Does anyone know why my laundry drain is backing up but not the main drain?

Question

The main line which is the shower, toilet and sink in the bathroom is draining fine to the street.

The laundry room line which is the washer and my kitchen sink backs up when just a little bit of water is used.

I've snaked this line and it still backs up. Any ideas?

Answer 1

If you are sure that you snaked the kitchen/laundry line through where it connects to the main line, you probably have a blocked vent. If it is an older home you might not have any vent because someone bootlegged the plumbing in during a remodel.   If you go outside your house you will see a large probably PVC pipe coming out of the roof.  That is the main vent.  You need a vent so the water will drain freely rather than gurgling down the drain the way a pop bottle does when you empty it.   Everything that has a drain connected to the sewer line has a vent.  Smaller vents usually connect to  larger vents.  If the appliances are too far away sometimes you will have two or more vents poking through the roof.   Since you have the kitchen sink and the laundry running slowly, they are probably tied into the same vent.

Answer 2

It could be that the snake you used was not long enough to push the clog out into the main line and to the sewer system. When a washing machine and a kithcen sink are on the same drain line this can cause some real nasty clogs because fats from the sink mix with lint from the washing machine. You can rent a long snake from home depot or a tool rental company, or you can call a professional drain cleaning company. The second option might be best because they will have different size snakes(length and width) to accommodate all drains.

Answer 3

Washing machine water contains lots of lint. Even if the snake is reaching it, it may be going through it and not removing it.

Answer 4

jigi is right anytime you snake yourself and you can't get the clog its best to call a professional just because its easy to break a drain line when snakeing long distances and if a plumber breaks it he's responsible to fix it at his own cost