A dirty sink drain can make your entire kitchen smell foul. It will also increase your risk of food contamination, foodborne illness, and messy backups and clogs. Fortunately, we can suggest nine easy ways to keep the kitchen sink in your Mesa, AZ home clean, smelling fresh, and working as it should.
1. Install a Properly Fitted Drain Cover
Whether you enjoy washing dishes by hand or only use your sink to rinse produce, you need to have a properly fitted drain cover. Drain mesh and drain plugs keep large, non-degradable items out of plumbing systems. By keeping your drain covered, you can prevent popcorn seeds, eating utensils, and dropped jewelry from slipping into your pipes and causing blockages.
2. Get Rid of Grease the Right Way
Don’t put cooking oil, grease, or rendered fats down your kitchen drain. Although liquid when hot, these things will cool and harden as they come in contact with cold pipes. Instead, put your used grease and oils in lidded, heat-safe containers. When their contents are cool, seal these containers up and toss them into the trash.
3. Rinse Your Sink With Hot Water After Cleaning
When you’re done washing your dishes for the night, turn your hot water tap on full-blast to rinse your sink and drain completely. Hot water will melt greasy residue and flush food waste out.
Boiling Water and Your Kitchen Sink
Although clearing your sink drain with hot water from the tap is fine, you shouldn’t pour boiling water down your drain from a teakettle or pot. This is especially true if you have polyvinyl chloride (PVC) drain pipes. Boiling water can cause plastic pipes to warp or melt, and it may create leaks at their connections.
4. Use Baking Soda and White Vinegar
One of the easiest ways to freshen your kitchen sink drain is with baking soda and white vinegar. When combined, these two pantry essentials undergo a rapid foaming reaction. This reaction breaks down soap scum, grease, oils, and other buildup.
Simply pour one cup of dry baking soda into your drain and then chase it with one cup of white vinegar. Let the mixture foam and fizz for five to 10 minutes and then rinse your drain clean with a generous stream of hot water.
5. Schedule Regular Drain Cleaning
Baking soda and white vinegar are perfect for periodically freshening kitchen drains, but they cannot replace regular, professional drain cleaning. You should schedule professional drain cleaning every 12 to 18 months.
These services slough off tough, tacky waste that decreases the interior diameters of wastewater pipes. They also flush out trapped food debris and slow-degrading items. Some drain cleaning treatments can even eliminate stubborn drain gnat infestations. Depending upon the age and condition of your pipes, we might recommend mechanical rooter service or hydro-jetting for your annual drain cleaning.
What Is Rooter Service?
We perform rooter service with a multi-functional rooter machine. This machine sends a long, flexible auger into drains and sewer lines that scrapes and grinds trapped debris. Rooter machines clean pipe walls, open pipe interiors, and get waste and wastewater moving. Our rooter machine has a drain line camera, clog detector, and built-in monitor. It also sends low-pressure water into plumbing systems to flush dislodged materials toward the municipal sewer main.
What Is Hydro-Jetting?
Hydro-jetting uses high-pressure jets of water to flush drains and sewer lines clean. We insert hydro-jet hoses into plumbing clean-outs or other access points. We can use pressure levels as high as 3,500 pounds per square inch (psi) to slough off tough, tacky waste and break up slow-degrading and solid obstructions.
Sewer Line Cleaning Is Important, Too
All your drains connect to your underground sewer line. If this pipe is dirty and slow-moving, your drains will move slowly too. Slow-moving wastewater leaves more buildup on pipe walls and plumbing fixtures. It also creates the perfect conditions for biofilm, mold, and other pathogenic growths. To keep problems like whole-house backups up at bay and keep your kitchen drain clean and odor-free, schedule sewer line inspection and cleaning services every 18 to 22 months.
6. Use Your Garbage Disposal Correctly
The term “garbage disposal” is a misnomer. This tiny in-sink appliance isn’t a catch-all for all your kitchen waste. Instead, garbage disposals are meant to grind up minor food scraps after pots, pans, and plates have already been scraped into waste bins. You shouldn’t clean out your refrigerator and dump multiple containers of expired food into this unit. Several food items should never go into your garbage disposal, including:
- Nuts, seeds, nut butters, and seed butters
- Potato and citrus fruit peels
- Coffee grounds and tea bags
- Eggshells
- Onions and garlic
- Dry pasta, rice, or oats
Using your garbage disposal correctly will prevent drain blockages, premature disposal failure, and other plumbing problems.
7. Avoid Chemical Drain Cleaners
If you ever have a clogged kitchen sink, don’t use a chemical drain cleaner to unblock it. Although store-bought drain cleaners are inexpensive and easy to acquire, these products are extremely dangerous if used incorrectly. Whether caustic or corrosive, they can cause severe skin burns and permanent eye injuries on contact. If you use them in a poorly ventilated space, they can also cause respiratory distress.
When chemical drain cleaners don’t clear clogs, they remain trapped in pipes and fixtures indefinitely. Worse still, they eat through organic materials indiscriminately. Thus, they’re just as likely to eat through pipe walls as through hair, food, or other debris. For stubborn blockages, call a plumber rather than wasting time trying to DIY.
8. Don’t Ignore Developing Drain Issues
Don’t ignore a slow-draining kitchen sink, foul drain odors, or drains that make bubbling or gurgling sounds. If multiple drains are malfunctioning at once, this could be a sign of an impending, whole-house backup.
Even if your kitchen sink is the only fixture with a blocked or slow-moving drain, letting the issue fester will compound your problem. Slow-moving kitchen sinks are more likely to get stained by greasy residues and hard water minerals. They’re also more likely to develop thick, slimy coatings of black biofilm. Biofilm contains dangerous bacteria, viruses, and fungi. While you can’t always see it in sink basins, these same microorganisms could make their way onto dropped strawberries, tomatoes, and grapes when residents wash produce or they might get transferred onto clean dishes.
9. Avoid Do-It-Yourself Drain Repairs
Never attempt to repair a blocked or damaged sink drain, especially if you have a connected dishwasher or garbage disposal. Mistakes made during DIY drain repairs could damage these connected appliances irreparably. They can also lead to major plumbing leaks, water-damaged building materials, and voided fixture manufacturers’ warranties.
It’s also important to get help for all major drain maintenance. For instance, part of keeping your kitchen drain fresh is regularly cleaning its p-trap. You don’t have to open and clean the p-trap on your own. P-trap cleaning is a standard part of professional drain cleaning. It’s also a job that’s best left in the hands of seasoned plumbers.
Proudly serving the region since 1995, we help homeowners in Mesa maintain clean, high-functioning drains. We offer top-notch drain and sewer line services. We also provide leak detection, repiping, sump pump, and gas line services. If you need help keeping your kitchen drain clean, get in touch with Delta Mechanical today!
