Huzzah! I think our plumbing saga may be coming to an end after 8 visits by 4 different plumbers in the last month.
About a month ago, the shower drain backed up and I couldn’t clear it with my 25’ snake. Plumber #1 called. He used his professional-grade snake through the shower drain to 80 ft, drain cleared. So far so good.
Within a couple days after that visit, we started getting, intermittently, slow sinks and overrunning toilets in other parts of the house, so we figured he had just pushed the blockage further downstream but didn’t actually clear it. So we called the next available plumber #2 to come “jet” (pressure wash) the pipes. They got set up to do that, but insisted on trying to recreate the problem before actually jetting. No dice, so they packed up and left.
Unfortunately, one of the things they do to prep for jetting is remove the washing machine drain hose from the wall and stuff a rag in there so water doesn’t splatter up into the laundry. Since they didn’t actually jet, they forgot to do their post-jet checklist and left the washer drain hose dangling behind the machine. We have 2 toddlers and a live-in au pair, so we did 7 loads of laundry that weekend before the wall became saturated enough that water became visible on the floor. Fortunately said plumber acknowledged their mistake and paid for the remediation, and returned to jet the pipes for real.
Still getting intermittent clogs, so plumber #2 comes out with a borescope. They return with all kinds of wild tales about fittings that don’t look like they are lining up and possibly a collapsed pipe, none of which will turn out to be true. The one true thing that they do find is that there is a length of a professional-grade plumbing snake sitting in our sewage line. They don’t know where, but they found it with 80’ of camera cable deployed. They cut off the operation at that point, because they didn’t want to get their camera tangled with the snake. So it’s pretty clear to us that plumber #1 forgot to count the segments of cable, but now we’re worried about the condition of the plumbing under our slab in general….
Plumber #2 returns with a snake with a grabber head on it to try to catch hold of the snake, but no success. They try to locate a clean out near the street to try to go upstream to get it, and manage to puncture our main sewer line in the process, so they had to repair that. Still no success grabbing the snake. Plumber #2 also gives a quote for repiping the portion of the house where they allegedly saw the other problems, and it’s obviously significant enough that we want multiple quotes. Keep in mind that the ground floor of our house is 2000 sq ft, nearly all of which is continuous tile that flows through all the rooms - dig anywhere and you’re reflooring the entire house. Cha-Ching!
A few days and a few intermittent clogs later, my wife uses the master toilet just before running into the office for a few hours (normally works from home). She returns home to find that not only was the system clogged, the toilet valve didn’t seat properly when she flushed, so it had been overflowing water the entire time she was gone, soaking through the wall and soaking the carpet in the master bedroom. JFC.
So we call plumber #3. They send a crew over with a camera just for inspection to be able to quote the repiping job. They report that there is so much standing water in the line that they really can’t see much, but it seems like the pipes may be sagging and creating low points. Sorry kids - looks like student loans for you!
On the advice of plumber #2, we’d beet running a hose into our kitchen every few days to try to flush out the system. Last Wednesday when we tried it, the water really backed up into the kitchen sink, then finally cleared and things seemed fine. It was only an hour or so later that my wife went into our master and realized that the water pressure had also pushed raw sewage back up into the master shower. Lovely.
Enter plumber #4, for another attempt at a repiping quote. They jet the pipes first, THEN go in with a camera, and the pipes are clean as a whistle and are in great shape. I stayed home for this visit, so got to see for myself for the first time. They couldn’t find the alleged snake that plumber #2 had spotted, either. But they decided to do one more check going down the kitchen sink and they found it, pretty far down the line. They dug up where plumber #2 had repaired the sewer line and started snaking for it, while watching with the camera. After nearly 3 hours, they gave up and dug as close to the house as they could get, broke into the line, and were fortunately able to just reach in and grab it by hand.
they put it all back, so I think that we are back in business, having finally repaired all the collateral damage that plumber #1 did when he came to clear what was probably just a run-of-the-mill shower clog.
