Toilets won't flush

[George Wirth]

Hello all! I'm sure that there is a thread that has already addressed this, but I couldn't find one per se. I have 2 bathrooms in my home and neither of them are flushing. All other drains seem to be working. When running my washing machine or running water down the kitchen sink, the toilet closest to them bubbles and drains to almost no water in that toilet. When I take a shower in the other bathroom, that toilet bubbles, but doesn't really drain. I can use a plunger for about 4 minutes and get what's in that toilet to clear. This is a 100 year old house that I rent. It is connected to city sewer. Not sure what other info is needed to deduce the problem, but any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

 

[Terry]

That's is sounding like a main line backup. Someone needs to snake that line.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[George Wirth]

That's is sounding like a main line backup. Someone needs to snake that line.

Even with everything else flowing just fine?

 

[Jadnashua]

It all depends on where the blockage is. Blockages often tend to be incomplete, and just slow things down. A toilet flushes a big plug of water all at once. Sinks, showers, etc., tend to do a smaller amount fairly continuously that might not back up.

 

[Plumber69]

Just ran into that same problem. The line wasn't fully plugged. Snaked it and was good to go

 

[George Wirth]

It all depends on where the blockage is. Blockages often tend to be incomplete, and just slow things down. A toilet flushes a big plug of water all at once. Sinks, showers, etc., tend to do a smaller amount fairly continuously that might not back up.

Ok, so snake the main line towards the house?

 

[Jadnashua]

YOu might remove the toilet and snake from there. If you're lucky, you might clear it with a toilet auger and leaving it in place, but most of them only use a small head, and they aren't all that long and may only poke a hole in it, rather than loosen it up.

Using a big snake designed to clean a main line can be dangerous, and may be better left to a pro. Sometimes, a smaller one will break it apart and let it drain down the line, sometimes, it doesn't.

If it's something like tree roots, those are better left to a pro. But, then, you need to find how they got in and fix that, too, or it will just recur. Sometimes, it's good to pay someone to run a camera down the line to identify what the problem is. It could be the line collapsed, or has a belly, where that slows or stops the flow rather than a constant downslope, and the problem will recur.