garbage disposal

[Dottie]

I have a 5 yr. old Insinkerator (Badger5) garbage disposal. It still turns - but doesn't grind up anything. Is this about the average age of a garbage disposal? I will go shopping for one in the next few days and would like to know whether to get another one like this or switch to something else.

My ice maker is giving me problems again so I will probably get a new one of those while I am in Lowe's. My husband and I are too old to try to do these jobs ourselves so we are thinking about using a service called Mr. Handyman. I checked with our local consumer protection board and they haven't heard of them. We had used a similar service in the past but it has gone out of business. We got a coupon from these people in one of the ads that come in the mail. Shows a license# ... but I will check with license people to make sure. Anybody on here familiar with these people. They appear to be nationwide. Thanks.

[Steve]

Dottie wrote on 31 Mar 2008 in group alt.home.repair:

I run my own handyman service. So far I have found clients soley by referral -- lucky me. I mention this because it's the best way to find a handyman. Ask your friends for names of people they use. Do you know a real estate agent? They work with handymen all the time.

If you want to go with the Mr. Handyman person, ask for referrals. Make sure they're for the person who will do your work.

[Don Wiss]

They should last longer than five years. I see they have a three-year warranty. Why don't you contact the factory service and see how much to fix it. To schedule a service call phone [phone], press 2, and enter your five-digit zip code. It will provide you with the name and phone number of the factory authorized service agent nearest you.

Fixing it saves the installation cost that comes along with a new one.

Don (e-mail link at home page bottom).

[Jim Elbrecht]

-snip-

I agree they *should* last more than 5 yrs--- but what repair could you do to a disposal without removing it?

And if you're paying someone to remove it- what repair is worth hanging on to a 5 yr old $100 appliance? [for that matter- what repair is worth doing on that thing even if labor was free?]

Jim

[Don Wiss]

Okay. I didn't realize this one was so cheap. I find $78.50 with free shipping at Amazon.com. Maybe no sales tax and no gas wasted driving to Lowe's.

Don (e-mail link at home page bottom).

[JoeSpareBedroom]

What sorts of things is it NOT grinding? I'm asking because many years ago, I discovered that a disposal will not handle kale stems, for instance. Rather, it will spin them into rope strong enough to anchor an ocean liner. If you've been putting any sort of tough vegetable stems into the disposal, some of them may have wrapped themselves around the hammers (the parts that do the grinding). That would prevent any subsequent food from being ground up properly.

The hammers are easy to feel. They're not sharp, and they're on the bottom plate of the disposal. Have you inspected them to see if they're covered with something?

[Erma1ina]

Along the same line as Joe: Check to be sure those "hammers" that do the grinding are moving freely.

A few months ago I noticed my Insinkerator sounded a little odd and was taking forever to grind up stuff. I discovered that one of the hammers was "frozen" and not moving freely -- a little Liquid Wrench and a bit of coaxing by tapping on it with a real wrench freed it up and it acts normally now.

Probably I use my disposal less than average and that may have contributed to the problem. Now I'm more conscientious about periodically grinding up some ice cubes to clear it out and keep everything moving the way it should.

[aspasia]

On Mon, 31 Mar 2008 17:18:25 GMT, Erma1ina wrote: [...]

I hardly use mine at all, since I compost all vegetable and other table scraps. No meat, no bones, no fat -- these go into the kitchen garbage for weekly pickup by city.

Practically the only thing that goes down disposal is lemons, which I use a lot of. They keep the disposal "active" and also disinfect it.

Aspasia

[aspasia]

This takes me back decades to the ultimate nightmare: 13 coming for Thanksgiving dinner next day - I put CELERY down the disposal. Will spare you the rest of the nightmare scenario...

Aspasia

[JoeSpareBedroom]

Amazing, isn't it? But, we know that rope was made from plants at one time. We know that celery can take forever to chew, and kale stems would need to be cooked for eleven years to be edible. And still, it takes an incident for us to learn.

[HeyBub]

Hanging still requires a hemp rope. Or at least in traditional hanging.

[Dottie]

I called the company and was given advice very similar to what has been offered here. I went out and bought a peach....used the pit to help sharpen the "blades" or whatever in the disposal. It actually did break up most of the pit. I put a grape down there and it just bounced around. I will try again - do ice cubes work? Those are easy to find. I am also guilty of not using my disposal much. I tried to avoid problems and composted much of what many people put down the disposal. Thanks for the advice though. Will wait a few days before deciding to get a new one or trying to clean this one.

[JoeSpareBedroom]

When the grape just bounced around, did you run some water along with the grape, or just put in the grape?