Hello,

I have recently purchased a home with a basement bathroom. The toilet is mouted flush to the slab. The toilet would not drain when flushed. Here is what I have done to date to correct the issue:

1.) Used a 3' snake to clean the toilet-No result
2) Removed the toilet and cleaned the toilet and ran a 15' snake through the drain. No clocks that I found but I did find roots. I rented a roto router and run it down the toilet drain and the clean out to the common stack and added chemical to kill off and roots I missed-No effect
3) Replaced the toilet, I was going to do this anyway as it in old toilet that shows its age, still no effect

All I can think of it 1) The toilet is either not vented or improperly vented 2) the drain is below the common drain the water is trying to go up hill.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hi 1sttimer

When you lifted the toilet, was the drain pipe filled with water? If not read on...

Here, I would relift the toilet and fill the drain pipe using a garden hose until the drain was full to the top of the pipe. Now, you would snake the drain line with a large snake and you would watch the water in the drain. At first, water may overflow the drain due to displacement of water from the volume of the snake... also may not, if the drain is only partially blocked.

In any case, you want to keep the water in the drain so you can see it at all times, so you may need to leave the hose trickling into the drain as you work the blockage.

The trick here is that once you hit the ROOT CAUSE (no pun intended) the water will react by bobbing up/down and that is when you will know that you are into the blockage. It is here that you will work the snake back and forth, back and forth until you clear the blockage. Keep watching the water bob up/down, keep feeding water as needed and keep proceeding down the drain a bit at a time depending on how the water reacts. Eventually, you should see the water disappear with a WHOOSH!

At that point you'll finish this by working the area the cable is in back and forth a few feet back and a few feet forward and that should finalize this for you!

If your drain was filled with water when you lifted the toilet and you kind of tried all this let me know, OK?

Mark