InSinkErator COMPACT Evolution 3/4 HP Continuous Garbage Disposal

Update: It's 2024 and this same unit is still going strong. It even carried over through a kitchen remodel last year since it was in perfect working order. Other than getting a new baffle for very cheap all else is original. Great disposal.***Important Note!*** Don't do what I did and forget to knock out the dishwasher hookup plug before you get the whole thing mounted up under your sink. That is, of course, as long as you're using the dishwasher hookup. I was lucky enough to remember before I ran my dishwasher, but it was a pain to knock it out under the sink.The previously installed disposal in my kitchen was an Insinkerator Badger 5 of unknown age. It failed in typical fashion due to internal seals breaking down and eventually causing water to leak through the bottom of the case.The best thing about this new unit was that it went in place with no adjustments to the rest of the plumbing. It was an exact fit for the Badger. I replaced the sink flange with all the new mounting hardware, which was perfectly simple. The new unit is relatively quiet and seems effective at disposing what little waste I use it for. I will say that it seems substantially more quiet when actually grinding up food waste than the Badger was, and I'm sure it is due to the combination of sound-dampening and grinding efficiency design improvements over such models. In my opinion, nobody *needs* to spend hundreds more for a disposal quieter than this one for anything more than bragging rights. It's a machine designed to pulverize your food waste into a slurry to go down your drains, and, from what I can tell, the sound of water running in my sink is almost louder than the sound of this unit grinding up my week-old leftovers.I will speak to the rate of water draining through the rubber baffle, as I've seen some people complain about it. In my own experience, I've seen no issues with slow drainage. My sink faucet has an aerator as most down nowadays, which reduces water flow. However, I tested it without the aerator using full water flow from the tap, and still had no problems with water draining through the baffle. If I dump a huge pot of water into the sink, does it drain more slowly than a regular sink drain? Absolutely. That's to be expected. The baffle does have a smaller opening than my previous unit for sure, and I do often have to push food scraps through, but this doesn't bother me. The smaller opening does make the unit quieter by creating a barrier of water as stated in the literature, and it's also less prone to the garbage slurry splashing back out while operating, which did sometimes happen with my Badger.The only tricky part of install was getting the quick mount collar rotated far enough to fully latch. I ended up using a large screw driver slipped between one of the mounting screws and the throat of the flange as a lever to hold the sink flange in place while I rotated the quick-mount collar in the opposite direction with the jam-release tool. This is critical since I've read several reviews around the internet where people had their disposer fall off several weeks after installation. I'd bet it was because they didn't fully engage the collar until it reached the stops. This can be a simple thing to overlook. I nearly did it myself.My previous disposal was hard-wired to a switch inside the cabinet under the sink. Not exactly an ideal arrangement. I rewired the switch as a GFCI outlet and bought the power cord kit (InSinkErator CRD-00 Power Cord Kit) for the new disposal along with the InSinkErator STS-00 Dual Outlet SinkTop Switch. This was a great choice and now makes using the disposer much simpler than opening the cabinet, hunting for the switch, dumping food waste, hunting for the switch in the cabinet again, and shutting the door. I know, first-world problems.If I discount the time it took for the electrical work I had to do (about two hours), the disposal install itself took no more than an hour. I'm pretty handy, but if all someone is doing is a direct replacement for another Insinkerator, it should be a fairly simple job.My only minor complaint is that this unit didn't include a power cord, which is a separate purchase if one is not hard-wiring it. In my case I was moving from hard-wired to plug-in installation. Most installations of disposals seem to be going to plug-in judging by the modern homes I've seen over the past few years. I do realize the benefit of waste reduction however in not including the cord for those who would be hard-wiring. It would simply be another part headed for the landfill or squirreled away in a homeowner's miscellaneous junk drawer. Simply be sure you know which type of install you've got and buy the extra parts if needed.I spent a fair bit of time trying to decide between this Insinkerator and a couple units from Waste King which were less expensive. In the end I chose the Insinkerator for the benefit of a direct replacement for the Badger 5, and also seeing a good number of people complaining about failures of the Waste King EZ Mount system used to attach the disposal to the sink flange. There was a lot of talk of plastic parts failing, and I decided that the tried and true Insinkerator mounting system (all metal) seemed like a better choice in the long run. Time will tell if this disposal proves to be reliable and lasts an expected number of years.

This has been a workhorse. We love it. It’s quiet and gets the job done.

Installation:I've never really done any plumbing, and before installing this unit, the thought of doing any plumbing sounded insane.Useful information: I was replacing a 1/3 HP GE disposal that is probably at least 13 years old. It was installed either by the previous homeowner or by the home builder (25 years ago). It made a lot of noise when it ran and sounded like it would be dying soon. It did still break down food, but slowly, so the sink would sometimes get backed up when we used it.I was planning to pay a plumber to come and install this unit, but hearing that it would take a plumber 1-2 hours to install meant another $100-200 on top of the cost of the disposal, which may be worth every dollar it cost, but is still expensive ($174 when I bought it from Amazon). So, I decided to try my hand at installing it. I figured I'd use an afternoon, and worst case, I wouldn't be able to figure it out, and I'd call someone to come install it tomorrow.Before purchasing this unit, I noticed two things in many of the comments:1) The unit does not come with a power cable. That needs to be purchased separately.2) Installation also required plumber's putty, which ranges in price from about .99 to $15, depending on how much you buy. I spent the $15 by buying a large container (14oz). You could probably get away with 1-2 oz -- maybe even less. It is only used to create a good seal between the flange (the park of the disposal that sticks through the sink) and the sink. If you already have an InSinkErator installed, you probably do not need to replace that part, so you don't need the putty. If you have a different brand installed, you should buy some.There are a few things to determine before installing this unit:1) Do you have an outlet under your sink? I did not, but I had a wire coming directly from the wall that went into the old disposal. I was able to easily unhook the wires from the old disposal and connect them to this one. I did buy the InSinkErator power cable kit from Amazon, just in case, and I'm glad I did. Even though I did not use the power cable itself, I did use the wire nuts and the Romex connector. No matter what, you will need 2 wire nuts and a Romex connector. Buying them outside of the kit would probably cost less than a dollar total, so if you're interested in saving money, I recommend that. If you're nervous about the installation, like I was, just spend the $8 and buy the kit and you'll have everything you need (aside from the plumber's putty mentioned above).2) Are you hooking your dishwasher up to the disposal. If so, be sure to follow that step in the instructions to remove the dishwasher plug or it won't work.3) Are you replacing an InSinkErator? If so, you probably will not need to remove the collar from the sink that holds the disposal up. This will shorted installation time drastically.4) Is anyone available to help you? It's a good idea to have a second set of hands when you are uninstalling your old disposal and when you are installing the new disposal's collar to your sink. I needed my wife to push down on the sink to keep me from pushing the new collar up through the drain hole. It would have been much much harder to do this job alone, even though 95% of it is easy to do alone.So anyway, back to installation... The first step was to remove the old unit. The instructions that came with the InSinkErator described how to remove an InSinkErator, but I had an old GE unit. I tried following the instructions, but eventually had to figure it out myself. It was not difficult though -- just look for screws and unscrew them. The removal of the old unit is definitely the hardest part of a new disposal installation. Some of the existing screws can be difficult to reach and over-tightened. However, once it was removed, installation of the new unit was simple. The total process of removing the old unit and installing the new one took about 1.5 hours -- way less time than I expected.Operation:The unit purrs. I've never heard a disposal that was this quiet. It sounds just a bit louder than the ceiling fan spinning above my head at full speed in my room right now. It would not interrupt a conversation to turn the disposal on.The unit also vibrates very little. At first it vibrated a lot, but then I noticed that I had not tightened the unit in place as much as the instructions told me to. Once I tightened it a bit, there were no noticeable vibrations.Long-term:I literally just installed the unit 15 minutes ago, so I can't talk about how the unit will hold up in the long-term, but if it maintains its current operations, I'll be very happy.Additional notes: The instructions that come with the device are very clear and easy to follow. Just please note the extras that you will need to buy to install it. They are listed above.