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Tired of your sink not draining properly? Cleaning your sink drain is one piece of plumbing that is fairly good for beginners and easy to DIY. Not to mention, if you’re satisfied by the removal of gross things, it can be quite fun too. POM Plumbing is here for you, no matter how hard the plumbing project. But, we also love to see our Toronto neighbors expanding their knowledge of plumbing and getting into the thick of things themselves, when it’s safe to do so. So, we’ve put together a little guide to make it easy to clean your sink drain yourself.

Things You’ll Need

To begin, make sure you have everything you need. Here’s what we recommend:

• A bucket. Don’t get a nice mixing bowl; this is going to get gross. You can also opt for a small, lined trash can.
• A monkey wrench, if your drain pipe is attached with metal parts and is tightly secured.
• Something long, like a pencil or a cheap pipe cleaner, that you won’t mind getting dirty or throwing out.
• A rag or cloth, if you want to get things clean like new.
• Rubber gloves, if you’re squeamish about touching gross things.

Step 1: Prepare

This may seem obvious, but make sure you keep your sink turned off. It’s easy to forget while in the middle of things and go to rinse something off your hands. After all, the sink is right there. If you’re the kind of person who might forget, mid-project, put some tape on the handles. The last thing you want is to flood the storage under your sink.

Next, remove anything stored under the sink. Some things may be pushed aside but, if you want to ensure nothing gets wet or covered in sink sludge, it’s best to remove it. You’ve got a whole bathroom floor at your disposal.

Finally, lay down a rag or hand towel that you don’t mind getting dirty beneath your drain pipe.

Step 2: Loosen Your Drain Pipe

Next up, it’s time to loosen that drain pipe. To clean your sink drain primarily means removing the drain pipe temporarily and removing all of the junk blocking it. There are chemical drain cleaners for this, but they damage your pipes and are bad for the environment. It’s best to simply empty the pipe yourself.

Your pipe should have two obvious rings around it. These are often plastic, with some ridges on the outside. As you can see, your pipe should dip down and then curve back up. These rings, called coupling nuts, should be placed, one above, and one after this dip. The piece of pipe between them is removable and these are what hold that piece in place.

Simply twist these coupling nuts counterclockwise to loosen them. If the coupling nuts on your sink are made of metal, they may be more tightly secured and may require a wrench to unscrew them.

Next Up: Clean Your Sink Drain

Ready for the really fun part of cleaning your sink drain? Continue on to Part 2 to get to the nitty gritty with us.

Many homeowners assume that anything poured down the drain will disappear without issue. However, certain items may clog pipes long after being washed down the sink, leading to frustrating blockages. Let’s explore three common but unexpected causes of drain clogs that can disrupt your plumbing!

1. Grease, Oil, and Fat

One of the most surprising but common culprits in kitchen drain clogs is grease, oil, and fat. When you pour grease from cooking bacon, oil from frying, or fat from meats down the drain, it may be liquid initially, but it cools and solidifies quickly within the pipes.

• Why It Clogs: Grease solidifies as it cools, creating a sticky layer on the inner walls of pipes. This sticky surface acts as a glue, trapping other debris, such as food particles, that wash down with dishwater.
• Example: Think of how bacon grease solidifies in a pan. Now imagine that same grease inside your pipes, capturing anything that passes by.

Prevention Tip: Instead of pouring grease down the drain, let it cool and dispose of it in a sealed container in the trash. Avoid letting any fat, oil, or grease slip into your sink to minimize clogged drains caused by grease.

2. Starchy Foods

Another surprising cause of drain blockages is starchy foods, such as rice, pasta, oatmeal, and flour. These items might seem harmless, but when they get wet, they expand and create a thick, sticky paste.

• Why It Clogs: Starch-rich foods swell and stick together when exposed to water, forming a glue-like substance that can clog your sink. Flour, in particular, becomes like organic cement when mixed with water, making it difficult to clear from the pipes.
• Example: Wet flour on your hands can feel sticky and hard to clean off. Now picture that same substance building up inside your pipes.

Prevention Tip: Scrape plates into the trash before rinsing them in the sink. Avoid letting foods like pasta, rice, or flour enter the drain, as they can quickly lead to starchy blockages in pipes.

3. Coffee Grounds

Though small, coffee grounds are another common offender in sink clogs. Unlike other food waste, coffee grounds do not break down easily in water and are prone to sinking, similar to sand.

• Why It Clogs: Coffee grounds tend to clump together and settle in low points of the pipes, especially if there is grease present. This creates a dense mixture that can be difficult to clear.
• Example: Coffee grounds act like sand in water, settling and compacting wherever there’s a dip in the pipe. When mixed with grease, they create a particularly stubborn blockage.

Prevention Tip: Dispose of coffee grounds in the trash or compost, not down the drain. Keeping coffee grounds out of your sink will prevent them from causing clogs in combination with grease or other materials.

Unclog Those Drains with Professional Help

If your kitchen drain is draining slowly or making gurgling noises, you may already have a blockage from grease, starch, coffee grounds, or other unexpected causes. POM Plumbing specializes in clearing stubborn drain clogs quickly and effectively. Our experts use professional pressure washing equipment to clear out pipes and restore normal water flow.

Don’t let clogs slow you down! Contact POM Plumbing today for fast, effective drain cleaning solutions and keep your pipes clear.

FAQ

A common topic of contention these days is whether biodegradable cleaners are really necessary. Because we deal in a related field – plumbing – our experts at POM Plumbing have put together some facts about biodegradable cleaners.  Are biodegradable cleaners really necessary? Let’s put them to the test!

What Are Biodegradable Cleaners?

Biodegradable cleaners have differences and similarities to standard ones. The first thing we have to note is that every company may use the word biodegradable differently. Unless your biodegradable cleaners have stickers or marks on them from earth-friendly organizations, you can’t necessarily trust the word “biodegradable.” After all, everything is biodegradable with enough time.

Likewise, eco friendly, green, and all natural don’t necessarily mean what you think they mean. After all, everything in the world is natural, leaving the margin for how safe something is quite big. Natural things are dangerous for humans all the time. Therefore, we have to look at the ingredients in a product to determine how safe it is.

Product Safety

When wondering if biodegradable cleaners are an important investment for the average household, the topic of safety is one of the first to be brought up. However, there are two kinds of safety. Let’s consider both.

Direct Safety

The first thing is direct safety. As in, are these products safe to handle and breathe in the fumes of. For most standard cleaners, the answer is no. You should avoid getting them on your skin at all and immediately wash them if you do. Many of the products, especially those made with bleach, are also dangerous to inhale. Using bleach-based cleaners in a closed bathroom can lead to passing out. These standard cleaners are also incredibly dangerous to use around each other. Mixing two of them just by using them one right after the other can create toxic, deadly gases. 

Because biodegradable cleaners are still made with chemicals (albeit less harsh ones), you should still be cautious when mixing or using in tandem. However, because biodegradable cleaners are made to be milder, they’re usually not as worrisome when in contact with skin. You should still wash your hands off when you’re done cleaning, but may not need to take immediate action.

Indirect Safety

Cleaners don’t just affect us while we use them to clean; they also effect the environment after we clean. The cleaners we use will get washed down the drain and inevitably end up in a body of water somewhere, or the soil. This will happen even faster if you have cracks in your drain pipes. This is more common than people think, and leads to drained fluids leeching into the soil around your house.

Standard cleaners, with harsher ingredients, will pose more of a threat to local wildlife and flora. The less harsh a cleaner’s ingredients are, the less likely it is to harm animals or plants. Therefore, in that regard, biodegradable cleaners that degrade quickly are better, as they won’t linger in the environment and build up.

Manufacturing

One of the oft-overlooked and most important parts of determining a cleaner’s effect on the environment is its manufacturing process. Manufacturing a cleaner involves combining a lot of ingredients and chemicals, no matter the type of cleaner. However, the harsher cleaners involve harsher chemicals and, therefore, a harsher process. The harsher the manufacturing process, the more likely it is for there to be chemical waste that needs to be dumped somewhere. This process, happening en masse, can be detrimental for wildlife near manufacturing plants (which are everywhere).

Are They Necessary?

Due to the strain standard, harsh cleaners have on the environment, we feel that biodegradable cleaners are something we should all strive to use as soon as possible. Shifting from dangerous manufacturing to something more sustainable is an important step in keeping ourselves and our children safe for generations.

Don’t Miss Part 1

Making the Problem Worse

Now, taking into consideration the aggressive nature of chemical drain cleaner, why can’t it solve the bigger problem, no matter how much it’s used? Well, the truth is, some problems just aren’t meant to be fixed by dissolving drain gunk. Let’s revisit that list of problems from Part 1.

Pipe Width

If your plumbing is so old that it’s not meeting modern plumbing code, using drain cleaner is a bad solution for 2 reasons. The first is that it’s actually increasing the fragility of older pipes and is very likely to cause a burst. Pipe bursts lead to flooding, which can give you a long-term mold problem and cost thousands of dollars in repairs. The second reason is that it’s doing nothing at all to combat your pipes being too narrow to handle your water flow. 

Metallic and Hard Water

If your drain is coated on the inside with iron oxide (rust) or minerals (lime, calcium, etc.), drain cleaner may seem like a great idea. After all, it’s made to clear undesirables from drains, right? The reason drain cleaner doesn’t work for this problem is one of these two reasons:

1. The directed wait time before rinsing is not long enough for it to eat through minerals or metal. Drain cleaner is meant to be used for weaker, organic substances, like hair, dead skin, and so on. The wait time on the bottle is not long enough to noticeably affect minerals and metal.
2. If you let it sit for long enough to break down minerals or metal, you’re letting it sit long enough to begin destroying your pipes.

Collapsed Pipe

It goes without saying that a collapsed pipe can’t be brought back to life by being made squeaky clean. This one is going to need some professional help.

Pipe Invasion

Pipes that have cracked and been invaded by plant roots are also not going to be repaired by drain cleaner. In fact, the problem is exacerbated by it. First, the volume of drain cleaner that you use is not likely to even reach where those roots have invaded. Even if it did, it would take so long that it would soon be time to rinse it away. 

Second, if roots have invaded your plumbing, that means there are cracks in your pipes. Chemical drain cleaner that does reach the invasion site will eat away at those cracks as well, making them bigger and allowing more water to leak into the surrounding soil. Water leaking into the soil is exactly what drew the attention of nearby plants to begin with.

Chemical Drain Cleaner Isn’t Safe

Last, but certainly not least, you should not use chemical drain cleaner because it’s terribly unsafe. If you wouldn’t dump drain cleaner directly onto one of the plants outside, you shouldn’t be dumping it down your drain.

Drain cleaner is made for destroying organic compounds. Therefore, putting those chemicals into the local sewer system can lead to all kinds of problems. That’s not even to mention the kind of damage it can cause closer to home. If you have a pipe collapse or there are cracks in your pipes leading to root invasion, chemical drain cleaner will follow the water, dispersing into the ground around your home. This can kill plants, poison animals, and even contaminate ground water. 

If you care about the environment or the safety of you and your neighbors, please consider the risks before using chemical drain cleaner. Instead, call a professional and get to the root of the problem.

If your drains ever stop draining, you’re probably no stranger to chemical drain cleaner. People from all over love the idea of fixing what is usually a bigger issue by just dumping something down their drain. However, if you’ve spent any time at all looking for drain solutions online, you’ve probably also seen that you shouldn’t use the stuff. The question everyone’s asking now is, “Why?”

The Solution Is Rarely Solved

If your drain usually drains perfectly, a sudden issue is probably an easy fix. This can happen to anyone. A sudden and unexpected problem with draining is usually caused by:

• A rodent getting stuck in the drain (yes, it happens)
• The results of a neighborhood or local clog in the sewage main
• An influx of hair in the drain (like when you shower after a haircut or shave your legs after a few months of ignoring them)

These kinds of things can make chemical drain cleaner seem like a life saver. Even though a plumber can fix the problem just as easily, the quickly available, DIY response of drain cleaner helps pad its reputation.

The problem is, many people then expect chemical drain cleaner to have the same quick results on a bigger plumbing issue. If you find yourself having to buy chemical drain cleaner more than once every few years on average, you aren’t experiencing a drain cleaner sized problem. You’re experiencing something that needs a plumber’s expertise. That brings us to our next point.

Short Term Solutions Are Expensive…

If the problem thats actually plaguing your plumbing system is one that requires drain cleaner every month or two, the chemical drain cleaner is kind of like putting a bandaid on a major skin infection. It’s not going to hide the problem very well and is certainly not going to make it go away.

The tiny improvement in drainage following use of the drain cleaner is a short term solution. For people with consistent draining issues, the problem isn’t usually hair in the drain. It’s more likely something like:

• Your pipes are not wide enough to handle a modern water flow and are likely not up to modern plumbing code.
• You have hard or metallic water that needs softening or a filter. Iron or mineral buildup along the insides of your pipes can narrow them to an inadequate diameter for your water flow. This buildup has usually been accumulating for so long, by the time it affects your drainage, that none of it is loose enough for a bit of drain cleaner to remove to a notable degree.
• There is a collapsed pipe somewhere, likely underground, where rubble is blocking drainage.
• There are plant roots that have grown into underground pipes and are blocking drainage.

Using chemical drain cleaner to solve these problems will usually solve a different problem. For example, there might be some hair in the drain that is contributing minimally. So, it may seem like the cleaner is doing something to fix the issue, but you’re actually just experiencing a slight uptick in performance due to a separate issue disappearing for a while. 

Because drain cleaner isn’t actually solving your problem, frequently spending money on it is a huge waste. The cost of drain cleaner will quickly surpass the cost of hiring a plumber.

… And Cause Long Term Damage

Not only does chemical drain cleaner rarely solve the larger issue, it can actually make things much worse. The chemicals in drain cleaner are extremely potent. That’s why it can dissolve things like hair and grime. It breaks it down in just a half hour, before you rinse it away. But, have you considered what else those aggressive chemicals might be doing while you wait for them to break down drain clogs?

Chemical drain cleaner is so aggressive in its attempts to remove everything it touches, that it can actually damage plumbing. Hard to believe? You may think your plumbing is immune to damage, but pipes are just as susceptible to damage as some organic compounds. If chemical drain cleaner can remove rust, which is oxidized iron, what is it doing to iron or steel pipes?

The answer is, it destroys small layers of the insides of your pipes. One use might not mean long term damage for your plumbing, but repeated use almost certainly will. Drain pipes aren’t extremely thick to begin with. They’re not made for more than water, soap, and your dead skin cells. Therefore, repeatedly dumping cleaner down them that has the power to dissolve metal will weaken them exponentially. This will eventually lead to burst or cracked pipes.

Keep Reading at Part 2

Interested in knobbed faucets? Check out our last guide on bathroom faucet design to get all of the beginning points.

Double-Handled Faucets

The handle design is much more common. Let’s see why.

Pros

The first thing to love about double-handled faucets is the ease of use. There’s no need to get a good grip on it to turn it off or on.

Because of the ease of turning them off or on, double-handled faucets are also great for hygiene. You can touch it minimally, bump it off with your elbow, or turn it off with a paper towel. 

Additionally, cleaning them is much easier. Wiping them down is simply a matter of wrapping a paper towel or cloth with some cleaner on it around the handle and pulling gently.

Plus, because sink handles are typically only touched on the part extending from the base, water doesn’t drip onto the base as much. That means they don’t grow mold as frequently as knobs do. This is especially true if the knobs are attached directly to the sink, If on a raised platform that’s part of the faucet, there are extra corners where water accumulation can be a problem. Therefore, we recommend handles that are installed right on the sink.

The complete opposite of knobs, double-handled faucets are very child friendly. This can be great for when they’ve been taught how to use the sink and know to be careful with hot water or to stick to the cold water handle only.

Faucet handles are also easy to tighten, should they come a bit loose. Because the part of the handle that people touch is a screw-on addition to the actual mechanism, all you have to do to tighten it is turn the handle clockwise. This is a much simpler fix than with knobs.

Cons

Double-handled faucets, much like knobs, have three separate places where they can break. Shower mixer valves repair can sometimes be difficult. There are also a lot of steps to disassembly. Those include unscrewing the handle, removing the decorative cap, which usually has a tiny screw on the side, and then removing and replacing any hardware beneath that.

And, also the opposite of knobs, the child friendly nature of handles makes them easy for small children to mess with before they know how to use the sink properly. At the least, this can make a mess. At worst, they can leave the sink running and flood the bathroom. If your small children are prone to messing with the sink, it’s best to get a childproof mechanism for the sink knobs to prevent problems.

Single-Handled Faucets

Single-handled faucets, like those that are common in the kitchen, are just as good in bathrooms. Here’s what makes them a great bathroom faucet design and where they have drawbacks.

Pros

The first great thing about single-handled faucets is their ease of use. Just by virtue of being a single handle, they’re twice as easy as double-handled faucets to turn on and off.

Likewise, they’re also better for touch hygiene. While turning them on with an elbow isn’t as easy as double-handled faucets, due to the need to lift, turning them off when your hands are wet and freshly cleaned is as simple as pressing down with your elbow.

This bathroom faucet design is also great for keeping clean. There are many designs for single-handled faucet handles, but the best for hygiene are those that are sleek and either straight or curved. Rounded handles that are reminiscent of those outdated knobs pose the same hygiene problems. However, their straight counterparts are very simple to wipe down and don’t have all of those ridges for mold and bacteria growth.

Having a single handle can make getting warm water easier. While double-handled faucets require twice as much contact and a lot more effort to get the correct temperature, single handled faucets can be moved to one place every time you want a certain temperature. This motion can become second nature. It’s very convenient.

Cons

Unlike double-handled faucets, single-handled ones require you to put your wet hands over the handle mechanism. This means a lot of water on the mechanism. This can lead to molding around the faucet as well as mineral buildup in the moving parts. That can be a huge problem if you have hard water. Not to mention the increase in water spots on the spout below, which can be frustrating for people who like their hardware looking shiny and clean.

The downside of the temperature being chosen from one handle is that in for some people or in some older buildings, getting the temperature to be warm, rather than super hot or super cold, can be tricky.

Easy Faucet Repair

If you’re looking into replacing your faucet because your old one has sprung a leak, it might be worth fixing. Save yourself some money and give us a call at POM Plumbing. We can repair your sink faucet in no time at all, no matter what bathroom faucet design you have. However, if you’re replacing your faucet for aesthetic or age purposes, we hope our little guide helped you with your decision! Give us a call if you have any further questions and we’ll be happy to help.

Looking to replace your bathroom faucet? Before you go any further in the planning process, you should know some pros and cons in bathroom faucet design. There are many different kinds of bathroom faucet design, but not all of them are great for everyday purposes. The pros at POM Plumbing know a thing or two about the ins and outs of faucet design. So, we’re here to help you find the best choice for you and your home.

Knobbed Faucets

To start, let’s talk about faucets with knobs. These faucets are largely outdated, but can still be found in some places – usually older houses or public bathrooms. So, what’s the scoop on knobbed faucets?

Pros

The most prominent benefit over double-handled faucets is their ability to fit into certain interior design styles. 

However, you could also make the argument that they’re more child-proof. If you have a small child who knows how to climb and likes to turn the sink on, knobs may be a roadblock. They take more coordination to turn, making them harder on small, uncoordinated hands.

Cons

What used to be a pro may yet become a con. Because small children have difficulty with knobbed faucets, when they begin potty training and need to wash their hands, they may need help with turning the water on and off well past the point when they’ve learned to wash independently.

Knobbed faucets can also be a pain for adults to use. If you have the kind of knobs that are more round and geometric or with vertical ridges, rather than having prongs on them, turning them off with wet hands can be a menace. Plus, turning them off with a paper towel can make it hard to get a grip. In settings where hygiene is important, that’s terrible news.

When a knobbed faucet springs a leak – something that happens in the lifetime of most faucets – knobbed faucets take more steps to fix. There are two different handles and the spout. That leaves three different places that can break. 

Plus, knobs usually involve removing a cap from the top of the knob. That means, should your knob get loose from use, tightening it involves finding a small tool to pop the cap off with. Then, you have to use a screwdriver to tighten the screw holding it in place.

However, one of the most frustrating parts of knobbed faucets is how difficult they are to keep sanitary. The many edges and ridges can be hard to adequately wipe down. 

Plus, those same edges and ridges fill with water frequently. Without diligent and effortful cleaning, they will harbor bacteria and, often, grow mold, which is then nearly impossible to remove entirely and is constantly fed by more water.

Continue Reading

Want to know about handled faucets? We’ve got some great information on those too! Check out double-handled faucets and single-handled faucets in our next guide to bathroom faucet design. If you have any questions, feel free to call and ask person to person. We love to hear from our readers!

In Part 1, we covered many of the things people flush by mistake. Take a look to make sure you’re not making the same common bathroom mistakes yourself. But, there’s a lot more to avoid than just putting the wrong things down your toilet drain. Next up, we have some things people do that can damage their pipes.

Using Chemical Drain Cleaners

Chemical drain cleaners are unfortunately common as a quick fix against slow drains. The problem is, they’re shown to have long-term affects on your drain pipes. The chemicals are strong enough that they eat away at the insides of the pipes.

Fixing a slow drain is as simple as removing whatever is blocking it. While that might be hard for a layman to do, it’s something plumbing professionals, like us at POM Plumbing, can do very easily. If it’s not an easy fix, it’s certainly not something that Drano can solve for you.

By using a snake, a drum auger (which is like an industrial snake), and possibly the help of a camera, we can pull out whatever is blocking your drain without damaging your pipes. This is not only better for your plumbing, but a more effective long-term solution as well. 

Plunging Drains

Plungers are great for toilets. Toilets sometimes need a little help when we flush too much toilet paper or waste and it can’t get to the larger part of the pipes with water alone. In this case, using a plunger is helpful and harmless. It simply pushes the clog to the part of the pipes that can handle it and then breaks apart into the smaller parts it’s made of, which is usually all stuff that degrades quickly.

However, using plungers for a sink or tub drain can spell trouble. Why? Well, drains are usually only made to handle water. The pipes are typically a consistently small diameter until they reach a larger part of the sewage system, which is either in your basement or out under the street.

When these drains are clogged, it’s typically because of a buildup. This buildup can either be in one spot or, more commonly, lines the interior of the pipe until it became so narrow that it couldn’t keep up with the flow of water.

In the first case, using a plunger may be able to push the clog further down, but it is not likely to get it all the way out to the larger sewer system – especially if it’s got any gaps for pressure release. Therefore, you’re likely wasting your time and potentially doing harm to pipes from repeatedly pressurizing them.

In the second case, a plunger will do nothing to solve your problem. It will simply pressurize the small amount of space down the middle of the pipe. Repeatedly raising the pressure inside your pipes can lead to cracks or bursts, which can turn into flooding, water damage, and more.

Ignoring Problems

Past creating problems, the worst of common bathroom mistakes that someone can make is actually ignoring the problems. The longer you allow a problem to persist, the worse it will get and the more money, time, and energy you are likely to waste. Instead, call POM Plumbing and let our professionals come help you out. The faster we can come and take care of the problem, the faster you can get back to a higher quality of life.

If you want to keep your bathroom fully functional and at peak performance, you’ll want to know these common bathroom mistakes to avoid. We at POM Group have been in the plumbing business for many years. That’s given us a lot of time to see people making the same mistakes over and over again. We want to help our clients avoid those mistakes in their own homes so that they can keep things running smoothly. Here’s what we’ve learned.

Causing Problems

The first thing we should talk about is how people tend to cause problems in their bathrooms. It’s easy to make a mistake that causes lasting issues. We’re going to cover the really common ones. 

Flushing the Wrong Things

In this article, we’ll take a look at all of the things people flush that should actually be put into the trash. More than anything else, one of the leading causes of bathroom mayhem is people’s tendency to flush the wrong things. This happens a lot because of public misinformation or passing along habits from parent to child without realizing they’re problems.

Here are some things you should never flush:

Paper products that aren’t toilet paper

Paper towels, tissues, regular paper, and any other paper product that isn’t toilet paper is not created to degrade the same way as toilet paper. The way these products break down is not sufficient enough to keep them from wreaking havoc on your plumbing system. These products can cause drain clogs, backups, and damage to the larger sewage system – yes, even if you don’t have a septic tank.

Hygiene products

Tampons, pads, liners, makeup wipes, diapers, and baby wipes should never be flushed. Like the paper products mentioned above, they are not meant to degrade fast enough to avoid causing plumbing issues. Plus, someone at a sewage plant has to remove all of that from the sewage.

The two most common of these that get flushed are tampons and baby wipes (or other wet wipes). Tampons are commonly considered flushable by the public, but this misinformation only began because of their size and seeming ability to flush without problem. However, they can cause clogs and they do build up in the sewage system. If the local sewage system has to deal with tens of these a day from all of the locals, they can easily band together to create disaster.

Supposedly “flushable” wipes are not actually flushable. Like tampons, these are only called flushable because they aren’t likely to cause immediate problems upon flushing. That does not mean they aren’t causing issues further down the line. Throw these wipes into a trashcan instead. To avoid putting noticeable amounts of waste into your bathroom trashcan, wipe with toilet paper first and then use wet wipes for further cleanup.

Contaminants

While these items won’t necessarily cause your individual bathroom any problems, they will cause problems in the local water supply. Avoid flushing paint, lubricating oil, and medication. All three of these have to be disposed of in unique ways, none of which involve a toilet. Because these things are made with ingredients that are dangerous to humans, their ability to get into the water supply is also dangerous. Do you really want the local water to absorb prescription drugs? Neither do we.

Absorbent & Expanding

If you want to spell some serious trouble for your own bathroom, rather than the sewage system, just try flushing kitty litter, rice, or other absorbent solids. Kitty litter, rice, and many other things are made to expand when in contact with water. That means, as soon as it goes down your toilet drain, it begins absorbing water. That’s a great way to get one nasty blockage.

More Common Bathroom Mistakes

Ready for the other mistakes you should avoid? Check out Part 2 for more than just flushing the wrong things. If you’ve found your problem, call us and let us know you need some assistance.

Cleaning a bathroom comes with many facets. This is a place that involves both waste disposal as well as hygiene. There’s a delicate balance in keeping the facilities for those things well-cleaned. One of the areas of the bathroom that gets regularly neglected is the floor. The fact is, the floor of the bathroom is one of the most important parts to clean adequately. Here are some bathroom cleaning solutions on how to care for it. And, remember, one of the most important times to clean the bathroom floor is after you’ve had plumbing work done.

Why the Floor Matters

You might be wondering why the bathroom floor is one of the most important elements to clean. The reason is, every time you enter the bathroom, any bacteria on the floor gets on your feet. It’s then tracked into the rest of the house when you leave. Your feet don’t just go on the floor either. If you lie down in bed or curl up on the couch, it will be spread to those places too. Plus, the bathroom floor doesn’t just harbor plain bacteria – it usually has fecal particles on it. So, if you don’t want what’s on your bathroom floor to be spread to the rest of the house, you have to clean the bathroom floor adequately.

Your bathroom floor is liable to get bacteria-filled water on it during cleaning. Because of that, it’s best practice to save the floor for last, when using these bathroom cleaning solutions.

Sweeping

Because of the aforementioned spread of bacteria when things contact your bathroom floor, it’s recommended to keep a separate broom for the bathroom floor. Cheap brooms can be bought for only a few dollars. This broom is best stored in a laundry room or other place away from the kitchen, that has hard flooring.

Disinfecting

There are multiple bathroom cleaning solutions you can use when disinfecting your bathroom floors.

Mops

Mops are a classic choice for floor cleaning. If you’re going to use a mop, you’ll want a cleaning solution with antibacterial cleaner in it. The standard way to create this is with a cleaning concentrate, such as what’s offered by Lysol. Simply fill a bucket with a couple gallons of hot water and mix in the necessary amount of cleaning solution. Check individual cleaner labels for the correct amount.

Wet your mop, after sweeping, and mop every part of the floor. Every time you rinse the mop in the bucket, wring it out with your hands or any built on wringer.Ensure, when mopping, that you don’t oversaturate the floor.  Getting the floor very wet will make it take longer to dry and can damage certain types of flooring, such as vinyl tiles, which can lose their adhesion. Then, leave your floor to dry. Once the floor has dried, it is best practice to go over it once more. This will ensure no part of the floor is accidentally neglected.

Because mops aren’t washable in the same way other solutions are, you’ll want to let your mop dry thoroughly and then keep it somewhere with hard floor, like the laundry room. It is also recommended, like the broom, not to use the bathroom mop in the kitchen, unless you want to spread fecal particles on the kitchen floor.

Swiffer Mops

If you prefer to use a Swiffer, or an off-brand version of a Swiffer mop, ensure you use some kind of cleaning solution. A dry Swiffer will not sanitize your floors. Swiffer Wet Jets include a cleaning fluid, and some Swiffer Mops come with wet wipe attachments. The most important part of using a Swiffer for your bathroom is throwing away the wipe attachment when you’re done. Do not use the same wipe in other rooms after using it in the bathroom.

Manual Washing

Alternatively, if you plan to change your clothes and shower after cleaning the bathroom, you can scrub the floor manually. You can use the same kind of solution you would for a mop. When scrubbing the floors manually, it is always recommended to use a cloth or towel rather than a sponge or brush. A cloth or towel is more effective and can be washed in a washing machine to purge it of bacteria and fecal particulates.