How to unclog a bathtub drain?

Get one of those handheld manual snakes.

Every house should have one.

Or the plastic rod with the barbs. That can get about 2 feet in for hair.

I would not get the hand cranked snake.

It's such a pain in the arse since it moves a milimeter at a time.

I'd get the one you can attach to a drill.

quote:

---

Wife's hair?

---

I took out about 2 lbs of my wife’s hair one time. It was wet but still. She removes the little clump after each shower but over time the ones she missed added up.

I usually unscrew the drain top and pull all that crap out with some needle nose pliers.

Bathtub drain is always hair and soap and oil. It will be black and stringy and smelly and disgusting. Wear some rubber gloves if you have them. If there is any more of the lye still in the drain you don't want to burn your skin.

The clog on a tub is almost always in the first three feet.

The advice in this thread is right on point. Plastic hair grabber followed by a 25 foot thin snake if necessary.

Don't ever use liquid plumber again.

Don't hire a plumber to pull out a hair clog.

If it is really stopped up, use a screwdriver and disassemble the fixture with the lever to close the drain, and pull the drain mechanism out. The clog may be wrapped around the inside drain plug. if it is lower than that, send the snake down the pipe through the opening high in the tub. That is usually the easiest way in.

Have used the exact one several times.

After the doing the tub drain, run it down the overflow as well.

Run that out pretty far because some of the blockage may be at a 'Y' where the pipe joins the main drain line.

Run it out by hand until it hits something, then lock it and and rotate the handle to grab the blob of hair. Retract, remove gunk, and repeat.

Have you tried a plunger?

This thing is amazing, got one several months back and have used it way more than I thought. Pulled out a softball sized ball of my wife’s hair from the master shower drain that freaked the kids out so bonus points for that entertainment.

I even used it outside on the pool clear out drain and now the overflow drains like new