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Old cast iron drain pipes, Muriatic Acid, or?

E

earlschieb

Member
Got some 60 year old cast iron drain pipes, hard to get to, I have ran a snake down them many times, and they open for a month or so. The snake comes back out full of rust, I can look in the clean out, in the garage floor when I run water after running the snake, and it will be full of rust.

So, can I use Muriatic acid, to do this clean out? My neighbors are saying to use white vinegar, or peroxide. I have used just about every normal over the counter, drain cleaner, on these with no luck.
 
Muratic acid is the ticket on cast iron. We bought the sewer plant at the WW2 prisoner of war camp in Orchard Park, NM in the '70s and cleaned all the big cast gate valves in drums of muratic. After 30 years full of crud and rusted, they cleaned up like new.
 
+1 to what Kip said.

Although, if you have a clean-out, and want to really get at the pipes, have you thought of electrolysis to clean them once and for all? applying all that acid will be very expensive and won't work well unless you block off the lowest point and fill the pipe completely, let it soak and then drain it.

Instead of that, you could block off at teh lowest point, fill the pipes with lye and water (draino powder is almost 100% lye) and then put an electrode, like a piece of iron bar in the middle of the pipe at one end (don't let it touch teh side walls. Then, hook up a battery charger and the electric current will flake all teh rust off for you.

Interested? I could explain more if it is something you would consider.
 
I work in a municipal wastewater system for the past 20 years and deal with a lot of clogged pipes from 20 inches to 1 inch and I have found that using a snake is just a tempory fix.Call a Roto-Rotter co.Use a flusher with very high pressure,it will clean every thing from roots to rust.We just desolved a ground hog that was stuck in a 3 in line.The price might seem high but aggravation is expensive also.Its worth at least a phone call to talk to a professionial

jimmy
 
What I would do is just cut a section out and replace it with PVC.
Use a slitting wheel on an angle grinder to cut the cast iron. Buy Mission couplings to connect the plastic to the cast. Use the purple primer then the glue to glue the fittings together.
You can look at what is there and buy the same parts in PVC.
Very easy to do and will last another 60 years.

3033.jpg
 
I can not get to the drain pipe without tearing out my whole bathroom, and bathroom floor. Otherwise, it would already be PVC pipe, that is on the, 'To Do' list sometime next spring.
 
I can not get to it to do that. Going to put in new PVC next spring, but I need it to be cleaned out enough to use for this winter.
 
It is south of Roswell, close to Dexter. Camp there had German prisoners. We bought the salvage rights from the landowner for the sewage treatment plant for $1. He wanted it removed.

Saw on the news that your lake is being searched again for missing women.
 
I have read everywhere not to use Muriatic acid on cast iron pipes, have you already done this and how has it been working for you?
 
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