Clogged Kitchen Sinks

The holidays truly are just around the corner.  Family and friends are getting together and all ending up in the kitchen where the food is being prepared.  The conversations are great and the food looks and smells even better.  There is nothing that can ruin these good times but there is one thing that can put a damper on them, a clogged kitchen sink.  You just can’t figure out why it won’t drain.  I only peeled 15 potatoes, 11 carrots, 8 egg shells and fixings for some salad and jammed it down into the disposal all at once and turned it on. 

 The problem is not the garbage disposal for they can grind up nails and glass although this is not suggested.  The problem is the baffle tee which is part of the drain piping directly below the kitchen sink.  There is a drain pipe coming from the disposal, usually a horizontal line and a vertical line, coming down from the other side of the sink.  These two lines go into the baffle tee that then goes down into the p-trap.  The baffle tee has a baffle in it, hence the name, that actually closes off ½ the diameter of this pipe.  This is where the clog usually is located. 

 To prevent the baffle tee from clogging up, feed the food into the disposal slowly while running water.  Give the disposal time to do its thing, grinding up the food into little pieces.  Probably the best way to prevent these clogs is to just put the garbage into the trash.  If you do this, there will be no damper put into your party and you won’t be paying a plumber the day of your event.