Attentive maintenance is key to making the most of your garbage disposal. As long as you regularly take care of your disposer with some basic upkeep steps, you shouldn’t encounter many notable problems. To help you enjoy a long-lasting unit, we will present the most significant garbage disposal maintenance tips below. Read all about how you can keep your disposer grinding effectively for years and years without requiring a replacement.
Run Your Disposal Often
You would be surprised to find out how important it is simply to run your disposal occasionally. By allowing the grinding components to do their job, you will be breaking down any particles left over from previous runs. Additionally, you’ll be keeping the components running smoothly throughout time.
As one of the best garbage disposal maintenance tips, running your unit regularly prevents:
- Rust
- Clogs
- Corrosion
- Jams (if you do undergo jamming, see how to reset a garbage disposal)
Even if you don’t use your disposer on a daily basis, we strongly recommend that you turn it on for a minute or two to keep it functioning properly.
- DON’T keep your food waste disposer unused for prolonged periods.
Rinse with Cold Water
A steady stream of cold water will always work wonders for your garbage disposal. By using cold water while your unit is running, you will be hardening the waste and making it easier to break down. Moreover, cold water solidifies any oily residue that may be in your unit’s grinding chamber. Cool water also flushes all waste in your drain with more ease.
- DON’T run hot water when using your disposer so the waste won’t melt.
Leave it Running Longer
Another one of the most useful garbage disposal maintenance tips is to keep it running for a bit more time. After your unit grinds up all the waste, leave it on for an extra 30-40 seconds with cold water. The reason is that smaller pieces of food tend to get caught in the components. By keeping the disposal on for another half minute, you are ensuring that all remains go down the drain.
- DON’T stop your garbage disposal if it hasn’t completely finished grinding food waste.
Use Dish Soap
You may be tempted to use your everyday household cleaners to keep your disposer hygienic. Nevertheless, the detergent you use for washing dishes is the best option. Not only will dish soap effectively clean and de-grease the grinding chamber, but you’ll also have it at hand at all times. Simply pour a few drops of dish soap in the drain hole and run the disposer with cold water for about a minute.
- DON’T clean your garbage disposal with bleach, drain cleaners or any other harsh chemicals.
Grind Smaller Chunks of Food
The bigger the food, the greater chances there are of your disposer malfunctioning. You should always cut any large waste items into smaller pieces prior to grinding them in your disposal. Furthermore, we encourage you to dispose of food waste in smaller portions at a time, instead of shoving one large load into your disposal.
- DON’T abuse your unit by grinding up any inappropriate items. Find out what shouldn’t go in a garbage disposal and avoid the objects at all costs.
Freshen up with Citrus
We know how smelly food waste disposers can get in time. However, there is a natural solution for removing odors. Even more, you just might have the ingredients in your fridge already. Any type of citrus will have an amazing impact on your disposer in terms of scent. All you have to do is take your citrus of choice and cut it into wedges, throwing them in the disposer and running it for a few minutes. Use their peels as an alternative.
You can choose any one of the citrus options below:
- Orange
- Lemon
- Lime
- Clementine
- Grapefruit
- Tangerine
Although they were the last entry on our list, citruses are one of the best garbage disposal maintenance tips of all time.
- DON’T use any other commercial cleaning products in your disposer.
Conclusion
To conclude, we’re confident that the garbage disposal maintenance tips we talked about will set you on the right track. We recommend that you apply the recommendations regularly, on a monthly or weekly basis, depending on how much you use your disposer. If you do, however, come across any issues, you can easily learn how to fix garbage disposals problems. Do you have any other garbage disposal maintenance tips you would like to share with others?