Nobody has improved on the plunger, and plenty have tried

Quick answer: Use a flat-bottom cup plunger on sinks, tubs and showers. Use a flange plunger on toilets. Keep the two separate, and don't plunge a drain you've just poured chemical cleaner into.

The inductee

Ladies and gentlemen, please stand. Tonight the Garage Hall of Fame welcomes a tool with no battery, no cord, no app and no moving parts. A rubber cup on a stick.

Its job description hasn't changed in generations. Somebody's toilet is filling toward the rim at 11 p.m., the plumber's phone is going to voicemail, and the plunger is standing in the corner of the bathroom like a goalie. It asks for nothing and it's ready.

I won't hand you an invented date or inventor for the first one. What's safe to say is that the basic design, a flexible rubber cup fixed to a handle, has been doing this work for well over a century. Nothing since has beaten it at the one thing it does.

Why it has never been improved on

Physics, plainly. Water doesn't compress. Air does.

Seat the cup over a drain so it seals, and you've trapped a column of water between the cup and the clog. Push down and that water has nowhere to go but through the pipe, so the pressure shoves against the blockage. Pull up and the pressure drops, which tugs the blockage back the other way. Push, pull, push, pull. A clog that won't survive a single shove often gives up after a dozen alternating ones.

Two details separate people who plunge well from people who just splash.

Cover the cup with water. If the cup is sitting in air, you're compressing air and doing nothing to the clog. In a sink, run a few inches of water in. In a toilet, make sure the bowl has enough to submerge the cup.

Make the first push a gentle one. The cup is full of air when you seat it. Shove hard and that air burps out around the rim, and sometimes it takes dirty water with it. Push slowly to push the air out, then work in steady, firm strokes. Fifteen or twenty is a fair first round before you check progress.

The two shapes matter too. A cup plunger has a flat rim and seals against a flat surface like a sink or tub floor. A flange plunger has an extra soft rubber sleeve below the cup. That sleeve fits into the toilet's curved outlet, and the fit is what makes the seal. Use a flat cup on a toilet and you'll mostly wave water around.

Safety, before the first stroke:

• Wear rubber gloves and old shoes, and put a towel down.
• If a toilet is rising toward the rim, reach behind it and turn the supply valve clockwise to stop more water coming in.
• On a double kitchen sink, block the other drain with a wet rag. Otherwise your pressure goes out the wrong side.
• If you've recently poured chemical drain cleaner into the fixture, stop. Splashback from that water can burn skin and eyes. Read the product label, and call a plumber if you're unsure what's in the pipe.

What the "improved" versions got wrong

Fairness first. Some of the new ideas aren't stupid. They're just solving a problem that a ten-dollar-class tool already solved.

The accordion plunger. Ribbed plastic that looks like a bellows. The pitch is more force per stroke. The trade-off is that hard plastic doesn't conform to a drain the way soft rubber does, and a plunger that doesn't seal is a stick. Look closely at the folds on any you're considering and ask yourself how many seasons of flexing they'll take.

The air-burst or pressurized toilet plunger. A pump or cartridge fires a pulse of air at the clog. Some people swear by them. They also add a pump, seals and sometimes a power source or canister, which are all things that can fail on the one night you need them. The cup-and-stick has nothing to fail.

The tiny plunger in the toilet-brush caddy. It comes free with the brush, so you get what you paid for. If the cup is small, the sleeve is thin or the handle is flimsy, you'll feel it in your wrist by stroke eight.

Chemical drain openers. Not a plunger design, but they sell themselves as the plunger's replacement. They're hard on some pipes, dangerous to splash, and they leave a bad situation behind for the next person with a plunger or snake. Plunge first. If it doesn't work, the next step is a drain snake. Our walkthrough on unclogging a drain with a plunger, a snake and ten minutes covers that order.

Buying one that lasts

A plunger isn't forged or cast, so the usual rules change. Look for these things instead.

• Rubber, not stiff plastic. The cup should be soft enough that you can press it flat with your hand and watch it spring back. Cheap, hard cups crack at the rim and won't seal on a worn tub.
• Thickness at the rim. Thin, papery edges tear. Check the cup lip and the flange sleeve, where the wear happens.
• A real flange for toilets. The sleeve should fold out and back in again without cracking. Fold it and look.
• How the head is fixed. This is the weak point. See whether the cup is molded onto the handle, screwed on or just pushed over a peg. A pushed-on head can pop off at the worst moment. Pull on it in the store, hard.
• Handle material. Wood is comfortable and tough but can swell and rot if it's stored wet. Plastic is fine and won't rot. Metal is strongest and coldest in the hand. Pick the one that feels solid, with no flex when you lean on it.
• Size against your drains. The cup needs to cover the drain opening completely. Measure your tub and sink drains before you buy.

Price? Check the current price. It's among the least expensive tools you'll ever own, which means paying for the thicker rubber and better-fixed head is the easiest upgrade in the garage.

I'm not naming a model, because I'm not going to vouch for one I haven't verified. Read the one-year-later owner reviews and look for two complaints: heads that came off and rubber that cracked. That tells you more than any box.

Buy two. One for toilets, one for everything else, and don't mix them up.

Keeping it for the next generation

Care is five minutes, and it's mostly respect for the next person who touches it.

Rinse it in a utility sink or tub after each use. Then disinfect it with a household cleaner, following the label, and rinse again. Don't mix cleaners, ever. Let it dry upside down so the cup holds its shape and doesn't stay wet against the handle.

Store it hanging or in a caddy, with nothing leaning on the cup. A rubber cup left folded under weight takes a set, and a bent rim won't seal.

Then the old rule. When a neighbor borrows it, and one will, it comes back rinsed and disinfected. If you're the one borrowing, return it cleaner than it left, with something small in return. A six-pack of soda or a loaf of bread says thanks without a speech.

And when your son moves into his first apartment, the plunger goes in the box with the toolkit. A well-made one will still be sealing drains when he hands it to his own boy.

If one plunger won't clear it, and the tub, the toilet and the sink are all backing up at once, stop. That points to a main line problem, which is a job for a licensed plumber. Codes and permit rules vary by area, so ask yours before you start cutting into anything. But for the first move on any clog, the plunger gets the call.