Almost ruined my sink with a DIY dish soap hack I saw on TikTok

I tried that trick where you mix your dish soap with white vinegar in a foaming pump bottle to make it last longer. Seemed harmless enough. After about 3 days I noticed a weird smell coming from my drain and the water was backing up real slow. Turns out the vinegar reacted with some buildup in my pipes and made it worse. I had to pour boiling water and baking soda down there for a week to fix it. My plumber buddy in Phoenix told me straight up that mixing acids with soap can mess with your plumbing seals over time. Now I just use Dawn straight from the bottle and skip the DIY hacks. Anyone else have a cleaning experiment go sideways like this?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_sam27d ago

Did you ever figure out if it was the vinegar or just the buildup reacting? I actually read something a while back about how mixing acids with dish soap can break down the rubber gaskets in your garbage disposal if you have one. It slowly eats away at them and then you get leaks or clogs down the road. I almost tried that same hack but my buddy who does maintenance told me the same thing, just skip the science experiments and use it normal.

king.val27d ago

Oh man, plain hot water and baking soda did the trick for me.

shane_park9227d ago

Man that's actually good to know about the gaskets. I wrecked my old disposal doing something similar with lemon juice and salt. Thought I was being clever cleaning it that way but ended up with a leaky mess under the sink three weeks later. Now I just run ice cubes through it once a month and call it good. Baking soda and hot water is probably fine though since it's not acidic, my grandma swore by that for her old sink drains too.