Things You May Not Know About Your Garbage Disposal

The garbage disposal is a good friend to have in your home kitchen. Maybe better than some of the finest books you can purchase on the culinary arts. You may not think of the sink disposal as a friend, but when you stop to consider the conveniences—and how much more work kitchen clean-up would be without it—you can see why it’s so important to have the disposal around.

The garbage disposal in Clovis, NM is one of our areas of expertise. We install them, replace them, and repair them, so we know quite a bit about their secrets. We’d like to share a few things you may not have known about the garbage disposal. These facts can help you take good care of your kitchen sink disposal and make sure it works for many years to come.

Disposals Help With Sewer System Management

The invention of the garbage disposal was to help stop food clogging the municipal sewer system. That’s right: homeowner convenience wasn’t the original reason for coming up with a food grinder attached to the kitchen sink drain pipe. A disposal changes food waste into smaller particles so it slips down into the sewer system without creating clogs. There were early concerns in some cities that disposals might encourage too much organic waste to enter the sewer system. Today, garbage disposals are recognized as a good way to keep this extra waste out of landfills, instead of sending it into the water waste treatment system.

Disposals Don’t Have Blades in Them

This surprises people—but we doubt many of them attempted to find out if there were blades in there by testing with their hands. (A good safety instinct!) Rather than blades, a disposal contains blunt impellers. These impellers spin to throw food waste into a grind ring around the outer perimeter of the hopper. This grinds the food down so it can go into the drainpipe.

Disposals Can’t Handle All Food Waste

This is one of the most vital facts to know about your garbage disposal if you didn’t already know it. A disposal cannot grind organic waste that’s too tough to chew. Do this simple test: if your teeth can’t chew something, your disposal can’t “chew” it either. This means chicken bones, fruit pits, and un-popped popcorn kernels should go down the disposal. Other foods to keep out of the disposal include stringy foods like asparagus, fibrous foods like onion skins, and pasta and rice, which swell up with water to create clogging.

You Can Deodorize the Disposal

If your disposal is smelling a bit rank, you can help by running pieces of lemon or orange rind down it. (Don’t put the actual orange and lemon down the disposal—too stringy.) A cup of baking soda can also do this. If the smells of the disposal are extremely unpleasant, like a sewage odor, please call a plumber. You probably have issues in the drainpipe or sewer line, not the disposal.