Sydney Homeowner's Prevention Guide: 5 Things that Stop Blocked Drains Before They Start

We clean blocked drains each day, in Sydney. It’s an honest fact, at least half of them were not necessary! These five things can be done this weekend to avoid most home drain backups.

Blockage prevention tips are typically of one of two types, either the obvious, such as “Don’t put concrete down your drain,” or the vague, “Take care what you put down your drain. Both have little impact on behaviour. So here are five specific and practical measures (all each take less than 10 minutes) that can take care of the real culprits to most blocked drains that we unblock in Sydney.

1. Place A Bin Next to the Toilet

This is the one single most effective measure towards drain blockage prevention in any home. A small lid-less container made for wet wipes, cotton buds, dental floss, sanitary products, cotton pads and any other items that can’t go into the toilet.

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Sydney Water facts: 75% of all wastewater blockages in the Sydney network are due to non-flushable wet wipes. The organisation spends up to $27 million annually on clearing some 20,000 blockages annually. Watch the pee, poo, and paper rule–which translates to ¾ of the time you can avoid ¾ of the blockages if everyone adheres to it.

The bin doesn’t have to be big. It doesn’t have to be costly. It simply has to be available, within arm’s reach of the restroom, to let the person know that there is a viable and convenient alternative to flushing. No bin/crap in the toilet (meat, pasta, wrappers and box etc). The default is changed by a bin.

2. PANS Wipe Pans Before Washing

Wipe a grease pan with a paper towel, and place in the bin before putting it into the wash. That’s it. Five seconds. Instead, grease goes in the garbage that would have clogged the pipe up and coated the wall, reducing the hole every month.

If you have a lot of cooking oil (frying oil, roasting fat etc.), place it in a tightly sealed container (old jar, milk carton, anything with a lid) and place it in the bin. Don’t pour oil or grease down the kitchen sink. When hot it’s liquid and harmless. When it cools it’s solid and pipe coating.

It’s the second most common reason for blockages in home drains, behind only wet wipes. Two habits, two bins (one by the toilet, one in the kitchen) and you’ve covered 80% or more of the preventable blockages.

3. Install Drain Strainers

A drain strainer is a small, flat piece of metal with a bit hole cover that keeps hair, soap bits, food bits and small objects out of the drain. From any hardware store, they are priced at $3-$10, and need only 30 seconds of installation.

Place one in the shower (for hair, the biggest culprit for shower drain clogging); one in the kitchen sink (for food scraps); and one in the laundry area (for lint and fibres from the washing machine). Make sure to empty them after every use. That’s three drain strainers, less than $20 combined, and you’ve eliminated the most common causes of fixture-level blockages.

4. If You're Planning On Doing Any Digging, Make Sure You Know Where Your Pipes Are

Visit the Sydney Water Tap in® website and retrieve your sewerage service diagram. It’s free. The diagram identifies the location of your sewer line from the house to the boundary, location of your boundary trap and connection to Sydney Water’s main.

Learning the location of the pipe can help avoid problems such as planting new trees no closer than 6 metres to the sewer line, gardens beds (avoid planting seedlings that love moisture directly over the pipe) and paving (don’t pour concrete directly over the boundary trap, you need to have access to it if a plumber calls).

In the event you already have established trees up to 6 metres from your sewer line, especially of the species: figs, jacarandas or liquidambar trees, have your sewer lines inspected annually with CCTV so you can identify any root intrusion early, prior to it becoming a blockage.

5. Drain Stormwater Pits in Fall

Identify all stormwater grates and pits on the property; each photo reveals a downpipe connection and there are one or two in paved areas. While most of them are not bolted (they fit in a frame) remove the grate and rake out any leaves, silt, and debris. Replace the grate.

This will only take 5 to 10 minutes per pit and can save you a flooded driveway or garden as the debris is not allowed to accumulate in the pit and be flooded over when the big fall storm hits. Prof. Brian Mickle Hill’s residential development stormwater design manuals recommend an annual winter and spring application: “With these two stormwater system applications, Sydney storms should be managed without surcharging.”

The Expenses Of All Five Actions

Action	Cost
A small bin	$10
Paper towel you already own	$0
Three drain strainers	$15
Sydney Water Tap in® diagram	Free
Clearing out stormwater pits	Free (time only)
Total	~$25, 30 minutes of work

That’s compared to the cost for 1 blocked drain call-out ($300 – $600). Or a sewer reline at $3,000 to $8,000. Or the $16,000 bill for repairing the wet wipes that Sydney Water has recorded.

Five actions. Twenty-five dollars. Thirty minutes. You have now solved most of your plumbing clog problems, with these done this weekend. Of course we would prefer to never be called for a blocked drain; but we know that some people do feel compelled to make that call at some point. And if we need to come in, for example, if your home really does have an issue with clogged drains that leads to flooding and none of your prevention measures has helped, we would prefer it to be a problem that can’t be prevented, as opposed to wet wipes and cooking oil that went in the bin.