Advice request: How to remove a 1 1/4" cable with Ridgid K-1500

595 Views 5 Replies 4 Participants Last post by Javiles, Apr 26, 2020

Bruce0909

Discussion Starter · Apr 23, 2020

Hi -I have a Ridgid K-1500 to clean out my house's main line. 1 1/4" cable. I realize this is probably the issue (that i should use a 5/8" at most), but here's my question: I'm going into a vent stack through a large removable cap on the side (so 90 degree bend), and about 6 feet down, there's another 90 into the main drain. That connection is not a smooth curve...it's a hard 90. I was able to make the turn on the way in, and run the cable to the city's sewer. Pulling it out, though, was epic, and I'm convinced that the resistance was the 90 into the main line.

I was running the machine in 'forward' and pulsed the rotation on for a few seconds, then pull about 6 inches, rinse and repeat. I didn't pull out anything significant, so it wasn't resistance from a root ball...

Is there something basic i'm doing wrong? (other than probably using too big of a cable)?

- One potential solution I considered was feeding the cable into the main line and then sending down a flexible sleeve, similar to the one that's attached to the back of the 1500. Is this done? If so, what do people use?

Thanks for reading...looking forward to any thoughts, tips, or tricks you might have!

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Missouri Bound

· #2 · Apr 23, 2020

you can run your device through any pipe you can access.
You may want to downsize a bit. Until you know the exact layout of your plumbing you will have to just guess and experiment.
I do have a memory as a child when my parents called a plumber to clean out their drain. He had a powered auger, huge device and he removed the toilet and went at it.
Even at my young age I had a good laugh when I saw his auger tip whipping around on the roof through the vent stack. He didn't like it when a kid pointed it out to him.

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Bruce0909

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 23, 2020

Missouri Bound said:
you can run your device through any pipe you can access.
You may want to downsize a bit. Until you know the exact layout of your plumbing you will have to just guess and experiment.
I do have a memory as a child when my parents called a plumber to clean out their drain. He had a powered auger, huge device and he removed the toilet and went at it.
Even at my young age I had a good laugh when I saw his auger tip whipping around on the roof through the vent stack. He didn't like it when a kid pointed it out to him.

Thanks for the reply. The layout: ~6 feet down in PVC to a 90. Whether I go through the toilet line (it's a few feet lower, 4 feet to the drain) or the vent pipe, I have to sit facing west, and the main line runs north. The vertical pipes are PVC and link to PVC at the 90, which continues as PVC for about 3 feet - all 4" diameter. At about 3 feet horizontal, the PVC couples to cast iron - also about 4" diameter.

Unfortunately, the 90 at the base of the vent stack and toilet line are not J-shaped, they're T's. This is the issue, as I see it, and I very much want to keep from damaging that T when retrieving the cable. If you have any thoughts or tricks, please let me know.

Thank you --

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TheEplumber

· #4 · Apr 23, 2020

Shops I worked at never went bigger than 7/8 cable. And we usually pulled them back by hand and manually fed it into the drum while in reverse. Also, consider turning on a faucet after the line is open. This will wet the pipe wall and move solids away while retrieving cable
Hope you are wearing proper PPE...

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Bruce0909

Discussion Starter · #5 · Apr 23, 2020

TheEplumber said:
Shops I worked at never went bigger than 7/8 cable. And we usually pulled them back by hand and manually fed it into the drum while in reverse. Also, consider turning on a faucet after the line is open. This will wet the pipe wall and move solids away while retrieving cable
Hope you are wearing proper PPE...

Thank you for the reply - Yes, wearing a metal rivet covered Ridgid mit and safety glasses. Kept the exposed line to less than 2 feet - probably more like 18 inches. I ran a hose into the pipe, so there was a lot of water running through the line.

The K-1500 does not auto feed or retract. It's all manual. When in forward or reverse mode, it just rotates the cable clockwise or counter clockwise, respectively. I am considering trading it in for an auto-feed machine with a smaller cable (5/8 or 3/4" at most), but still don't quite understand why the cable kept getting stuck every 6 inches as i was pulling it out - or how to keep that from happening.

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Javiles

· #6 · Apr 26, 2020

Cables to Big the coupler ends on the sectional cable get caught on the bens as the coupler don't bend
that machine is not for what your using it for.

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