Mike Barnes wrote:
The Medway Handyman :
Asked to sort out a blocked downpipe on a hotel today. Cast iron
pipe coming down from roof into a hopper, then a smaller diameter
pipe down to the ground.

Piggin plastic drinks bottle had somehow entered the top pipe at
roof level & become jammed in the hopper. Top of the bottle was
inside the top pipe, bottom wouldn't go any further into the lower
pipe.

Spent half an hour prodding, hacking, pulling to no avail. Finally
managed to get a piece of string around the neck & attacked the
bottle with a hot air paint stripper gun. After a few mins it
started to buckle & shrink the point where I could pull it out.

Lost your angle grinder?

That was on the list of possibilities :-) I did consider cutting a bit off
the upper pipe so I could free the neck of the bottle. Typically the
blocked gully was right above the hotel main entrance, so it had to be
sorted.


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk