Replace Your Bathtub Drain

Last week I realized that we needed to replace the bathtub drain; it wouldn't retain enough water to keep Rubber Ducky afloat. I am a whiz at plumbing; simple plumbing that is, for a non-professional. Keeping this in mind, I decided to surprise Mike and do the job while he was redoing someone else's home. The first task was to get the old one out.

Tools and materials necessary:

Screwdrivers

Blanket or thick towel

Pliers

Wrench

Special tool to remove drain flange (optional)

Cheater bar

Remove the Bathtub Stopper.

Protect the floor of the tub. Lay a towel down before you begin. Decide what type of stopper you have. If you have a trip lever-style stopper, you have one of two types. The pop-up style and the plunger style both fall into this category. For the pop-up style, adjust the trip lever until the stopper is at full height. Some of these stoppers pull straight out or wiggle out, while others require that you twist and lift them. When you move the handle on the plunger style, you can't see anything happen. That's because the plunger, or plug, hides in the pipe. Just unscrew the faceplate and pull everything out. If your leak is because the stopper on this is bad, you simply replace the plunger and you're done.

You also could have a stopper without a lever; these include the lift and turn, roller ball or foot lock stopper. The roller ball or foot lock stopper just pushes up and down to hold or release water. You use either a little handle on top to do the job or it has a flat surface so your foot can do the work. Turn these counterclockwise and pull out. The lift and turn stopper is a little trickier. Check under the lip for a setscrew. Loosen the screw and you can remove the stopper.

Pull the Bathtub Strainer

Now you're about to embark on the fun part. Look into the drain for cross bars. At this point, you can use tools created especially for drain removal or make your own at home. If you can't see crossbars then you'll need the special tool.

Go the plumbing supply house, local home improvement store or call them to see if they carry the tool to remove the tub flange if you don't have crossbars in the center. The tool goes in the flange and then spreads so it tightens against the walls and allows you to turn the flange.

You can cheer if your tub has crossbars in the flange because you can use a simple pair of pliers and a tough screwdriver to remove the drain in your tub. Insert the handles of the pliers into the openings left by the crossbar. Put a long thick screwdriver in between the screwdriver handles. Twist the screwdriver so the flange moves counterclockwise to unscrew the flange.

When you run into a difficult drain, stop before you turn blue. Sometimes the plumbers putty and years of corrosion needs more oomph. Try heating the bathtub drain with a hairdryer. Use the power of extra leverage if the screwdriver isn't doing the job. Insert a wrench between the pliers' legs as close as you can get it to the flange. Put a cheater, a 2-foot piece of pipe on the handle of the pipe wrench. The extra leverage gives you more power to break loose any seal the years provided.

Clean the bathtub drain strainer and plug. Scrub the fixtures with baking soda and then submerge in warm vinegar. If nothing else, the bubbling action is fun to watch. This removes most of the lime from the drain and all the gook found in it. If you need a new plug, take the pieces to the hardware, home improvement store or plumber supply house. Even if you're replacing the pieces, clean them first. This makes the threading easier to see and the clerks far more gracious.

Replace the Bathtub Drain Assembly

The simple part is the replacement of everything. Before you put on the new strainer, make a snake of plumbers putty and put it around the underside of the strainer lip. This provides a waterproof seal for the tub drain area. Screw the strainer down into the tub drain.

You simply need to reverse all the steps on reassembly. If you follow all the instructions carefully, and make sure that you use plumbers putty around the strainer basket, Rubber Ducky can take a nice long ride on the bathtub lake.