My Bathroom Sink

DIY: Caulking the Bathroom Sink

Caulking a bathroom sink is easier than some homeowners think. Care should be taken so no water or moisture seep into the floor, the cabinet or the woodwork. Moisture or water is terrible for your bathroom floors or unprotected areas. Mold can only spread where there is moisture. Don’t underestimate the danger of mold; it is with no doubt a health hazard for all the users of the bathroom. Once mold seeps into a bathroom, it can cost thousands of dollars to get rid of it. After some months, some homeowners simply discover that the mold is back. Equally destructive is water seeping behind the tiles or into the floor. Repairing that kind of damage cost something around a thousands dollars. Preventing it from happening costs sometimes less than $10 and a couple of hours of easy work.

All these headaches can be avoided by just spending a couple of hours caulking the bathroom sink properly.

What will you need?

Caulking, of course, this can be bought as a tube of caulking or a cartridge for a caulking gun. The choice is a matter of personal preference. If you have just one bathroom, go for the tube, it is cheaper for a one time application. If you want to caulk more than one bathroom, the caulking gun is definitely a useful tool.

The prices range from $4 or $5 for the caulking tube to about $15 for the caulking gun with a cartridge.

Razor blade, screw driver, knife, cleanser. You’ll need to remove the old caulking completely. That means scratching until it is completely gone. This step is more difficult than it seems. Caulking is, due to its purpose, sticky, so you’ll have to scratch until every single piece is completely removed. If you find mold on your old caulking, extra care should be taken. After removing the old caulking completely, clean the spot with alcohol or other stronger cleanser than soap. As said above, mold is a danger to your bathroom.

Wait until it is completely dry to apply the new caulking.

Some extra tips: if the old caulking is only partially broken, do not try to repair only the broken part. Remove it completely and caulk it completely anew. Not removing the old caulk will probably implies that the old problems are still there. Buy quality caulking, specifically developed for a bathroom. It costs only slightly more, but fulfils much better its function.

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Unclogging a Bathroom Sink

A clogged sink is annoying, but we only think about it when it is too late. As long as water is flowing, we normally don’t mind how much hair, cream or soap is flowing down the sink. Until all these elements combine to clog the bathroom sink.

The easiest try, the one which should be the first, is simply to try the plunger. Every household should have one, since it will be useful for sure. Add a little bit of water and plunge the sink at least dozen times. Take a look to see if water is flowing faster. If it is, then it is working. Don’t give up until you tried hard enough to expect results. A tip here is to cover the overflow drain so that all the pressure builds up in the clog. If thing works out, turn on the hot water and let it flow for some minutes. That will remove the grease or whatever and wash it down. Didn’t work out? Then try next step.

Take apart the tail piece. The tail piece is also called the P-trap, since it has the form of a P. Perhaps you’ll need a pipe wrench or any similar tool. It smells terrible, but it can solve your problem. If the clog is in the tail piece, than you can clean and put it together again. No results? Then move to step three.

Use some chemicals. If the bathroom sink is clogged, but there is still some water flowing, try some caustic chemical products. Some are specific for clogged sinks, and some can be made at home. Vinegar is known for being effective.  Alcohol and gasoline will also dissolve some grease substance clogging your pipe. Don’t abuse pouring too much down the drain.  All these substances are very harmful for the environment and should only be used as a last resource.

Nothing worked out? Go for a drill snake. There is no need to buy one, they are available to rent. There are also sink snakes that are equally effective. The smallest are thirty feet and can reach deep down the drain. Just let it go down the piping and move it slowly. You’ll feel it going down and you can partially control the direction of it. Sometimes you’ll feel the clog getting dissolve and other times you’ll have to test pouring water down the sink. Drill snakes are highly effective. Wear gloves for your safety.

After unclogging the bathroom sink, always let hot water flow down abundantly for some minutes.

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Unclogging a Bathroom Sink Drain

A clogged bathroom sink is nasty, but it doesn’t have to cost you a lot of money to unclog it.  Of course, you can call a plumber and he will solve the problem for you in a couple of minutes.  However, there are simply ways of unclogging it.  Normally, bathroom sinks are just clogged by hair, soap, toothpaste and creams that went down it.

For these simple homemade clogs, there is nothing like a homemade unclogging. Here is how you can do it.

If there is some water still flowing through the clog then your problem is not too serious.  Such partial clogging, where at least some water is coming through, are the easiest to solve.

The simplest way to try and unclog it is just pouring boiling water down the drain.  If the clog was caused by some greasy substance, this solution will do the trick.

If it didn’t work, you need some stronger measures for it.  A safe home remedy is mixing vinegar with baking soda.  This is very effective against most clogging element in a bathroom.  It won’t do anything against hairs, but hairs don’t stick to each other alone.

So, pour baking soda down the drain and pour vinegar on the top of it. Let it rest for at least 30 or 45 minutes. Pour boiling water after waiting and see what happens.

Sometimes, you’ll need to use a plunger on the top of that. The vinegar and soda is certainly doing their job, but some pressure will help it.  Use the plunger to put pressure and suctions.  This pulling and pushing will put some movement into your pipe.  Some people also use stronger substances with some caustic chemicals. Others, however, mind the environment and stick to natural means, which also work in most cases.

For major clogging, you would perhaps need to remove the pipe and clean it.  If nothing helps, possibly the clogging is way down the pipe.  In this case, you might need to stick a steel cable down it and see what happens.  Normally just pushing and pulling it will do the trick. If some water is coming through go for the vinegar and soda method or some caustic chemicals, like caustic soda.

In almost all cases, you’ll be able to unclog your bathroom sink drain. Remember to apply any measure before the drain is completely clogged. Partial clogged drains are normally very easy to unclog.

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