The drains in your household can slowly clog with organic matter, inorganic debris, impurities, corrosion, and various components of the liquids that pass through your plumbing system every day.
You can adopt two distinct approaches to clearing the clogs in your drain: First, you could remove such clogs with manual methods like scrubbing or drain snakes. Second, you could use chemical cleaners.
One of those chemicals is sulfuric acid. But even this strong acid doesn’t always work.
Sulfuric acid drain cleaner will not work if you do not follow the instructions that are usually clearly written on the bottle, regardless of the brand of drain cleaner you purchase.
This guide will describe why sulfuric acid isn’t cleaning your drain and what you can do about it.
Why Is Sulfuric Acid Drain Cleaner Not Working?
You have to follow instructions, or else the cleaner won’t work. Likewise, chemical cleaners like sulfuric acid don’t work for blockages that are big enough to completely back up the system, requiring manual methods or a skilled professional.
Systems that require additional interventions to be adequately cleared are usually entirely backed up and do not have a genuine passage for water flow.
Many chemical drain cleaners like this require a plumber’s skills anyway to ensure that the job is done thoroughly, efficiently, and safely. So, human error is usually the cause of your drain cleaning problems, even when using potent drain cleaners.
Below are human errors that can render sulfuric acid ineffective.
You Didn’t Use Enough Sulfuric Acid
Usually, sulfuric acid drain cleaners must be applied to drains and toilets only once you have removed any standing water to prevent acid contact with water. The standard procedure would also be pouring about six ounces of sulfuric acid drain cleaner.
However, sometimes you might need a little more than that. It depends on the scale of the blockage in your drain. Using too little sulfuric acid drain cleaner can render the product ineffective.
While manufacturers of sulfuric acid drain cleaners will often instruct you to pour the chemical cleaner into your drain or toilet so it doesn’t splash, you also want to pour it with enough force to remove the obstruction in your drain.
You Tried A Shortcut With Your Sulfuric Acid Drain Cleaner
Sometimes you are the reason that the sulfuric acid drain cleaner is not working because you were not patient enough to wait for the chemical cleaner to do its work.
Chemical cleaners for your drain need anything from 15 minutes to several hours before they can effectively perform the task you require from them. In some instances, the work only gets adequately done after a full 24-hour period of time.
If your sulfuric acid drain cleaner didn’t work, it is quite possible that you tried to flush out the blockage too soon before the clog had fully dissolved.
The Cleaner is Too Weak
Beyond all of this, it is just possible that you are using an inferior product that does not have the chemical strength required to unclog a toilet or a drain, regardless of how it has been marketed.
How Long Does Sulfuric Acid Take To Unclog Drain?
The best drain cleaning products available at online vendors are marketed as being able to unclog your drain in about 15 minutes, provided you follow all of the steps correctly.
Some products and drain clogs will require up to an hour to finish the work. In extreme circumstances, you can expect to wait up to 24 hours until your drain has been properly unclogged. Anything longer than that just means your drain cleaner isn’t working.
What to Do When Sulfuric Acid Did Not Clear Drain
If your drain unblocker doesn’t work the first time you use it, it might be prudent to follow all of the steps again a second time. Usually, that will be enough to clear your drain blockage.
However, if the chemical product doesn’t work after a second attempt, you will need to explore other drain cleaning options, such as a plunger, sodium hydroxide, a vacuum, or a drain snake.
Plunger
If your drain unblocker doesn’t work, there is still the old-fashioned option of using a plunger to try and unblock your drain. As a first line of defense, however, you may have already tried this. In that case, this probably isn’t a beneficial alternative.
Sodium Hydroxide
While sulfuric acid is likely to be more effective than sodium hydroxide in most drain cleaning operations, sodium hydroxide is still an option worth pursuing if your sulfuric acid doesn’t work.
An example of a drain cleaner that contains sodium hydroxide is Crystal Drain Opener, which is highly effective when dealing with grease and grime.
However, the most compelling feature of sodium hydroxide is that it is a lot easier and safer for DIY. If sodium hydroxide works, it will give you a similar outcome to sulfuric acid drain cleaners.
Wire Or Drain Snake
If time is of the essence and you cannot find your way to a hardware store, you could search your household for a piece of wire or even a hanger (which you should have in your closet).
The key with this method would be to use a piece of wire that you can bend enough to create a hook.
When sulfuric acid does not clean your drain, there is usually some immovable object preventing you from achieving the desired results. Using a bent or hooked wire can remove that object—even if it survives the initial chemical approach.
If you are searching for something a little more sophisticated and perhaps a little more effective than a bent wire, many drain snakes are currently available on the market. Powered drain snakes make the job of unclogging your drain a little easier and quicker too.
Wet & Dry Vacuum
A wet & dry vacuum like the Drain Hero can compensate quite well for drain cleaning jobs that don’t produce the desired outcomes through other methods.
The key to wet & dry vacuums is that they help pull the clog back out towards you instead of pushing it further down the drain. In many ways, this could be better than your chemical options too.
Conclusion
Many things can prevent you from using sulfuric acid to effectively clean your drains. If you do it yourself, always be sure to wear safety glasses and rubber gloves to prevent chemical burns, avoid toxic fumes, and never add the acid cleaner to water.
If the acid doesn’t work, remember the many other manual and chemical methods available, such as plungers and alternative chemical cleaners.
