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Hello. I've read many questions and answers on sewer smells in the home. I am experiencing the same problem but don't know where to start. I've read suggestions on pouring bleach down the shower drain, letting it sit overnight and then pouring hot boiling water down the drain the next morning. I've also read responses on vents being blocked. We've tried pouring solutions down the toilet and down the washing machine drain. When we poured it down the washer drain it seem to get better for a few hours but came back. The smell is still very bad. My mother's house is very old. It smells like the gas is coming through the vent but the smell gets worse when we wash. It sometimes gets better but never goes away. It was very bad in our main bathroom (washer and dryer is located in this bathroom) but now we smell is in the other two bathrooms and throughout the house. Should we try pouring the bleach down the drain? And if so which ones (all)? Or does it sound like it is a vent problem. If so, how do I fix this. Please help the smell is really bad and we can't seem to correct it.
Skip the bleach for now, the shot gun approach does not work for sewer gas. Try shutting all interior doors for a while to see which room is the worst. Put you palms on each side of the toilet and see if it rocks left and right, could be a bad wax ring under the toilet. Check all drains for proper traps that are holding water in the trap, unused sinks or traps can dry up and vent gas. Back to you.
ballengerb1, thanks for the response. Closing all interiors doors helped us identify that the smell was coming our main bathroom. We now need to determine if it is the washer or maybe one of the sinks that rarely get used. We checked the toilets and none are loose. Any other suggestions?
That stand pipe might not be trapped, put your nose to it and take a snort. If it is the source you can add a trap under the house if there is room.Otherwise there are connector to make the drain line and stand pipe a sealed unit.
this may sound crazy, but, i had a similar problem where my house smelled like sewer when i used the electric dryer. long story short, a plumber used a "smoke test" and determined that the seals under the toilet were bad. smoke spewed out from under the toilets in less than a minute. replacing those seals got rid of the smell.
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