#16: Garbage Disposal Changeroo

One thing that's awesome is discovering late on a Sunday night that the area under the kitchen sink has flooded because your garbage disposal sprung a leak.  This happened last Sunday.

We quickly declared that part of the sink "OUT OF ORDER" and on Monday, after some research, determined it needed replacing.  I did not have time to get around to taking the old one out and putting in the new one until this weekend.

Friday night I got started.

Whoever last messed around under the kitchen sink in my house - not me - apparently believed plumber's putty was a magic cream you could apply liberally to make leaks go away. Either it actually worked, or there were never leaks to begin with, but it made disassembling the works down there kind of an archaeological gig.

The "tools you will need" list that came with the new disposal seemed like overkill - please don't mean it when you say I'll need a hacksaw - but I was not about to be caught with my pants down so I went out to the workbench and did as I was told.

The old disposal was out in no time.

Now, what's all this crap?

Puzzling, wiring, entertaining the peanut gallery.

This turned out to be my downfall. I got the new disposal all hooked up and plugged in and ready to rock, and as soon as we road-tested it the damned thing leaked like a sieve. A little trouble-shooting narrowed the problem down to not using anywhere near enough plumber's putty on the flange - fortunately not a problem with the new disposal or anything else serious, but by the time we figured it out it was late and I was going to have to wrap this up another day. The "OUT OF ORDER" sign was put back in place.

OK, back to the drawing board. This time: use way too much putty. It's the only way to make sure you've used enough.

There she goes.

And this method of weighting the flange?  Feel free to steal it.  All the instructions I read said you should weigh down the flange with the garbage disposal itself, over a towel. But that made no real contact with the flange and wasn't all that heavy anyway. This barbell, on the other hand, was a perfect fit and I was able to rack it up to 45 pounds.

Excellent. That flange is puttied the hell in there.

Now to test for leaks before putting in the disposal. Feel free to steal this idea, too, because nobody said to do this. I am capable of learning from experience.

Leak-free. Sweet.

All done. Another one for the DIY achievement wall.