Ah, the garbage disposal. It’s a magical piece of machinery that lets us toss our gross old food down the drain without issue, never to be seen again, right?

Wrong. While our drains might seem like magical chutes that take away the nasty parts of our lives, if you don’t treat them right, you’ll be paying with clogging that nobody wants to deal with.

Whether it’s your kitchen sink, your bathroom sink, or your toilet, there are certain things that should never go down the drain. Keep reading to learn 5 of the worst things you could pour down the drain.

1. Grease, Oil, Fat

You get a three-for-one right off the bat. Grease, oil, and fat are not water soluble. This means that they won’t be dissolved or truly washed away by the water in your drain. They also combine with chemicals and compounds in the pipes and drains, which leads to huge build-ups of greasy fat in your drain, pipes, and sewers.

This trifecta of slimy, nasty buildups is what causes almost half of all the sewer overflows in the US.

Some common examples of these things are any type of cooking oil, salad dressing, bacon fat remnants, fat trimmings from meat, lard, most dairy products, gravy, and mayonnaise. 

2. Coffee Grounds

In second place for the most common clogging culprit right after fat/grease is coffee grounds. Throwing coffee grounds down the drain is almost guaranteed to result in a clog at some point in the future.

3. Paper Towels

Maybe you ran out of toilet paper and used paper towels in desperation. Or perhaps you were cleaning the sink and just shoved a paper towel down the drain to get rid of it.

Whatever the case may be, avoid doing that in the future. Paper towels are super absorbent, which means that instead of breaking down like toilet paper down in water, it will absorb water.

This causes it to expand and block the drain it’s in. To fix that, you’ll almost definitely need a plumber.

4. Medicine/Medication

Most medications and medicines won’t blog or block up your drain. However, that doesn’t mean they should go down the drain.

The chemicals and compounds in medications are bad for the environment. Throwing them down the drain could leech those chemicals into water, surrounding soils, plants, etc. This can cause serious environmental damage, food/water contamination, and more.

5. Paint

Paint is usually either latex or oil-based. We already know why an oil based paint would be bad for your drains from our grease section, but what about latex?

Latex won’t degrade in water. This can lead to buildup and clogs in your drains.

Also, the chemicals in paint can do the same (and worse!) damage that the chemicals in medications do to the environment. Look at the paint container or online to see the best and safest way to dispose of your paint.

Don’t Put These Things Down the Drain!

Hopefully, this article will save you from putting things down the drain that should be disposed of in other ways. This could save you and your pipes a whole lot of hardship.

For some, reading this post might be too little too late. Have you already put some of these things down your drain or in your sink, and now you’re experiencing issues?

Don’t worry: we can help. Contact us today.