It all started last Wednesday. The grass was more like a hay field when it was cut, so when I walked across the yard, my shoes ended up covered in moist grass clippings. I wiped off most of it, but decided it would be easier to rinse off the rest in the sink and just let the garbage disposal take care of it.
That was my first mistake.
I spent the next several hours...until about 3 AM...trying to unstop the sink. I started with Drano. Didn't work. Poured boiling water down the sink. Didn't work. Tried baking soda and vinegar. Didn't work. Then I spent a couple of hours searching for my plunger. No luck. Now I'm thinking the plunger did not move to Spartanburg with me last October. -sigh-
This is when I decided to search for my drain snake. I found it in only about 30 minutes!! I was so excited. Got my drill and my drain snake and opened the doors under the cabinet to start taking the plumbing apart.
That is when it first started getting worse.
The bottom of the garbage disposal was leaking water, and I knew what that meant. I would have to replace the old disposal, but since I had the snake, I decided to unstop the drain first.
Lord have mercy on me.
I undid the plumbing and tried and tried the snake, but could not get it to work. After a lot of frustration, I decided I was just too tired to do any more that night, so I went to bed, and slept absolutely fitfully.
The next morning, Thursday, I put everything back together and tried Drano again. Let it sit all day. More boiling water. Didn't work again. I was just too tired to do much to it Thursday, so I gave up and went to bed early.
Friday, still stopped up. I spent a lot of time researching garbage disposals and how to unstop pipes that day. That is when I decided to try the drain snake again.
This time I went very slowly. I used the drill in the forward position and only spun about six inches of snake into the drain at a time, tightening the little knob down on the snake each time I pulled out six inches. It took forever, but I kept going until the whole drain snake was in the drain. I hit two separate clogs. At the end of the snake, I reversed the drill and spun the snake out about six inches at a time. The end of the snake was covered in grass and hair. I cleaned everything up. Put everything back together, and low and behold, the sink was unstopped!!!
Saturday, I purchased a garbage disposal and a plunger at Lowes. Took the old disposal out. Stored the plunger where I could find it if needed. Installed the new disposal and everything was perfect until Sunday night when the new disposal stopped and would only hum.
I spent Sunday night trying to get the new disposal to work again. I pushed the red button. I used the hex wrench and turned it. I noticed the whole disposal was very hot. I waited until it cooled down and would try again. Nothing worked.
Monday, I took the new garbage disposal out, gathered all the parts, and took it back to Lowes with the receipt. They gave me my money back and I bought an even more expensive disposal with a five year "fix it in my house" warranty. Came home and installed it.
One of the pipes leaked at the joint. The knob was cracked. I must have tightened it too far. Back to the hardware store. Bought the new piece I needed. Came home. Put everything back together replacing some of the other old washers. No leaks!!
NOW the second new disposal worked fine, but drained very slowly. I researched as to why that would happen, and most documentation said it was a partially blocked drain, so I bought more Drano and put it down the other drain. (I NEVER put Drano into the garbage disposal side of the sink.) Tried grinding ice to unstop it. Tried the plunger several times.
I read everything I could find on why a brand new disposal would drain slowly while the other side of the sink drained just fine. Most posts said the garbage disposal was stopped up. I tried everything...everything but calling a plumber in the middle of the night.
NOTHING WORKED. I went to bed frustrated and woke up in the middle of the night thinking maybe something was wrong in the pipes on the garbage disposal side of the sink. My brain sometimes solves my problems best when I'm asleep. Sometimes the solutions seem crazy, but they usually work, so....
Got up this morning. (Tuesday now, nearly a week of garbage disposal and clogged sink Hell.) Took everything apart again.
I found the problem.
The new disposal is larger than the old disposal, so when I installed it, I pushed the drain PVC pipe from the disposal to the T-connector in too far. It was nearly blocking the drain hole in the T-connector on the garbage disposal side of the sink! Fixed it. Turned on the water to check for leaks. No leaks!
Kept the water running and turned on the new disposal again. What?!! It sounded like just a quiet hum. I thought, "OH NO!! This one is broken too!" I put some ice down it. To my surprise, it ground up the ice very quietly. It is NOT broken. It is just that quiet! Working perfectly and you can barely hear it at all. Amazing.
It is draining much better. I may still need to adjust the pipes a little more, but I'm glad I did not call a plumber because that was a crazy problem and the plumber probably would not have known what to do either...except bill me for the service call, of course.
I'm posting this in case something crazy like this happens to you someday.
This experience, like almost all my "Do It Myself" projects, required three trips to the hardware store and a trip to the grocery store for Drano.
Now I'm hoping someone opens a hardware store closer to my house. There are a lot of good places to open one on the Asheville Hwy near Hearon Circle. I'm hoping for a True Value or Ace Hardware.
In a perfect world I would hope I never need a hardware store again, but I don't live in that world. At least not today. Maybe tomorrow. One never knows. Life surprises me all the time.
