How to Fix Your Toilet if It's Not Flushing & You've Plunged It

Tools and methods other than plunging may eliminate toilet clogs.

Sometimes plunging a clogged toilet dislodges the clog, but different clogs react favorably to different unclogging efforts. When plunging fails, you have several other options for removing a clog from the toilet’s drain line, starting with simple solutions and ending with the removal of the toilet. Avoiding clogs helps save you the time and hassle of the process, which you can do by only flushing human waste and toilet paper down the toilet’s drain. Flushing too much waste and toilet paper at a time can also result in clogs.

Things You'll Need

• One cup baking soda
• One cup vinegar
• Quarter cup dish detergent
• Bucket
• Toilet snake
• Adjustable wrench
• Blanket or piece of cardboard
• Putty knife
• New wax ring

Instructions

1. Pour one cup baking soda down the toilet’s drain opening and wait at least two minutes for the baking soda to settle. Pour one cup of vinegar in the drain, creating a fizzing reaction that breaks apart the clog. The power of the solution drops if the bowl has more than 2 or 3 inches of standing water.

2. Pour a quarter cup of dish detergent in the toilet’s drain and wait 10 minutes for the detergent to settle around the clog, providing lubrication between it and the drain’s walls. Pour a large bucket of water quickly in the toilet’s bowl, without spilling the water over the edge of the toilet bowl, applying pressure to the toilet’s drain line.

3. Feed a toilet snake down the drain line. Once you feel the snake contact the clog, turn the snake’s handle clockwise to bore through the clog. Turn the handle counterclockwise as you pull the snake out of the drain line, potentially pulling the clog out of the drain line.

4. Twist the handle on the water control valve clockwise, and then remove the toilet’s tank. Suck the water out of the tank with a shop vacuum. Remove the nuts from the toilet’s base and loosen the nut that connects the water supply line to the water control valve using an adjustable wrench.

5. Pull up on the toilet’s bowl to remove it from its mount on the floor. Lay the toilet on its side on a large blanket or piece of cardboard, allowing you to pull any stuck objects out of the toilet’s drain line. Scrap the old wax ring off the flange on the floor using a putty knife, and place a new wax ring on the flange with the flat side down.

6. Lower the toilet back over the mount on the floor and sit on the toilet to compress the wax ring so the base of the toilet touches the finished bathroom floor on all sides of the base. Tighten the nuts on the base of the toilet so the toilet does not move, and tighten the connection between the water supply line and the water control valve.

References

• Drano: How to Unclog a Toilet
• The Family Handyman: How to Fix a Clogged Toilet
• Planet Green: 7 Green Methods to Unclog a Toilet...Plumber's Crack Optional