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I have a dual bowl kitchen sink. The nondisposal side drain sits higher than the disposal side. The disposal drain connects to the nondisposal drain horizontally via a tee pipe. Sometimes when there is a lot to grind in the disposal the ground contents will shoot up into the nondisposal side then recede on down the pipe. My old house did not do this but the disposal was connected vertically to the nondispsoal drain. Can this be fixed (no shooting up of ground stuff in the nondisposal sink) with a horizontal tee joint? See attached image of my configuration.

Thanks, mHorizontal Diposal Connection

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  • Using a Wye instead of a Tee might help, but it doesn't look like you have the space available without a more significant reconfiguration.
    – brhans
    Commented Apr 18, 2019 at 15:06
  • Hi thanks for the info... I'll see how much space there is in that area.
    – Marvin Nicholson
    Commented Apr 18, 2019 at 16:54

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The cause of the water shooting up through the other sink is not caused by the disposal being on the lower sink. It is because the plumbing is not set up correctly.

When using a disposal you need to have slip joint baffle tee with tail piece. The baffle is inside the tee and it directs the water, that is being ejected from the disposal with force, downward.

With out the baffle the pressure is to great and the water will shoot the wrong way.

In the photo below the water comes from the disposal on the right, the baffle is in the tee. When the water hits the baffle in the tee it is directed downwards.

enter image description here

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  • Hi thanks for the feedback. I see the baffle tee in the picture is vertical. Will a baffle tee work in the horizontal orientation?
    – Marvin Nicholson
    Commented Apr 18, 2019 at 18:10
  • Your fittings are glued together so you are going to have to do a full re-plumb anyway, might as well do it correctly. Putting the disposal on the other sink will make thing easier. Not sure if you have a P-trap, possibly obscured behind the disposal. By code and for your well being, You must have one.
    – Alaska Man
    Commented Apr 18, 2019 at 18:29
  • 100% agree (except not all those fittings are glued, some are slip-joint); move the disposer to the shallow side and replumb the entire set up correctly, using a baffle tee. +1
    – Jimmy Fix-it
    Commented Apr 19, 2019 at 17:18
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The shallow sink is supposed to have the disposal on it, that's why it's a different depth. Move the disposal over to the other sink.

Does your sink drain slow too? Your drain is probably clogged which is probably the root cause this problem.

You may be overwhelming the disposal too, what's the typical stuff you put down there that causes this?

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  • Hi, thanks for the feedback. We just moved into this house about a month ago. Inspector did not identify anything related to this sink or disposal. Regarding what we put down it... generally left over food bits off dinner plates. We don't run it until we've kinda loaded it up after dinner. It happens if there is considerable food stuff in the disposal.
    – Marvin Nicholson
    Commented Apr 18, 2019 at 16:54
  • @MarvinNicholson - Besides considering swapping the disposer to the other sink, which is excellent advice, you may want to consider using your disposer differently. Start the water running into it and turn it on before you start stuffing things into it. This should help a lot until you can get around to changing the piping around.
    – Michael Karas ♦
    Commented Apr 19, 2019 at 10:18

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