Homemade Draino

I don't know what it is about the drains in my house, but they are ALWAYS clogged. It has been like that since we moved into our house about two years ago. In fact, when we moved in, the drains were still clogged from the previous owners.

Nice.

We spend A LOT of money on Draino. Last time I bought Draino I bought 4 bottles of it thinking it would last. Hmmm. Nope! I spent around $15 (after coupons) and it was gone in two days. Given, that was a bit of an unusual situation in that both bathtubs were clogged and we don't usually go through that much. But still. Two days.

I recently found this recipe for Draino you can make at home and thought it was worth a shot.

Here it is:

1 Cup salt
1 Cup baking soda
1/4 Cup cream of tartar

Add all ingredients to some sort of seal-able container and mix. Here's what mine looks like:

 I wrote directions on the back of the can.

Add about 1/4 Cup of this mix to your drain and store the rest.

Follow this with 2 cups of boiling water. When you add the boiling water, the powder mix should foam. When I saw this happen I started thinking about activation energy and catalysts and why this would work... it would have made for an interesting demonstration when I was teaching. Anyway, I digress...

Let the drain sit for about an hour.

Flush with tap water.

The results: It actually worked pretty well. It wasn't amazing (we have VERY difficult drains) but it was about the same as Draino. Next time I will probably try a bit more than 1/4 cup of the mix to see if it works better than Draino. And for a fraction of the price and no chemicals or harsh fumes, I think we have a Draino replacement!