Construction & Contractors Blog
When planning and installing a whole new kitchen, you have a lot of options to personalize the space. You can customize everything from the light fixtures to the appliances, to the flooring and countertops, to even the drainage system. Although it's not the most glamorous part of the kitchen renovation, your drainage system should be part of this customization as well.
Here are a few drain features and upgrades to consider adding for your new kitchen.
1. Grease trap
In some cases, you may want to add a grease trap to your kitchen sink drain pipes. Although these aren't standard in residential kitchens, they can be useful if you do a lot of cooking or have other habits that mean lots of grease ends up in the drains. A grease trap, as the name indicates, catches the grease to prevent grease clogs in your drain.
Although some grease traps are installed out of doors, your construction contractor can also install a smaller model inside your kitchen, under the sink for easy access.
2. Larger diameter drain pipe
Kitchen drainpipes leading away from your sink are typically a 1.5 inch size, although some are even smaller. However, if you're tired of dealing with narrow, easily clogged drains, you could ask your construction contractor to use larger drainpipes (such as a 2 inch diameter pipe) so the drains have more capacity.
3. Pipe insulation
In some climates, drainpipes may freeze up and make drains unusable in winter. If you've had problems with this issue, you may want to add insulation to your drain pipes. This is particularly important if your kitchen drains enter an unheated space (such as a basement or garage) as soon as they leave the kitchen. Make sure to protect the pipe along its entire length, not just the part that's in the kitchen.
4. Graywater system to reuse water
If you're interested in living an eco-friendly lifestyle, you may want to reuse some of your graywater (lightly used wastewater, as opposed to extremely dirty or contaminated wastewater, which is known as black water or sewage). One way to reuse this water is to have plumbing installed that drains the water from your sink into a holding tank that you can then use to irrigate your landscaping.
These are just some of the customizations and upgrades you can include with the drainage system when you're designing and planning a new kitchen install. Talk to your contractors about the possibility of these or other options to add more functionality and help your drains work more smoothly.
Share24 February 2021
My name is Debbie Greenberg. I’m a single woman who owns her home, and like most homeowners I dread home repairs. I’m not very handy with do-it-yourself projects around the house. I can do a few minor repairs when necessary, but for the most part I have to call in a professional. Last year I had a leak in my roof. When it rained, water would leak into my kitchen. What appeared to be a simple fix turned out to be anything but simple. It took over four months to finally identify the problem, and double the money I was initially quoted to fix it. The problem ended up being that the flat part of my roof didn't have shingles, but a sheeting material. I learned a bit about home roofs along the way, and that is what I want to share with you.
