When you pour a pan of grease down the sink drain some of it will quickly cool down, congeal and stick to the inside of your plumbing. It will begin to collect food scraps that are rinsed down the sink drain as well.
Can You pour grease down the kitchen sink?
As mentioned above, grease poured down the kitchen sink drain can cause a number of serious - and expensive - plumbing problems. The grease you pour down the kitchen sink may be fluid as spills out of the pan, but it does not stay that way for long.
Is grease Ruining Your plumbing system?
A little bit of grease probably won't wreak major havoc on your plumbing system. Unfortunately, though, grease deposits build over time, even if you can't tell by looking at your kitchen sink, according to O'Connor Plumbing. One day, that tiny bit of grease could be the tipping point, causing major plumbing headaches.
How do you get grease out of a drain pipe?
While you do so, pour about a gallon of boiling water slowly down the drain. Squirt dish soap into the kitchen sink drain as the hot water runs down it. Any solidified grease should be liquified by the hot water and the dish soap should help the grease and any debris leave your pipes.
How to fix a clogged kitchen sink drain?
If your kitchen sink drain is clogged due to grease, there are several home remedies you can try besides the soap and hot water method mentioned earlier. Throw a handful of baking soda and hot water down your kitchen drain. Baking soda is a powerful cleaning agent and absorbs unpleasant odors.
What do I do if I accidentally poured grease down the drain?
Tip 1: Snake your drain. A snake is a tool that spirals into the drain, drilling itself into the messes that clog your drain. ... Tip 2: Make a homemade drain cleaner. Drain cleaners are abrasive, no matter what brand. ... Tip 3: Pour boiling water down the drain. ... Tip 4: Clean your P-trap.
Does grease ruin your sink?
A grease clog in your drainpipe will trap all the debris and food particles from your sink and grow. Over time, a blockage will form, which will prevent your home's wastewater from draining away.
Is it bad to pour grease down the drain?
Pouring grease down the sink drain is never acceptable. Doing so can cause major plumbing problems that can affect the entire sewer system in a home. Not only can grease cause backups and clogs, but it builds up over time and coat pipes.
Is it safe to pour grease down the kitchen sink?
In reality, grease should never go down the drain. Even if it's hot and easy to pour out of the pan, it will eventually cool and solidify somewhere in your plumbing. This causes a gummy, goopy mess to form along the pipe walls, trapping other debris that flows down the drain.
How do you throw out grease?
If you have grease left in a pot or skillet after cooking, let it cool and then pour into a metal can. When the can is full, simply throw it in your kitchen trash. Do not put grease down garbage disposals. Instead, put baskets/strainers in sink drains to catch food scraps and other solids.
Does hot water dissolve grease?
Fact: Hot Water Cuts Grease This is cool enough to keep your hands in. When the fat is exposed to warm water, it melts, floats, and washes away.
Will Drano dissolve grease?
Drano® Kitchen Granules has a powerful formula that heats water to quickly melt grease clogs in your kitchen sink. It's designed to destroy your tough, greasy kitchen clogs guaranteed!
Why is grease bad for the sink?
Why is Grease Bad for the Kitchen Sink Drain and Plumbing? As mentioned above, grease poured down the kitchen sink drain can cause a number of serious - and expensive - plumbing problems. The grease you pour down the kitchen sink may be fluid as spills out of the pan, but it does not stay that way for long.
What is the best way to prevent a kitchen sink from clogging?
Preventative maintenance is the best form of maintenance. Besides grease, there are plenty of other culprits of drain clogs, such as soap scum and coffee grounds. To prevent frustrating kitchen sink clogs, avoid pouring grease down the sink and dispose of used coffee grounds and other debris in the trash.
Tip 1: Snake your drain
A snake is a tool that spirals into the drain, drilling itself into the messes that clog your drain. It acts as a cork screw that lifts everything out as it's pulled up from the drain.
Tip 2: Make a homemade drain cleaner
Drain cleaners are abrasive, no matter what brand. The chemicals can damage pipes over time and may be ineffective against oil and fat. Pouring baking soda and vinegar down the drain causes a reaction that breaks down fats.
Tip 3: Pour boiling water down the drain
A fairly quick method for reducing the mass is to boil water and pour it into the drain. The hotter the water, the more effective it is at re-liquifying the solid waste.
Tip 4: Clean your P-trap
If the other methods don't do the trick, your problem most likely lies within your drain system's P-Trap. There's no sugar-coating the fact that this is a dirty job — gloves and a strong stomach are recommended.
What happens when you pour grease down the sink drain?
When you pour a pan of grease down the sink drain some of it will quickly cool down, congeal and stick to the inside of your plumbing. It will begin to collect food scraps that are rinsed down the sink drain as well. This buildup reduces the diameter of your pipe and eventually will clog it so that wastewater, from the kitchen and bathrooms, backs up into your home. What doesn’t stick to the inside of your plumbing makes its way into the sewer network where it joins up with wastewater from your neighborhood.
What happens when a fatberg blocks a sewer line?
Once a fatberg has blocked a section of a sewer line, wastewater then gets pushed upward and flows out of drains and manholes into local neighborhoods, homes and the environment.
What to do if you accidentally pour Grease down the Drain
Sometimes you or someone in your family will pour grease down the drain not because of ignorance but by sheer accident. What should you do then in such a scenario?
How to Dispose Fats, Grease and Oils
After finishing preparing bacon or French fries, let the cooking oil cool and then pour it out in a sealable container. Once it has solidified, toss it in the trash.
What Happens when You Pour Grease down Your Drain
Cooking oils are very viscous. They therefore drain out slowly, coating the drainpipes and causing them to be sticky. With time, food scraps, coffee grounds and other solid wastes will bond with the grease and cause a nasty clog in your drains.
What Happens to Grease in Your Pipes?
Knowing that grease is bad for your pipes, it’s important to know exactly what it does to your pipes. For starters, grease solidifies once it cools down. Once the oil is poured into your sink or garbage disposal, in time, the grease will transform from a liquid state to a solid-state, eventually causing a blockage and clog of your pipes.
How to Properly Dispose of Grease
No matter if it’s bacon grease, lard, or avocado oil, all grease tends to solidify, and oils tend to stick. As a result, they demand to be disposed of properly and safely to avoid costly repairs, sewage backup, and awful smells from your pipes. When it comes to grease, it’s important to take note of its solidifying structure.
One Major Cooking Oil Myth
Cooking oil, for a while, was widely and falsely believed to be safe to pour down the drain. This couldn’t be further from the truth, as the oil can stick to the lining of your pipes, causing erosion, leaks, and blockages over time.
Grease in Drain? There's Still Hope!
If you’ve already poured grease down your drain, there are a few things you can do to try to dissolve or remove it. Pouring boiling water over the sink can help reactivate the liquid state of the grease, which is easier to handle than the solidified version of grease.
Hire a Profession Plumbing Company in Cypress, TX
If you think you might have some grease buildup in your plumbing system or drains, don’t fret. As hard as it may be to assess your plumbing or flush out the grease on your own, a professional makes it a lot more manageable. Call a company you can trust, with years of experience like Joe The Plumber, to remove the grease from your drains.
How to get rid of grease clogs?
Baking soda reacts with vinegar to break down the fatty acids in grease clogs. Start by pouring about a cup of fresh baking soda directly into the drain. If necessary, use a funnel to get the bak ing soda past the garbage disposal splash guard. Be sure to also remove the stopper from a bathroom sink before adding the baking soda.
How to clear a clogged sink with vinegar?
Combine both methods for very stubborn clogs. Add half a cup each of salt, baking soda and vinegar into the drain. Plug the sink with the drain stopper and allow the concoction to sit for several hours or overnight. Flush with hot water, either heated on the stove or straight from the hot water tap.
What happens if a solidified mass grows over time?
If this solidified mass grows over time, it will consume more and more space in your pipes. Eventually, even water may have difficulty flowing through the pipes. In the worst case, the puddle of fat, grease or oil that once seemed so harmless could grow so large that it spawns a raw sewage backup in your home. You might find the smell and the repair bill to be equally offensive.
How Grease Affects Your Plumbing
Cooking grease might make your food taste delicious, but when it goes through your drains and into your water and sewage lines, it can quickly cool and harden into a thick sludge that may completely block your system.
How Long Does It Take for Grease to Clog a Drain?
We’ve all been guilty of having a temporary lapse in judgment and pouring the grease from some freshly cooked burgers down the drain. If this happens once or twice, it’s typically not cause for too much concern. It may help to run some hot water down the drain right after to help reduce the impact.
What to Do If Your Drain Gets Clogged
When your system becomes clogged with grease and cooking oils, you may well be looking at some fairly costly repairs. In general, it’s best to call in a plumbing professional to clear the clogs. Pros will have the know-how and the tools to clear the obstruction completely without further damaging your system.
Where You Should Pour Grease Instead
By far, the best way to prevent grease clogs and the damage that can result is to minimize the amount of grease that enters your drains in the first place. If you’re dealing with a lot of grease—say from that bacon from breakfast—you’ll want to handle this carefully.
