A Simple DIY All Natural Recipe for Unclogging Drains

A Simple DIY All Natural Recipe for Unclogging Drains in your Grass Valley Home

  • Remove all water from the sink or tub and pour about 1 cup baking soda down the drain.
  • Then pour 1 cup vinegar down the drain, plugging it immediately (if you’re unclogging a double sink, plug both drains).
  • When the bubbles have died down (about 30 minutes), chase them down the drain with some hot water.

If this recipe seems familiar to you, you may have as I did (at one point in your school days) used this recipe to make an erupting volcano for science class.  Baking soda, a base, combined with vinegar, an acid, reacts to form carbon dioxide and sodium acetate—the bubbles that do the scrubbing work inside the drain.  Once drain sludge is dissolved, these all natural, non-toxic ingredients get flushed down the now clog-free drain and will do no harm to your plumbing and or septic tank.

Baking soda and vinegar as you know are natural ingredients preferable to the manufactured chemical sodium hydroxide, also known as caustic soda or lye. Sodium hydroxide is the active ingredient in most grocery store drain cleaners.  While the chemical isn’t too harmful for the environment since it’s broken down by the time it flows into oceans and rivers, it can be harmful to whomever it touches. And it can do a nasty number on the working of your septic tank.

According to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, sodium hydroxide can burn skin. If swallowed, it can cause chest and abdominal pain, and has the potential to lead to death if it severely damages the lungs, tissue, or causes a loss of pulse or shock.

Baking soda and vinegar are common, consumable (though perhaps not together!) ingredients that don’t pose health dangers and are probably already sitting in your kitchen cupboards.

And hey if the home remedies don’t work you can always call ABT and well be right out. 530-272-9120

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