing system of a house, only to be rescued from a blockage somewhere within the network? Well, things like this are more common than you think – with some of the most common yet weird and wonderful blocks caused by everything from jewellery and valuable items to children’s toys that get flushed down the toilet on a (near daily) basis.
Drain blocks are part of everyday life. It is how you deal with them, and how efficiently you seek the expertise of our drain block removal specialists, that affects the long term impact and cost of the issue. For more advice, visit our website or get in touch with us directly.
