I have a slow drain in my tub. I use liquid drain cleaners, that work temporarily, but the drain re-clogs within a few days. All the other drains in the house (kitchen, bathroom sink, washer) are fine.

All the plumbing is accessible in the basement. Do I replace the trap? Is there something to keep the drain open?

Please help.

show picture of piping.....

Here are two pictures. Drain connecting to main drain to sewer and the drain from the tub. Thanks.

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Since it's a glued on trap your going to have to snake it from the drain.
Alway try a drain snake before using dangerous, castic chemicals.

At some point consider getting rid of all that old steep pipe.

your problem is between the trap and the wye that old piping is really restricting from age ..as joe mentioned will need to snake line....you could remove fernco fitting after trap and clean it out from there....

Is is possible to snake it all out of there? Or would there be just too much build up over the last 70 years that I'm better off replacing the whole thing?

I guess what I'm asking is, is the reoccurring because of a clog (hair and such), or is it years and years of build up.

its yrs and yrs of build up if you can replace it thats the best thing.. cleaning is only making a hole through the build up.. yes will only last for awhile....ben sr

Likely hair in the pipe. I've had good luck running a small snake down tub overflow and getting a wad out that way.
May be the problem; may not but a bit easier than replacing the mains...

Update: I tried plunging like crazy but that actually made it worse, i was stuck with about three inches of water that wouldnt go down, as in stuck, not just slow. so i snaked the drain today (bought one for $15 at hd) and boy did it do the trick. You should have seen, and smelled, the glob of hair and gunk I pulled out. Water drained immediately. Woohoo!

Using the snake was very easy too. I took out the overflow and stopper assembly, fed the snake down the overflow, twists and turns were very easy to manage, and there you have it.