Hello,

We just moved into an apartment, and we are on the ground floor of a four level building. The other day we heard a noise from our laundry room and were surprised to discover that laundy suds -- thankfully not actual water -- were backing up out of our standpipe in the space between the washer drain hose and the standpipe. It was kind of a slowly growing wall of foam...

Now, seeing as how we weren't doing any laundry at all that day, we can only assume that the suds were backing up our standpipe from someone else (probably above) doing laundry.

Is there anything we can do to prevent that from happening again? The building manager went and knocked on a few doors to find out who the culprit was (and advised them to use less soap), but I'd rather rest easy knowing it can't back up like that again...

Can I completely seal (watertight) our laundry drain hose into the standpipe? Would doing so create the potential for any new issues?

Thanks!

"Can I completely seal (watertight) our laundry drain hose into the standpipe? Would doing so create the potential for any new issues?"
Yes and no! Yes you can install a compression fitting on the stand pipe to seal off the hose and no it wouldn't stop the suds from backing up the stand pipe, into your hose and back into your washer. If any liquid came up with the suds you might have a partial blockage in the drain, in which case it should be snaked out. Regards, Tom