The Lifetime of a Garbage Disposal
May. 11th, 2010 11:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
According to the websites that I visited yesterday, the average lifetime of a garbage disposal is 10 to 12 years. Since our house is going on 14 years old, this would explain why our builder-installed disposal is stubbornly refusing to grind potato skins fine enough to go through the pipe without clogging it up. Sunday night was the second time that this happened and it took both
daisy_knotwise and I (again!) to get it unclogged after the application of a whole bunch of drain cleaner. (It's a dual sink, so Gretchen held one plunger in place as a stopper while I plunged the open side with great vigor.)
I took this as a hint. The original garbage disposal was a InSinkErator 1/3 hp Badger 1. Tonight, I purchased a InSinkErator 1 hp Excel model which I'm hoping will eat pretty much anything we want to throw at it. Supposedly, a replacement garbage disposal is easily installed by one person. However, it apparently is very useful to have a second person handy to help hold the thing up while doing the installation. (The recommended alternative appears to be building a stack of books to hold it up. Thank you, but no. I like my books.) I considered having it professionally installed if it didn't cost too much, but I carefully checked with
samwinolj to see if he were available to help in case of obscenely high installation costs.
$150 was well into the obscene range, so I've officially asked Sam for the favor.
We'll see if $150 still seems obscene when we finish. :)
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
I took this as a hint. The original garbage disposal was a InSinkErator 1/3 hp Badger 1. Tonight, I purchased a InSinkErator 1 hp Excel model which I'm hoping will eat pretty much anything we want to throw at it. Supposedly, a replacement garbage disposal is easily installed by one person. However, it apparently is very useful to have a second person handy to help hold the thing up while doing the installation. (The recommended alternative appears to be building a stack of books to hold it up. Thank you, but no. I like my books.) I considered having it professionally installed if it didn't cost too much, but I carefully checked with
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
$150 was well into the obscene range, so I've officially asked Sam for the favor.
We'll see if $150 still seems obscene when we finish. :)
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 12:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 12:59 pm (UTC)I dunno, I think I remember installing one once for someone. I don't think we've ever been in a place that had one, though maybe we did in the old apartment or something. I'm just thinking if you have to hold it up from underneath AND work down there, it'd be pretty cramped.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 01:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 02:02 pm (UTC)The ideal disposal mounting technician is very small, can lift a 50lb weight one handed at arms length, and maneuver it precisely. I've yet to meet this person.
Bill also bought the largest, most powerful, and therefor probably heaviest unit.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 02:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 02:11 pm (UTC)I just don't see that a second person can be used at all.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 02:07 pm (UTC)The person on the floor is moving the unit around, bumping the first persons legs, and hoping like H that the stick doesn't dislodge and drop the unit on their nose.
The board doesn't help much, the person on the bottom still has to lift the unit the last inch. One inch, or a foot, they're still lifting it.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 01:12 pm (UTC)I have yet to find a disposal that handles onion skins happily on a consistent basis, no matter the oomph of it.
Use plenty of water and try to always mix bigger chunks of things with skinny/small things. We try to keep a few lemon or orange peels around for just such purposes.
Very soon we'll be trying to compost yet again, so we'll be able to reserve all those peelings for the garden.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 04:52 pm (UTC)While I'm not a complete home-repair novice, I'm pretty much a non-rank amateur, and plumbing is not my specialty (I'm pretty good with electrical stuff). (When we did the bathroom in Bartlett, ironically less than a year before moving, Tara didn't let me uninstall the toilet).
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 05:38 pm (UTC)Here in London we're given small green boxes to put our potato skins etc. in that are collected by the council's recycling people, so they would really want us *not* to have garbage disposals ... they also give out plastic composting bins for free and i have one at the bottom of my garden which I hardly ever use (sadly)
no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 06:51 pm (UTC)Scissord Jack
Date: 2010-05-12 10:26 pm (UTC)http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/254578304/1_5_ton_hydraulic_scissor_jack/showimage.html
. . . which is just perfect, size and power-wise, to hold up any conceivable garbage disposal -- it'll hold up your car.
Sam'l B.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-13 01:31 am (UTC)