Your plumbing is the lifeline of your home. Properly maintaining your pipes and drain lines is necessary to protect it from overflowing toilets, broken pipes, and water damage. Here are five key safety measures to prevent clogs and protect your home’s drain lines.

1. Clean Your Drains Regularly

One of the most important home maintenance tasks overlooked by many homeowners is regular drain cleaning. Most folks simply wait until their drains are clogged, or perhaps even overflowing, before they’ll call a professional plumber for assistance. But this is a mistake.

Regular maintenance for your drain lines is just as important as maintenance for your car, your yard, and your teeth. You wouldn’t skip changing your oil, mowing your lawn or brushing your teeth. So, don’t skip annual drain cleaning either.

2. Avoid Dumping Food Scraps, Oil, and Solid Waste Down Sink Drains

Aside from professional drain cleanings, the next best thing you can do to protect your drains is to be careful of what you dump into them. While your garbage disposal is a useful appliance for preventing clogs, it provides a false sense of security.

Your kitchen sink should never take the place of your trash can. Dump coffee grounds, used cooking oil, vegetable peels, and food waste into the trash instead of the sink to prevent clogs deep down in your drains and sewer lines.

3. Only Flush Toilet Paper Down Your Toilets

Toilets often clog up when folks try to flush paper towels, hygiene products, and other items that belong in the trash can. Only toilet paper is designed to break down properly in the toilet. So, avoid flushing anything except toilet paper.

4. Use Drain Strainers to Catch Debris

The drains in your bathtub, shower, and bathroom sink can also clog up frequently if not properly cared for and cleaned. Soap scum, hair, toothpaste, and bits of bar soap often go down those bathroom drains and stick to the insides of your drain lines.

The easiest drain safety measure for protecting your bathroom pipes is a simple drain strainer installed or placed over your drain. This will reduce the amount of hair and debris that enters your drains and keep them flowing freely.

5. Don’t Wait for Clogs to Get Worse

Clogs don’t always form suddenly inside of your drain lines. Often, the flow of water is restricted gradually as soap scum, oils, and debris accumulate on the insides of your pipes.

When you notice your sink or shower has a slow drain, it’s tempting to wait until it gets worse before calling a plumber. But clogs in your drain lines and sewer lines cause water pressure to increase and potentially allow the damage to get much worse and more expensive to repair. So, don’t wait! Call a professional as soon as you notice a problem.

If you have a drain clog in your home or need to schedule preventive drain cleaning services, contact Almighty Plumbing in Antioch, CA today for an estimate.