Drain Unblocking Zaandam

Living on peat: why Zaandam's sewers need extra attention

The Zaan region is built on peat, which is soft, waterlogged and slowly compacts. Houses are built on piles and stay where they are, but streets, gardens and pavements sink with the ground over the years. That matters a great deal for drain unblocking in Zaandam, because many blockages start exactly where the house meets the street.

A house that stays put, a street that sinks

The sewer connection runs from the front of your house to the sewer under the road. If the street sinks and the house doesn't, that pipe comes under strain. Over time, a kink can form close to the wall of the house, a joint can come loose or a section of pipe can start to sag. Water then sits at the lowest point and dirt settles in it. In a case like that, the blockage you notice indoors is really a symptom of a sunken pipe outside.

Because the ground keeps sinking, streets in peat areas are raised every so often. The section of pipe under your own garden doesn't automatically rise with them. After a few years, there's a difference in height again, and the kink moves to the point where the garden meets the pavement.

Downpours and a single sewer for rain and waste water

Heavy rain adds another factor. In the older parts of Zaandam, rainwater and waste water often flow into the same sewer. If a lot of rain falls in a short time, that sewer can fill up, and the water is forced back to the lowest point it can find: a floor drain, a shower drain or the garden drain. If your sewer connection is already partly blocked or sagging, you'll notice it before your neighbours do.

Drain unblocking in Zaandam by type of home

Zaandam is a city of contrasts. Centuries-old dyke houses stand a few minutes away from 1960s flats and new builds from this century. Each type of home has its own weak spots, and anyone who unblocks drains here regularly soon learns to recognise them.

Wooden houses along the Zaan

Along the Oostzijde and the Westzijde, and in Het Kalf, there are still many old Zaan houses. Toilets, basins and showers were added over time to buildings that were never designed for them. Drains run through cramped, damp crawl spaces and take quite a few bends along the way, which gives hair, soap residue and grease every chance to get caught. On top of that, the sewer connections here have often been in the ground for a very long time, which increases the risk of subsidence or a loose joint.

Rosmolenwijk and Kogerveld

The Rosmolenwijk has older terraced houses on narrow streets, with sewer connections that have been lying in the soft ground for many years. In Kogerveld, terraced houses and flats from different periods stand side by side, so there's a mixture of old and newer pipes underground. Where an old section has been joined to a new one, subsidence can easily create a small ridge, and paper snags on it.

Walk-up and deck-access flats in Zaandam-Oost

Poelenburg, Peldersveld and Hoornseveld have many blocks of flats from the post-war years. Flats stacked on top of one another drain into the same soil stack. If someone on the fourth floor flushes wet wipes or cat litter, the neighbour downstairs may see their toilet fill up. The kitchen drains in these blocks are often thick with grease after decades of use, so the sink empties more and more slowly.

Flats in and around Inverdan

The redeveloped centre around the station has lots of flats above shops, restaurants and cafés. The pipes are newer, but long horizontal drains in blocks of flats have little fall, and grease from restaurant kitchens builds up even in new pipes. Here we mainly see blockages in kitchen drains and collector pipes.

Westerwatering: gardens by the water

Westerwatering has lots of family homes with gardens, and there's a striking amount of water between the houses. Garden drains and yard gullies here discharge into the sewer through a garden pipe. If sand, leaves or soil wash into it, that pipe gradually silts up. In a heavy shower, the drain is then full to the brim within minutes. A gully with a silt trap that you empty out yourself every now and then prevents a lot of these call-outs.

Sewer unblocking in Zaandam: who is responsible for which section?

If you have a blocked sewer at a point where the pipe has subsided, sewer unblocking in Zaandam raises a question sooner or later: who is responsible? On peat, where subsidence is more common than elsewhere, that question is far from theoretical.

Garden or pavement: where is the kink?

The part of the connection on your own property is generally your own responsibility. The section under the public road usually falls to the municipality. The municipality of Zaanstad can tell you exactly where the boundary lies at your address. With a camera inspection, we show precisely where a problem is, so you have the footage to prove whether the kink is under your garden or under the pavement.

A shared soil stack in a block of flats

If the blockage is in the soil stack shared by a whole stairwell of flats, it isn't just one household's problem. In a rented flat, the landlord needs to know about it, even if we've already cleared the pipe on an emergency call-out. If you own your flat, the VvE (owners' association) is the point of contact for everything that's shared. We first clear the drain in your home and, if necessary, the section it connects to.

Raising the garden? Have the pipe checked first

If you live on peat, you'll often need to raise your garden after a number of years. Extra soil means extra weight on the pipe below, which can make it sink further. Inspection chambers and rodding eyes also sometimes disappear under the new layer, so they can't be found when a blockage strikes. Have the garden pipe checked with a camera before you raise the garden, and keep the inspection chambers accessible at the new level.

Drain unblocking in Zaandam: smells, gurgling and a full sink

The drain smells, but everything still drains away

In a house with a crawl space, sewer smells often come from under the floor. A trap that has dried out, for example under a washbasin that's rarely used, lets the smell straight through. First, run some water down every drain. If the smell lingers, a joint in the crawl space may have come loose, or a section of pipe may be sagging with standing water in it. The engineer can spot that quickly with a torch or a camera.

A toilet that gurgles in strong wind

On windy days, the toilet in some houses gurgles even though nobody has flushed it. Wind blowing across the vent pipe on the roof creates pressure differences in the drain. If that vent is partly blocked by a bird's nest or leaves, or the pipe further along is half blocked, the effect gets stronger and can even suck the water seal out of the bowl. Unblocking the drain and clearing the vent usually solves it. If the toilet has become blocked, don't flush it again until the engineer arrives.

A sink that won't empty after cooking

In the flats of Poelenburg and Peldersveld, where kitchen drains have been handling grease for decades, you often notice it in the evening, just after cooking and washing up. The water no longer drains away and smells sour. Scoop as much water out of the sink as you can, unscrew the trap over a bucket and see whether the blockage is there. If it's further down, you'll need our kitchen sink unblocking service: a rotating drain snake scrapes the layer of grease off the pipe wall all the way to the soil stack.

How we tackle a blocked drain in Zaandam

It all starts with a call to 085 333 4698. We ask what's going on: which drain is blocked, whether the water is still draining away slowly and whether water is coming up anywhere else in the house. You then get an assessment and a price estimate straight away. As a drain unblocking company in Zaandam, we only get to work once you've heard the price estimate and agreed to it.

The engineer who comes out is usually with you within the hour. They first work out where the blockage is, and only then choose their tools. Afterwards, they let the water run for a while and tell you what caused the problem. If they see signs of subsidence, they'll tell you that too, so you can decide for yourself whether you want it looked into further.

The right tools for every pipe

A blocked trap or a toilet that won't flush properly can often be sorted with a plunger or a hand-held drain snake. If the blockage is deeper, we use an electric drain machine with a long, rotating cable. For sewer connections full of silt, grease or sediment, we use high-pressure sewer cleaning. On peat, a drain camera inspection is often the logical next step: it shows whether the pipe is sagging, kinked or has come loose at the house wall. You can read more about how we work as a drain unblocking service on our service page.

Price estimate up front, in Zaandam too

What does drain unblocking in Zaandam cost? Unblocking starts at €129, call-out charge not included. If you call in the evening, at night, at the weekend or on a public holiday, an out-of-hours rate applies. For jobs whose scope is hard to judge in advance, such as a sunken sewer connection that needs cleaning and inspecting, you can ask for a quote. Whatever the job, you'll hear the estimate before the engineer starts. Customers rate us 5/5 based on 48 Google reviews.

How to keep your drains clear for longer

Many of the blockages we see in Zaandam can be prevented. A few habits make a big difference:

• Don't pour frying fat or cooking fat down the sink; let it set and put it in the general waste.
• Only flush toilet paper; wet wipes, cat litter and kitchen roll belong in the bin.
• Put a strainer over the shower drain and clean it regularly.
• Keep the garden drain and the grate under the downpipe clear of leaves and sand.

If your drain starts running slowly again within a few months of being unblocked, on peat that's often a sign of subsidence, so have the pipe inspected. That way, a small kink won't turn into a broken pipe under your garden.

From the Zaan region to Almere

As well as Zaandam, we work in the rest of Zaanstad and throughout the Netherlands. Across the IJ, we're active in Amsterdam, and towards the coast in Haarlem. You can also call us in Hoofddorp and the rest of the Haarlemmermeer, as well as in Almere on the other side of the IJmeer. You'll find a selection of places with their own page in the overview of our locations.

Dealing with a blocked drain right now? Call 085 333 4698. We're available for drain unblocking in Zaandam around the clock.