Sewer line still clogged after snake

[Serge9898]

My bathroom (BR) sewer pipe is clogged. (4" I believe)
We passed the snake 3 times: 25ft too short. Then 50ft did a lite "glu glu" noise and water drained slowly, bit got clogged again. Then powered 75 ft snake with cutter head.
Still clogged.
The BR sewer line make 1 bent and meet the "kitchen" sewer line, after about 30 ft.
The kitchen line is flowing ok, no issues
I cannot use a camera because it's full of durty opaque water...
This is an old house with no cleanout. The city came and quoted me $4500 to intall a cleanout... with no garanty it will help (as the kitcheen line is clear anyway)

Any idea?? How does the 75ft snake goes through the clog, then though the cleared kitcheen line, most likely up to the city sewer and not open the clog?!?!

My idea: A section of the BR line is very corroded with a limited remaining section. The snake goes goes through the clog and the section, then pressure of the water pushed the clog on the limited section... Possible?

How do I fix that?
The house is old, there are no trees around.
I am a DYI. Plumbers in the Bay Area are like : I come for $300 an hour and try, no guaranty... $400 for the endoscope camera...

 

[Twowaxhack]

Put a blow bag in the line from the bathroom. Let it run for a while and monitor that the water isn’t flooding another room. Be careful, you can make a mess quick.

 

[Serge9898]

This is great thank you. I didn't know this. Questions:
- Do I use it it water garden hose? (I saw video using it with air compressoir..)
- while watching video they advise not yo use it on old plumbing older that 20 y.o. Mine is very old.. any risk to damage the pipes?

 

[Serge9898]

I can actually access a cleanout in the crawl space in the 4" ABS pipe (connected to the cast iron 4" pipe) directly before the clog.

 

[dmmsr]

Sometimes what happens is you have a lot of toilet paper and other stuff in the line that causes everything to muck up and become what is known as a soft clog. Your cable will go through it and it will close right back up with the cable still in it. Soft Grease is good for doing the same thing.

When you hit the spot where you said it went "glu glu" what you should've done there was went in a few more feet then pulled back 6 feet and went back in 6 feet and just kept doing that as you were at the spot. Sometimes you have to a little more instead of a 6 foot spot do about 10 foot to get past the soft clog. And what you are trying to do is push that muck out slowly. If you go too fast you will just go right through it. I would try cleaning it again with the drain machine. And as you hit the spot and water is going down a bit, turn on the water and let it fill as you are running the snake. You were right there. There have been times it took me a good 1 to 2 hours to finally get it.

And as twowaxhack mentioned you might need a blowbag. I am not fond of this if you are not sure how your plumbing is only because it can cause a mess if you're not careful and you do not get it past all tie-ins. But since you can see the pipe I'm the crawlspace you can go right through that with the blowbag


If all this fails to work you may need a mini jet to clear it out.

 

[Serge9898]

Ok thank you that helps! Solf clog
The issue with the powered snake machine is that you don't feel or ear anything. I heard the "glu glu" only when I used the 50ft manual snake. But it was a serious workout lying down in the crawl space...

For the blow bag (new to me): the only thing I am sure is that I can access a clean out on the 4" pipe right before the clog (~30 ft without tie-in in between) So I'll try now...

Last do you know if a mixture of Baking soda and Vinegar takes about 15-20 min to act (as I read on line)? If so it's worth to pour some while I setup the blow bag...

 

[Serge9898]

Well... success: The blow bag did the job. (Let's see after couple of days of observation though because we thought that we got it couple of times already, so I'm not celebrating yet, but I was able to run teh water full blast for 10 min in the pipe so we should be good).
I wanted to thank you for the help!
(The market here in the Bay Area is crazy where demand is so high that plumbers, if you can get one, ask $200 an hour just to see, no warranty. I appreciate the help, and arogantly suggest the expensive options first knowing thta you are not going to wait or discuss. The $27 blow bag did well!)

 

[dmmsr]

Ok thank you that helps! Solf clog
The issue with the powered snake machine is that you don't feel or ear anything. I heard the "glu glu" only when I used the 50ft manual snake. But it was a serious workout lying down in the crawl space...

For the blow bag (new to me): the only thing I am sure is that I can access a clean out on the 4" pipe right before the clog (~30 ft without tie-in in between) So I'll try now...

Last do you know if a mixture of Baking soda and Vinegar takes about 15-20 min to act (as I read on line)? If so it's worth to pour some while I setup the blow bag...

I know they say it works, never done it myself. For your case I would say most likely not. Try the blow bag. That should work if you can get proper access.