Help! Horrifically stinky shower drain!

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Hi everyone - woke up yesterday, went into the bathroom, horrendous smell emanating from the shower drain. Bought some drain unblocker and used it last night as per instructions, thinking it would clear any smelly cloggy stuff, but this morning it's just as bad if not worse.

It's AWFUL. What can I do?

Can it be removed to be cleaned? I have to regularly remove and clean my shower plug hole

I always found Mr Muscle drain unblocker useless, I bought some Buster bathroom (blue lid) and you pour the whole bottle down, leave it for a few hours and it dissolves hair/sludge and breaks down anything stuck in there. It works an absolute treat and got rid of the smell too. Probably not good for the environment, but then again I couldn’t deal with the smell and standing in dirty shower water for a minute longer!

Asda have it for £2.50 at the moment

There were a load of threads a while back about using Veet or similar to dissolve hair in the plughole .

IirC, very hot water and soda crystals to degrease then the Veet.

I bought some of the plastic hair-traps ( 4 of us in the house) it needs emptied every time the shower is used though, I think DH and DS are Yetis .

Right, I'll try some Buster - sounds cheaper than the Veet option, and then if that doesn't work I have more money for a plumber!

It's not blocked, but it smells like something has died down there 😫

Thanks folks!

Drains have traps that prevent smells coming back into a bathroom. I think you might need a plumber. Also do what others have said.

I reckon the trap is loose - pull it out, clean it and put it back in really tight

Pour a dose of zoflora into it if you have any?

Loose trap. Pour some water down the drain after each use. If the drainage is also connected to a toilet the trap water gets sucked out when the main drain gets a bit clogged up with hair, soap and toilet paper, you flush the loo and it makes a big sucking noise which also dislodges the shower trap water so smells come back up until the water is replenished. Pur some water into the trap before bed.

Spirits of Salts. Do not inhale it. Pour a good drop into the hole, if it is a small bottle use about a third - half and leave it in for an hour or so, then run hot water for a while to clear it.

Do all your drains and toilets at the same time. It shifts pretty much anything in the way of build up.

I think it was the trap! Passed all your messages onto DH and he . . . did something 😆 . . . and now the smell has gone away!

Thank you, everyone - we're trying to save cash at the minute so it's a relief not to have to call a plumber out!

Ask your dh what he did; would be useful to know ( save someone else some plumbing Costs)

Yes, share what your DH did please, it'll be useful for others...Glad you got it sorted.

I asked him, and he said (as PPs suggested) that water sits in the p-trap which stops smells coming back out, and as we never use the bidet (whole other thread - should we?! 😄) he figured that the water must have dried up. So he ran the bidet for a while and voila - problem solved.

I THINK that's what he did. My eyes glazed over a little bit.

Use the HG drain unblocker - fab stuff and really cleans out shower drains.

I get called out to a few of these issues and 99% of the time the issue is the shower waste / trap. After taking it apart to clean its important to make sure it goes back together correctly. It's usually the case that the waste fitting isn't pushed down far enough. Not dying this allows hazardous smelly gasses from the drain into your house.

Hi @Pavlouplumbers - definitely seems to have been the trap as you described because it seems to be totally resolved now, which is a relief!

Thanks for responding, everyone.