Having lived in the country most of my life, I didn’t grow up with garbage disposers, but our new apartment has an Insinkerator. And, um, I confess that I am Unclear on the Concept. What are they useful for? Are they just an alternative to putting certain things in the garbage, so you don’t have to take the garbage out as often and it doesn’t get as stinky? My efforts at understanding are confounded by my search for a definitive guide to what Can and Cannot go into this thing, because there seems to be no rhyme or reason to it. Apparently:
Fruit pits: OK. This seems quite improbable to me, given that fruit pits are HARD.
Banana peels: BAD. Too much fiber or something?
Stems from Greens: BAD. Ditto
Potato peels: BAD. The starch supposedly makes a gummy paste that leads to slow draining.
Big bones: BAD. This seems logical to me.
Small bones: GOOD. They help clean the thing out!? And where’s the cutoff between “small bones” and “large bones”?
Fat trimmed from raw meat: BAD. Supposedly a clogging-up substance.
Grease from fat: BAD. This seems fairly logical to me, I guess.
I’m goin’ a little nuts here. Help me out. Here’s some stuff I commonly contemplate putting down there to be insinkerated. What’s okay and what’s not?
Mango peel?
Past-its-prime raw spinach?
Apple cores?
Grape stems?
Cooked rice?
Uncooked rice?
Garlic skins?
Onion skins?
Onion roots and stems? (Just the bits you cut off the bulb of yer basic white onion from the Megamart, y’know what I mean?)
Carrot tops?
Solid fat or gristle trimmed from cooked meat?
Olive pits?
Moldy cheese?
I wouldn’t put large amounts of anything down a garbage disposal. (I’ve never lived anywhere that didn’t have one). Small bits of just about anything else, though.
Grease and greasy foods go for any drain. Rice, sure. Small bits of onion or potato peel, sure. I wouldn’t put any fruit pit down there, for no other reason than it would be super loud and annoying.
Eggshells are good for disposals, as are citrus peels, like lemon. They make “scented garbage disposal cleaning tablets”, but lemon peels and eggshells have always worked for me.
Shot glasses are bad, especially the ones with thick glass bottoms. I had to remove the garbage disposal and turn it upside down to get out the chunks of glass out.
The big thing is to not put stuff down it too fast. and had a good amount of water running so that the ground up stuff is washed down. It is really there so you don’t have to scape every thing off the plates before rinsing them for the dishwasher or washing them. It is not a replacement for a garbage can.
It depends to a great extent on the disposer. Our first one did not have a powerful enough motor, and choked up on a lot of things.
In an other house there was one with a stronger motor, and it took a lot more, but still no banana peels, fish skin or peach pits or bones.
Same for the one in our present house, but it died. Talked to plumber and he strongly advised to get a really powerful one with a 3/4 HP motor. It cost more, but brother, it eats anything. Bones, peach pits, banana peels, and I’ll bet it would take a shot glass too!
I use it as an insurance policy- if I drop vegetable peelings or whatever in the sink, I don’t have to fish them out, just let the garbage disposal take care of it. The only thing I deliberately put down it is old moldy food from the fridge, that I’m afraid would smell up the place if I put it in the trash.
I put just about anything in mine, except hard things like large bones and pits. Even fat and banana peels. And I always have ***cold ***water running when it’s in use.
I am pretty sure that they are primarily for things that end up in your sink from food preparation and cleanup. However you really shouldn’t use them to dispose of large quantities of anything. That said, I think the fat and grease are the only banned items on your list.
This is exactly right. Garbage “disposer” is a misnomer and most plumbers advise against installing them at all. Small bits of food will start to decompose in a disposer and you will notice that that side of the sink is not draining as well as it should. A flick of the switch along with some water and the rotted food disappears and the drainage improves. Grease in the sink is always a bad idea and eventually (unless you’re very lucky), you will have a major $100/hr problem.
Another thing not to put in the disposer - coins. I don’t know how many times I charged someone $40 - $60 to remove a penny or a dime from one. Aquarium gravel is also not a good idea.
As far as the potato peels and starchy vegetables, the main thing is to use plenty of water and leave it running for a period after you shut off the disposal to ensure that everything gets flushed into the main drain.
Here’s a tip on garbage disposals that I picked up as a repairman. You can use the disposal itself to clear small clogs like potato peels or grease in the trap.
Stopper both sides of the sink and fill the side with the disposal about halfway with water. Hold in the stopper on the non-disposal side (it will try to come out), flip on the disposal and then remove the stopper on the disposal side. It forces the water into the drain with enough pressure to clear blockages, but not enough to harm any plumbing.
It doesn’t always work, but it’s pretty easy, safe and cheap to try.
The blade from an Osterizer is also a no-no. That just means twice as many sharp things down there when you have to reach in and grab it.
It’s good you have an ISE, depending on the model, they are pretty tuff and can take quite a bit of abuse.
I just picked up the highest end model of the new line of ISE’s. I shoved the entire top of a pineapple (the leaves) down it and it took it in stride.
When I remodeled my kitchen, I put in the largest pipes that would fit in the wall and bought the stainless steel garbage disposal with a hemi (a one horse auto reversing kitchen aid)
I love it, I would get it again in an instant. I have put raw turkey bones and whole bags of potatoes down it and never had a problem. No shot glasses though.
If you ever feel a need to test the integrity of your undersink plumbing, try stuffing the disposal with artichoke leaves. The backpressure that builds up behind the clog in the P-trap will explosively pinpoint any loose or corroded fittings. Be sure your undersink cabinet is closed before doing this, or you’ll spend the best part of an hour mopping up masticated artichoke bits all rhe way to the far side of the kitchen.
My husband sells plumbing supplies (like garbage disposals) for a living, and does lots of handyman work on the side and I called him and asked about this. He said as long as they’re used correctly, there’s nothing wrong with having a disposer. You do need to be a little careful about what you put down it (obviously, no big bones, coins, shot glasses ), but most vegetable peels, fruit peels, meat scraps, coffee grounds and other food waste is fine. Always have the cold water running as the disposer runs, and let it run until you can hear that everything is gone. Don’t just flick it on for a few seconds or it won’t all get flushed away.
Obviously, this is only true for those on municipal water supplies. If you have a septic tank, you shouldn’t have one.
As for cleaning it, I dump about a cup of baking soda in, let that sit for 10-15 minutes, add a squirt of lemon juice, and then pour in about a cup of vinegar. Then I turn on the cold water and the disposer. Fun foaming action, too!
Sory for double posting, but I figured I would go through your list. I have a 3/4 hp disposer that’s about 12 years old and just fine. I use it all the time.
Fruit pits: Depends on the pit or seed. Peach pits, obvioulsy, no. Little grape seeds, probably ok. Watermelon seeds, fine.
Banana peels: I’ve put them down before and they went bye-bye just fine.
Stems from Greens: I put broccoli stems down all the time. Cucumber peel, too.
Potato peels: I’ve put potato peel down before and never had a problem.
Big bones: BAD. No t-bones.
Small bones: I’ve heard you can put chicken bones down, but I never do. Really tiny fish bones have gone down with no problem.
Fat trimmed from raw meat: I’ve put fat trimmed from beef and poultry fat down before, no problem.
Grease from fat: I pour bacon grease down all the time. Turn it on and run the water till you know it’s gone.
Mango peel? Should be fine. I put apple and pear peels down.
Past-its-prime raw spinach? Fine.
Apple cores? Should be okay if it’s a bigger model disposer.
Grape stems? Maybe.
Cooked rice? Fine.
Uncooked rice? Fine.
Garlic skins? Fine.
Onion skins? Make sure it’s not one big piece that can get wrapped around any of the impelers. Tear it into smaller pieces.
Onion roots and stems? Should be fine.
Carrot tops? Yep.
Solid fat or gristle trimmed from cooked meat? Yep.
Olive pits? Probably not.
Moldy cheese? Yep. Not a big 2-pound block of cheddar, but if it’s a smallish piece then it should be fine.
Meat fat and gristle tend to wad up and ride around forever.
The hard disk at the bottom of garlic is better thrown out. It will go down, eventually.
Canteloupe rinds are noisy, but they go down.
If you must put melted fat down, don’t use hot water. You don’t want it to congeal ten feet down the line.
If you’re doing a whole lot of garbage, don’t stuff it in all at once. That’s the road to clog city. A handful at a time.
How It Works Really, a lot of folks don’t know. The walls don’t move, but the floor spins around, and it has a pair of free-swinging hammers that force the garbage into sharp-edged slots around the bottom of the walls. Some models reverse direction every time you turn them on, so they are self-unjamming (usually.)
Cleaning. There’s 2 kinds; gummy cutter slots and stinky walls. The slots can get coated, and won’t work so well. Toss in a few ice cubes and grind them. (In the old days of batch feed disposals, repairmen used to throw in a 6 oz. Coke bottle! :eek: ) When it gets stinky, it’s because the top part never gets washed. Fill the sink with hot soapy water, open the stopper, and run the muncher. It will wash itself. When I finish washing dishes, I just dump the dishpan into the sink while it’s running. It rumbles, but it doesn’t hurt the machine at all.
Be careful how much, though. I had a big batch of fat/gristle just turn into a huge wad of snot. I had to unplug the disposer and stick my hand down there to pull it all out. Damn near lost my lunch.
Mango seeds are a bad idea too. They get beat up, but are just too fibrous to totally go away.
See, I’m not very good at being ultra-careful about what goes down the sink and what doesn’t. That’s going to happen to me anyway, garbage disposal or no. At least with a garbage disposal, I just turn on the switch and the problem usually goes away without me having to reach into the sink and get whatever it is out (eeewwww…).
One no-no is the “guts” removed from a pumpkin. Went about 50’ down before the mass of string plugged the drain solid. I have a 50’ sewer rod, and it found the plug with about 3’ to spare.
Heh, the old joke I heard about plumbers is that they reccommend only two things (other than water) go down the drain: human waste and toilet paper, and they’re really not all that keen on the toilet paper, either
But plumbers tend to be a conservative lot because anything that plugs up the drain has the potential to cause HUGE damage in your house. People have gotten less and less risk-averse with plumbing over the years as it has proven to be more reliable, but things like 2nd floor laundries really scare me.
), but most vegetable peels, fruit peels, meat scraps, coffee grounds and other food waste is fine. Always have the cold water running as the disposer runs, and let it run until you can hear that everything is gone. Don’t just flick it on for a few seconds or it won’t all get flushed away.