Because women are the only ones who clean drains?!?!

I have chin length hair, and a lot of it. I must lift the square of shower floor material and remove my hair in the 4 x 4 square drain after every other shower. I will leave the cover off and let the area dry out after I wipe it clean of any other gunk or lint that made it to the drain. Hubby has little hair, kept short, so I don’t think he needs to do this. He also showers at the gym 6 days a week, so only uses our shower on Fridays.
Mine is a 3 x 5 ft solid surface shower pan with a drain at the front edge.

Thank you. I have read linear drains have to be kept clean. But so does everything in a bathroom. And yes most times cleaning is left to us ladies.

Following! I love the look of a linear drain and the elimination of a trip hazard in the morning for shower time! That said, I worry I would forget to clean the drain and water would spill into the rest of the bathroom.

Linear drains "dump" into a traditional, conventional 2' pipe....just like any other drain. You simply remove the "grid" and clean the pipe as usual. Easy-peasy.....

What sort of cover will you have on your linear drain? If you do the tile one, then you will have the "hair catch" grid underneath it. Otherwise you can do the ones that have the " catch" the whole length of the drain - then it is no different than a regular shower drain....

Linear drains and tile insert drains are the worst for the purpose of cleaning, they look great and most function well.

our linear drains have a grate that lifts off, as nd a little perforated bucket that sits in the center of the trough to catch hair. I have long hair. I clean it about once a week. not a big deal.

I hate the cleaning of the linear drain and am trying to figure out if it was installed incorrectly. I rarely got a clog in the old shower floor with center drain. My linear drain has a tiny basket that clogs easily. And when I remove the long tile cover there is still soap and shampoo residue that looks disgusting. Does anyone have any suggestions why we may be having more trouble than other people on this thread? I wonder if I had a metal grate instead of tile would that help. Also there is no metal anywhere on shower floor. I notice the photo above the tanish shade tile has a metal rim outlining tile then a space between that and the tile drain cover. Would that help? Would love to know some terms to come back to my installer about when he finally calls me back. Big Thanks!!

Maybe the problem is that you are using soap. It makes soap scum on surfaces and it can leave more residue in a drain trough. Try switching to liquid body wash. No soap residue, maybe less gunk? All of the metal linear drains that I have seen are pre-molded and the bottom slopes to the center drain. If the top of it is level, then it should drain as intended. You can check the level yourself by getting a 3 or 4 ft level and holding it on the top edge of the metal trough. If the drain is installed correctly, it will be level.

My trough drain hardly gets any water, since my shower pan was made to drain to the 4" drain next to the trough and the little dam molded into the surface of my shower pan directs the water to the center. In my case, the trough is really a back-up. When I take off the cover over the 4" drain, there is a little scummy water, along with the hair I am there to remove. I use a wad of TP to wipe the surface clean, then let it dry with the drain cover off so that I do not get any mold or mildew growing in the drain. I get lint and crumby bits out of there sometimes, too.

Nancyinmich, I like using soap. I don't have a linear drain (yet), but we were contemplating getting one for our master bath redo. If I can't use soap daily, then a linear drain is not for me.

Most bar soap uses animal fat as fillers. You can imagine how this can clog a drain. The only exception I can think of is Dove. Aside that, a liquid, neutral PH soap is the best thing to use in a shower.........

It has nothing to do with it being a linear drain, really. Soap and soap scum are good for gumming up shower walls, glass and drains. The only difference is that the sloping bottom of a linear drain might hold onto the gunk. Gail G was complaining about this gunk and I was just trying to explain where it is coming from.

I find the mechanics of it to be at fault. With a regular circular center drain I had to may once a year deal with gunk. With this linear drain it monthly and gross! Do you all keep the small strainer basket in place?

yes, of course. if I have to clean the basket/bucket, its not s big deal. clogged drains are a really big deal.

I clean the little basket when I clean the shower... just a little extra time. An extra minute or two?
I personally love the linear drain.

Mine has no basket. I could not find one when I needed it. So I just have a grid underneath the plastic cover that my hair catches on and I take off the cover and grab the hair.

We always had a hair catcher on the tub drain before, anyhow. It would get all mildewed underneath (since I can't use chemicals to clean because of my lungs) and so this is much nicer than dealing with that.

if I remember correctly, the little hair basket was an extra charge...
glad you found a workaround. I can sympathize with the chemical issue. I have some issues as well, but my sister can't be around most household chemicals, at all. its dangerous for her. please be careful.

Oliviag, I bought the Force of Nature system. It uses tap water and little ampules filled with salt and vinegar. Then the bottle it is mixed in hooks up to an electric powered base and the machine changes those ingredients into electrolyzsed water. It is a combination of hypochloric acid and sodium hydroxide. This is a disinfectant that kills germs, mold mildew and viruses. It is also a surfactant, which cuts through grime. It is not a smelly combination (I can't use ammonia or bleach or most cleaners because it sets off my asthma). It smells like the air at a chlorine pool. Each ampule makes a 12 oz bottle, and you can make as many as you need each day, each takes 6 minutes. The electrolyzed water does not hurt your skin and it leaves no residue to be rinsed off. The water in the bottle is good for two weeks, as it degrades over time. I got the kit with the base, bottle, and spray bottle and 5 ampules for about $60, plus $19 for 25 more ampules. I used to clean with vinegar and water. This does work better. It made mopping the floor so easy! Force of Nature site

Thank you to everyone who commented! we have decided to go with the traditional center drain. I will be posting pictures of our master bath soon as it is complete.

My builder suggested a linear drain and and I decided against it. A small 3" round metal drain cover compared to the linear drain of several feet of metal to keep clean was a no brainer for me.

Yes. We had both drains available and our installer chose the center drain. I have long hair and I do my best to keep it from clogging drains. In our new home remodel my husband tore out all drains and replaced with 8". He didn't think it would be an issue with keeping it clean and the center drain looks good. Turns out the tile I chose a small mozaic slate for the floor was a very rough cut and wouldnt have worked well on the linear tile over drain. I had purchaes it on Amazon. I was quite surprised at how well built it was. Better price than our home improvement store price.

Linear drains are awesome when its a barrier free/curbless entree. Other then that, it's just a high maintenance accessory.

From personal experience, having a linear drain installed and having been used to center drains before that:

• center drain is a whole lot less to maintain, especially with a good drain cover (small holes) to prevent hair going in drain, no cleaning of the drain area itself needed besides the cover. no clogs either if hair doesn't really get into the drain.
• residue builds up in the linear drain that needs periodic cleaning, some scrubbing will generally do, but caked on grime may require Tilex/bleach/baking soda/hydrogen peroxide to help clean. Some red mold also can build up, again scrubbing and Tilex/bleach will take care of it.
• fully/truly cleaning the strainer hair catcher basket in terms of squeaky clean requires a lot of work, easy if u just want to remove hair and minor gunk off the basket. Truly cleaning basket squeaky clean requires methods like strubbing with brush and soaking in hydrogen peroxide to get the remaining grime to come off and have it looking like "new" again. With center drain, never had to deal with this cleaning mess.
• no clogs or no clogs for quite some time if hair catcher basket cleaned regularly, if it overfills, or maybe over time even with cleaning/hair removal, some hair still slips through into drain, so you may have to de-clog drain from rare time to time. So far in 2 years, I only had to de-clog the drain once for a partial slow draining clog, it might have been related to forgetting to clean hair catcher basket for some time once because of my knee injury - either that or some hair slips through from time to time to eventually have the slow draining clog.
• aside from a real drain clog in the drain pipe, linear drain won't clog in terms of drainage if the hair catcher has hair in it unless it is full of a lot of hair. Surprisingly, it still drains pretty well with quite some hair in it. We generally clean out the hair catcher like every 2 days to every week.

Also wanted to mention with center drains, today, there are also infinity drains that mount as center drains, it's a recessed square area above the drain pipe, below your tiles, optionally with a hair catcher basket in some designs. The linear drain is just one type of infinity drain. I don't think I've seen a center infinity drain that's circular, it's always square center drain recessed design. I wouldn't recommend this (center infinity drain) either based on my experience with linear drain, as I suspect it is also a pain to maintain compared to a traditional center drain with just a drain cover.

Have the infinity linear drain with tile insert and would not recommend for all the reasons noted above. Only way to keep it from not getting mucky and moldy is to not use any type of thick shampoo/conditioner or shaving cream in the shower. Only when using a light liquid soap as body wash/shampoo like Dr. Bronners does the linear drain stay muck free.