How should you clean your garbage disposal?

Answer

Garbage disposers clean themselves if used properly. Do not put lye or other chemical drain pipe cleaners into the disposer.

Periodically, and always after disposing of fibrous food wastes, purge the drainline by filling the sink with two or three inches of cold water. Turn on the food waste disposer and allow this water to run through with no wastes added.

Before leaving your home for several days, check to be sure all wastes have been flushed out of the disposer to avoid the creation of odors. If odors should occur through an oversight, they can be removed by running orange or lemon peels or ice cubes through the disposer.

[Info from the Home Maintenance And Repair Database at the Michigan State University website]

Answer

I always run the citrus peels through along with a cup of ice cubes on garbage night to keep the blades sharp.

Answer

Update

Disposal DO NOT have "blades".....they have grinders on the side or bottom.

Ice cubes DO NOT "shapren" the blades...the ice only knocks off crud on the

sides or the "grinders.

Answer

As said above citrus peels are great also you could try pouring baking soda in the drain then pour vinegar over the baking soda and wait a few minutes before rinsing.

Answer

Pressurized drain cleaning products, like CLR Power Plumber, offer an alternative to chemical drain cleaning. One of the CLR products is usable 10 or more times. The 4.5 oz replacement cans can be found at Amazon.com for around $8. The actual pumping action product is usually priced at around $30. Plumb-Away is a similarly operated and priced device, also able to be found on Amazon.com.

They generally advertise the pressure can clean:

50' down a 1.5" diameter pipe

40' down a 2" diameter pipe

35' down a 3.5" diameter pipe

25' down a 4" diameter pipe

18' down a 5" diameter pipe

A quick, cursory search on Google for either product name, in quotations, will yield many forums of happy customers.

I'm including this link because they have a demonstration video, however cheesy and capitalistic, on their website.

http://www.jelmar.com/CLRpowerplumber.htm

They advertise on the same page that this product is usable on garbage disposals.

Additional Response

According to the author of Talking Dirty with the Queen of Clean, Linda Cobb, fill the sink with 3 inches of warm water and mix in 1 cup of baking soda. Drain with the disposal running. This should keep disposals fresh and free-flowing.

First answer by anonymous. Last edit by Denisec. Contributor trust: 135 [recommend contributor]. Question popularity: 202 [recommend question]

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