Drain Unblocking Zwolle

Zwolle and its water: why it affects your drains

Zwolle has always been a city of water. The IJssel flows along its western edge, the Zwarte Water and the Vecht lie to the north, and the old city centre is ringed by a moat. That gives the city its character, but it also has consequences below ground. In the lower-lying parts of the city the groundwater is high, and a sewer that fills up quickly in a heavy downpour has little room to get rid of the water.

For drain unblocking in Zwolle, this means we don't just look at the blockage in the pipe, but also at when the problem occurs. If the shower only drains slowly after a rainy day, the cause is often outside your home. If the water won't go down in dry weather either, the blockage is in your own drain. That's why we always ask on the phone whether it rained heavily that day or the day before.

Sewer unblocking in Zwolle, by type of home

A Hanseatic-era building behaves differently from a 1960s block of flats or a terraced house that's ten years old. So we tailor our approach to the type of home and the district it's in.

Hanseatic buildings inside the city moat

The buildings around the Sassenpoort gate, the Peperbus tower and the Thorbeckegracht have a long history of alterations. Kitchens and bathrooms were added later, sometimes on a floor where a drain was never meant to go. The pipes then run through the floor joists with little fall, and have bends where grease and hair get caught. Here the engineer works with a thin drain snake and a camera, so no floors have to come up.

In the Diezerstraat and around the Grote Markt, the kitchens of cafés and restaurants add to the load. Their grease sets in the cold pipes under the street and gradually builds up into a hard crust. We clean pipes like these with the high-pressure jetter, which restores them to their full bore.

Just outside the moat: Assendorp, Diezerpoort and Kamperpoort

Assendorp lies south of the city centre and Diezerpoort to the east, both with lots of terraced houses from around 1900. To the west is the old working-class neighbourhood of Kamperpoort, where old and renovated buildings stand side by side. The older homes are narrow and deep, with a garden or yard at the back and sometimes a long pipe out to the street. Underground, there are often still vitrified clay pipes whose joints have shifted or sagged over the years. An inspection chamber in the back garden that empties slowly after you flush the toilet is a familiar first sign here.

Flats in Holtenbroek

In the post-war estates on the north side of the city, such as Holtenbroek, many people live stacked above one another. All the kitchens and bathrooms drain into the same soil stack. If grease and soap residue narrow the bottom of the stack, the residents on the ground and first floors are the first to notice: the water comes up in their homes while the neighbours upstairs carry on doing the washing-up.

So when we get a call like this, we ask which floor you live on and whether your neighbours are having problems too. The engineer clears the soil stack from the lowest accessible point, often from a cellar or the storage corridor under the building. Make sure someone can unlock it, and in the meantime ask the upstairs neighbours to use as little water as possible.

Stadshagen and the newer districts

Stadshagen was built in the polder as a Vinex district (a large, centrally planned new-build area), on low ground with lots of ditches and ponds between the houses. The pipes are plastic and easy to reach through inspection chambers. Even so, we regularly get call-outs here, usually because of wet wipes in the toilet or sand and building debris left in the pipe during construction. It's a similar story in Zwolle-Zuid and Westenholte.

When the sewer backs up after a downpour

In a summer cloudburst, more rain falls in a short time than the sewer can handle. In streets with a combined sewer, where rainwater and wastewater are carried away together, water can then flow back up the sewer connection. It surfaces at the lowest point: a shower drain on the ground floor, a floor drain in the utility room or the inspection chamber in the garden. If backflow happens regularly, a non-return valve in the sewer connection can be the answer.

What the engineer checks on site

After heavy rain, the engineer first checks the inspection chamber next to your house. If it's full while the gullies in the street are empty, the blockage is between that chamber and the main sewer. If the chamber is empty but the water indoors still won't drain, the problem is in the pipes inside the house. We confirm this with the camera. So when we're called out for drain unblocking in Zwolle, we don't waste time looking in the wrong place.

Downpipes and gutters in leafy districts

An overflowing downpipe often has a different cause from a full sewer: leaves, moss or a bird's nest in the leaf guard or the bend at the bottom. In the home zones of the Aa-landen and among the trees of Berkum, lots of leaves blow into the gutters every autumn. With downpipe unblocking, we clear the pipe and flush out the drain that runs to the sewer. If the downpipe continues underground, we use the camera to see whether the blockage is down there.

Drain unblocking in Zwolle: from upstairs flats to dishwashers

A few call-outs come up time and again in Zwolle. Here's what's usually going on, and what you can do in the meantime.

An overflowing toilet in an upstairs flat

In buildings split into flats in the city centre and Kamperpoort, the waste pipe from an upstairs flat often takes a long detour on its way down. If the toilet is blocked, don't flush it again, and turn off the isolation valve to the cistern. Put towels around the bowl, because water standing on a wooden floor soon soaks through to the neighbours below. The engineer works with a toilet auger or a small machine and follows the pipe further down if necessary.

A shower drain that's been slow since the renovation

A new walk-in shower or shower channel looks sleek, but sometimes starts draining poorly after just a few months. Often, bits of sealant or tile adhesive were washed down the drain during the work, or the pipe under the floor has too little fall. Hair and soap then get caught more quickly. The engineer takes out the grate and the trap insert, clears the pipe and uses the camera to check whether the fall is right.

A dishwasher that leaves water standing

If water is left at the bottom of the dishwasher after the programme has finished, the appliance isn't always to blame. A dishwasher usually pumps its water out through the trap under the kitchen sink. If that's half blocked with grease and food scraps, the water can't get away. Clean the dishwasher filter first. If that doesn't help, the engineer cleans the trap and the kitchen pipe behind it.

Sewer connection, soil stack and street sewer: who owns what?

If you own a house, you're responsible for the drains indoors and for the pipe on your own property. There's usually an inspection chamber or rodding eye at the property boundary; beyond that point, the sewer generally belongs to the municipality. Exactly how this works varies from one municipality to another. In a block of flats like those in Holtenbroek, the soil stack and the collector pipe are usually a matter for the VvE or the landlord. Afterwards, the engineer tells you what they found, so you can report it to the right people.

A drain unblocking service for the whole of Zwolle

As a drain unblocking company, we handle every kind of blocked drain in Zwolle. These are the jobs that come up most often:

• Blocked or overflowing toilet: we use a toilet auger or a small machine for toilet unblocking.
• A shower or bath that won't drain: shower drain unblocking, including removing hair from the drain.
• Roots, silt or sand in the outside pipe: sewer cleaning with the high-pressure jetter.
• Problems that keep coming back: a camera inspection of the sewer shows whether there's a fracture or subsidence.

Drain unblocking in Zwolle: how to reach us, estimates and rates

Day or night, someone always answers 085 333 4698. Tell us which drain is blocked and what you've already tried, and you'll get an assessment and a price estimate. Once you agree, Afvoer Ontstoppen sends a specialist, who is usually with you within the hour.

Our unblocking prices start from €129, call-out charge not included. If you call in the evening, at night or at the weekend, we charge an out-of-hours rate. For a bigger job, such as cleaning and inspecting an entire outside pipe, you can ask for a quote. You get a price estimate up front, and the decision is yours. Our customers rate us 5/5 based on 48 Google reviews.

What you can do while you wait

If the toilet is blocked and the water level is high, turn off the valve to the cistern and don't flush again. Under a washbasin, you can unscrew the trap over a bucket; you'll often find a clump of hair or soap residue right there. Put towels down by an overflowing shower drain and make sure the engineer can get to the inspection chamber easily.

Want to stop it happening again? Don't pour fat down the sink, use a hair catcher in the shower and only flush toilet paper. Clean the gutters in the autumn, because in a green city like Zwolle, plenty of leaves end up in the downpipes.

Around Zwolle

Afvoer Ontstoppen works throughout the Netherlands. A number of cities in the east, north and centre of the country have their own page: you can call us in Enschede and Apeldoorn, further north in Groningen, and in Flevoland in Almere. To the south-west, we cover Amersfoort. You'll find an overview of all the cities with their own page under our service area.

Got a blockage right now? Call 085 333 4698 for drain unblocking in Zwolle. We're available 24/7 and will send an engineer as quickly as possible.