Home Repair Center Garbage Disposers Repair Tips, DIY Help, and Information Maintenance Tips for Garbage Disposers

Parts of a garbage disposer

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[Back to Common Questions about Garbage Disposers (FAQs)]
[Garbage Disposers Repair Tips, DIY Help, and Information]

Household appliances have average lifetime expectancies. Maintaining your appliances properly can extend their lifetime indefinitely.

• Always run a steady stream of cold water into the garbage disposer while grinding food wastes. Continue running water for at least 30 seconds after turning off the disposer. This will flush all solid waste down the drain.
• To refresh your disposer, use an approved disposer cleaner such as Disposal Magic to clean and deodorize your disposer, or you can occasionally grind half of a lemon, lime, orange or their respective rinds with some ice cubes while running cold water. This can help remove any bad odors.
• Do not put fibrous foods down the disposer, including celery, corn husks, and potato peels. Food wastes like these have a tendency to clog your disposer or drain because they are high fiber wastes and tend to clog and clump. Never put rice down the garbage disposer. Rice grains can swell from the water and clump up and clog the drain.
• A good way to clean the drain lines for the disposer is to fill the sink with hot, soapy water, and then run the disposer while the water drains. This can help clear out any grease or food buildup. We sell a disposer cleaner, Disposal Magic if you want to purchase a specialty product.
• You should always replace a torn or misshaped splash guard.