The Wife threatens to call a plumber.
I just had a look under the sink and I have a garbarator on the right
sink with the dishwasher comming into it at the top of the garbarator.
The garbarator has to be used excessively to clear the cloggs and slow
drainage. When the dishwasher is used it envaribly backs up into the
left sink and sometimes into the right. What if I took out the
garbarator altogether? Is there a better plumbing system or size? It
must be clogging at the cleanout, the size is a stantard sink copper
one and 1/2 if my ruler is correct.

wrote in message
...
The Wife threatens to call a plumber.
I just had a look under the sink and I have a garbarator on the right
sink with the dishwasher comming into it at the top of the garbarator.
The garbarator has to be used excessively to clear the cloggs and slow
drainage. When the dishwasher is used it envaribly backs up into the
left sink and sometimes into the right. What if I took out the
garbarator altogether? Is there a better plumbing system or size? It
must be clogging at the cleanout, the size is a stantard sink copper
one and 1/2 if my ruler is correct.

There are many possible factors that we can't see. The size of the drain is
right. What we don't know, is there grease buildup? Is there garbage
buildup? Is the pipe pitched properly? Is the disposal partly clogged?

Good practice is to run the disposal before doing the dishes to clear out
any stuff in there and the hot water from the DW will usually keep the drain
lines clear of grease buildup.

on 5/4/2008 1:29 PM said the following:
The Wife threatens to call a plumber.
I just had a look under the sink and I have a garbarator on the right
sink with the dishwasher comming into it at the top of the garbarator.
The garbarator has to be used excessively to clear the cloggs and slow
drainage. When the dishwasher is used it envaribly backs up into the
left sink and sometimes into the right. What if I took out the
garbarator altogether? Is there a better plumbing system or size? It
must be clogging at the cleanout, the size is a stantard sink copper
one and 1/2 if my ruler is correct.

I don't have a garbarator , but why is the dishwasher draining above
that garbarator? Can't the dishwasher drain be placed below the
garbarator thing so it is not so close to the sinks?

I had to look up garbarator, and found it is the Canadian spelling for
disposal. I see that at least one Canadian municipality wants to ban
them because of the extra debris that is being discharged into the
wastewater system. Some other areas have already banned them in new
construction.
I can see their point.

--

Bill
In Hamptonburgh, NY
To email, remove the double zeroes after @

Hello James,
Here's my suggestion because plumbing is my worst skill.
I'd had the same problem including the wife on my ass.
I called a plumber and not one of those huge company's and had it taken
care.
I paid the $150 and had the lines cleared and my problems all went away and
have not returned.
FYI: I didn't have to replace any plumbing or the garbage displosal.
Good luck.



"Edwin Pawlowski" wrote in message
...

wrote in message
...
The Wife threatens to call a plumber.
I just had a look under the sink and I have a garbarator on the right
sink with the dishwasher comming into it at the top of the garbarator.
The garbarator has to be used excessively to clear the cloggs and slow
drainage. When the dishwasher is used it envaribly backs up into the
left sink and sometimes into the right. What if I took out the
garbarator altogether? Is there a better plumbing system or size? It
must be clogging at the cleanout, the size is a stantard sink copper
one and 1/2 if my ruler is correct.

There are many possible factors that we can't see. The size of the drain
is right. What we don't know, is there grease buildup? Is there garbage
buildup? Is the pipe pitched properly? Is the disposal partly clogged?

Good practice is to run the disposal before doing the dishes to clear out
any stuff in there and the hot water from the DW will usually keep the
drain lines clear of grease buildup.

wrote:

The Wife threatens to call a plumber.
I just had a look under the sink and I have a garbarator on the right
sink with the dishwasher comming into it at the top of the garbarator.
The garbarator has to be used excessively to clear the cloggs and slow
drainage. When the dishwasher is used it envaribly backs up into the
left sink and sometimes into the right. What if I took out the
garbarator altogether? Is there a better plumbing system or size? It
must be clogging at the cleanout, the size is a stantard sink copper
one and 1/2 if my ruler is correct.
Hi,
How about removing P trap plug first and see?

wrote

The Wife threatens to call a plumber.

Unlikely you need one if you have simple to work with PVC pipe there.

I just had a look under the sink and I have a garbarator on the right
sink with the dishwasher comming into it at the top of the garbarator.

Yup, common enough. Have same here.

The garbarator has to be used excessively to clear the cloggs and slow
drainage. When the dishwasher is used it envaribly backs up into the
left sink and sometimes into the right. What if I took out the

In the configuration you mention, you shouldnt run water into the sink with
the disposal at the same time as the dishwasher is draining. The pipe can't
handle both.

garbarator altogether? Is there a better plumbing system or size? It
must be clogging at the cleanout, the size is a stantard sink copper
one and 1/2 if my ruler is correct.

Too bad it's copper but all is not lost. You've probably got a buildup at
the other end of the disposal sink on the left and before the main drain on
the one to the right. Replacing your disposal will not fix that. If you
get backups even when not running the water at the disposal sink, you have a
partly blocked pipe. Lets see if the configuration is what I think it is.
There's a 1/2 inch or so flexible drain from the dishwasher plugged in at
the top of the disposal. At the lower end of the disposal, there is an
outlet pipe that should be about 1 or 1.5 inches diameter. This outlet pipe
also connect at the other end to the other sink then has a drain that leads
'away'.

If this lower outlet pipe is only 1/2 inch, you may not have a clog but
instead have a substandard size. You'd have problems with slow draining
sinks on both sides and have always had that problem though you may be used
to the slower draining so not noticed it or 'thought it normal'. It will
not help to increase the size of this lower pipe that runs between both
sinks, if the bottom most portion that leads 'away' (to septic or city
sewer) is also 1/2 inch unless you replace both. I'm guessin gthough that
you reported only the size of the smaller drain just from the dishwasher to
the top of the disposal and the other pipes below are bigger. If I am
right, you have a partial clog along the pipe between the sinks since
normally only the sink with the disposal is affected. If both sinks are
normally equally affected, the clog is in the 'drain pipe that leads away to
the septic/sewer'.

Sorry if i'm a bit verbose, but this one can be very expensive if you
replace a disposal when there's nothing wrong with it.

Suggestion? If you are handy with a bit of plumbing, replace the copper
with PVC. It's much easier to work with. For reasons irrelevant to this
post, we had that done. Last week or so, we had the same buildup causing us
to at first think the disposal was at fault then I recalled a post some
other person had made and thunked myself on the head. Don fixed it in 15
mins flat because the PVC type we have, can just be hand unscrewed at the
right junctures. Yup, that 1.5 or so inch PVC was partly occluded with
buildup. We just used a bottle cleaner brush and put it back up and all is
well.

Thank you Gentlemen all very good info. I didn't have to call the
plumber yet. It looks good when I flush the "Disposal unit" with hot
water before the dishwasher starts, no back up at all. I am thinking
of removing the "disposal unit" out of the system and it will please
the Wife.

Thanks again.

wrote

Thank you Gentlemen all very good info. I didn't have to call the
plumber yet. It looks good when I flush the "Disposal unit" with hot
water before the dishwasher starts, no back up at all. I am thinking
of removing the "disposal unit" out of the system and it will please
the Wife.

Grin, glad to help James. The hot water trick means there is some level of
build up, probably in that pipe I mentioned between the 2 sinks.