Waste King L-2600 Legend Series 1/2 HP Continuous Feed Operation Waste Disposer
by Waste King
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List Price: Our Price: Calculated in a shopping cart Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Tools See more product details |
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Tools and Hardware Reviews of Waste King L-2600 Legend Series 1/2 HP Continuous Feed Operation Waste Disposer
Customer Review: Great product for a great price
Summary: 4 Stars
I purchased this garbage disposal to replace a broken one in my rental house. I've never installed one before, but after reading the reviews on here and watching a few YouTube videos, I decided to save some money and install in myself.
Hopefully, some of this information can be helpful to you...
Remove the power cord - 10 minutes
My old garbage disposal was hard wired so the first thing I did was remove the power cord attached to the unit. I knew this was going to be difficult to remove, thanks to other posters on here, so I decided to do it before I actually went to the rental house. A few days before installation, I sat down in front of the TV, grabbed a utility knife, and slowly cut away the black rubber stopper (strain relief). Eventually, I was able to detach the rubber stopper and pull out the power cord. You will also have to cut the power cord in half because the plug is too large to fit through the hole in the unit.
Remove the old garbage disposal - 15 minutes
Before you do anything, turn off the power supply to the garbage disposal! I suggest watching some YouTube videos of people removing old garbage disposals. These videos can be extremely helpful as you can see exactly how to detach the disposal. It can be a bit tricky and I would never have known to use a screw driver to loosen it, or that there is a tiny metal ring that you have to pry out before the mounting unit will come apart. Basically, unhook the wiring, the drain pipe, and the dishwasher hose. Unscrew the three bolts, then use a screw driver to loosen the garbage disposal. Once it's removed, dismantle the mounting unit. You do that by prying out this thin metal ring. Again...check out some videos online.
Installing the new garbage disposal - 60 minutes
When you disassemble the EZ mounting unit, be sure to notice exactly how it all fits together. This was a pain for me, as I couldn't figure out how the actual garbage disposal connected to the mounting unit. The last two pieces of the mounting unit are a metal ring and a black rubber ring. For the life of me I couldn't figure out how those two pieces held onto the garbage disposal. It wasn't until I went back to the instructions and noticed an insert with some extra 'important' instructions that helped me out. Anyway, this was very frustrating and took me about 20 - 30 minutes to figure out, but once I did, it's easy.
Make sure the sink is clean before you begin. If you don't have a stainless steel sink, purchase some plumbers putty before you begin. Begin from the top down, installing the EZ mount unit. Once the unit is attached to the sink, then you'll need to attach the actual garbage disposal. If you had a dishwasher hose running from the old unit, don't forget to pop out the white plastic stopper out of the new unit. Just use a hammer and a screw driver and it pops right out. Also, I attached my wiring (black on black and then white on white) before I attached the garbage disposal to the mounting unit. I don't think it matters either way, it was just easier for me to do.
I didn't need to use the black piece of plumbing pipe that came with the unit as my old piping was a perfect fit. But unfortunately, the rubber seal around the pipe that fit into the garbage disposal was still stuck in the old one, so I didn't realize it was gone...when I attached the pipe and eventually turned on the water, it leaked everywhere. I thought I really screwed up, but quickly realized my mistake. I just removed the black rubber seal off the piping that came with the new disposal, reattached the plumbing, and all was good! Turned the power back on...and voila...it worked.
Anyway, ladies, if I can do it, you can do it too. In total, after researching, watching videos and actually installing, it probably took me a little over 2 hours. However, if I did it again tomorrow, I really feel like I could do it in about 40 minutes. :)
Customer Review: Check to see if you have an electircal outlet under the sink to plug this into before buying.
Summary: 1 Stars
First, I'm a bad DIY-er and limp along with projects that are even rated "easily performed in 2 hours". For those of you who are pros, you might read this review and say, "Well, duh!", so bear with me. I watched lots of YouTube videos about how to replace the garbage disposal and wanted to purchase a disposal that was a good value for the money. We're not members of Consumer Reports so Amazon is a great, great place to get ratings on products. I also wanted to purchase a product that was made in the States, if possible, because of the current economic situation (shout out to Ohio - where I'm from). Saw this disposer and seemed like it was highly rated by reviewers and a great buy for the money, so purchased it. (I didn't see in the description that it noted where it was manufactured. Maybe I just overlooked it.)
When it arrived I saw that it DID have a power cord (as stated in description but I hadn't understood what that meant exactly when I read it - basically it's a plug in disposer) but knew I DIDN'T have a socket/outlet under my sink to plug it into. (Who knew new houses were being built with electrical outlets under the sink to plug in disposals? I didn't.) I considered trying to take the cord out of the disposer, I wondered if that's what the pros do, but just had no idea of even where to begin that undertaking. All of the videos I watched had shown how to "wire in" (for lack of a more technical term) a new disposer. Just replacing the disposal made me nervous enough, so the idea of pulling out a cord or installing an electrical outlet under the sink was too much for me - I'm a home improvement pansy.
I put this unit back in the box. I hopped in the car and went to my big box home improvment retailer and purchased an Insikerator Badger for $30 more than this one.
Highlights of the story:
If I HAD had an electrical outlet under the sink, this would have been a BREEZE to install (even for me). For novices, check right now to see if you have an outlet under the sink to plug the disposer into (a newer house) or if you have to wire it in (older house).
If you are a novice, get advice about whether the power cord on this unit can be removed and then whether the unit can be installed using the traditional wiring in method. Maybe pros do this all the time, I dunno but it scared me (and there were no instructions in the instruction manual about how to do this - too risky for me). If you are handy and you really, really want to use this product, it might be worth your while to install an electrical socket under the sink.
The unit I received said it was made in a foreign country - not the US.
The Badger I bought at my big box store cost $30 more than the Waste King but said it was made in the US. (Or at the very least the box was.)
I wished I had known, or more thoroughly understood, that this was a plug in disposal because then, instead of buying a Badger InSinkerator at the local big box retailer, I would have bought it through Amazon and saved $26. When you're learning, you win some and lose some.
Because I had both units out, I felt (though didn't weigh them) that the Badger was heavier than the Waste King (more steel?).
Customer Review: Impressive product and customer support
Summary: 5 Stars
Like several of the other reviewers, I purchased this to replace a Badger 5. I found the Waste King product impressive on a number of areas. The warranty is five years and it includes in-home service, which is a rarity nowadays. Some of the larger Waste King models (1 Hp) have a lifetime in-home warranty. I looked at them, but decided to go with the ½ HP version since I only use the disposal for plate scrapings (bones go in the trash and vegetable peelings go into the compost pile) and didn't want to buy way more disposal than I needed.
Waste King offers two mounting options - the traditional three bolt method, and the EZ method. This model is the EZ method and, true to its name, is really easy! Very clear instructions come with the unit, plus there are videos on the Waste King site to walk you through the process. If you have even the most basic of tool skills and can follow instructions, this is a job you can handle.
The other feature I liked about the EZ mount option was that the rubber guard (the piece of rubber at the top of the opening that you push scraps through) is removable for cleaning. It is not removable in the 3 bolt mounting option and, considering how horrible the one looked in my Badger after a few years, I wanted something that I could take out and clean (or replace). But, all the parts in the 3 bolt option are stainless steel, whereas there are plastic parts in the EZ mount option. The plastic seems sturdy enough, so I hope it will last a long time.
I'm especially pleased to report that Waste King has outstanding customer service. I emailed them some questions before I ordered, and they replied in a few hours, and answered all my questions in full (versus just those canned boilerplate responses you sometimes get from companies). After it arrived I had a question regarding if the sink flange (the part you see when you look into the sink) was plastic or stainless. So I called them and got an answer very quickly (it is stainless). Very pleasant phone call, and minimal (3 or 4 min) hold time.
Product works great. It runs faster (higher RPM) than the Badger, so it grinds quicker. Not as ultra quiet as the really high end ones, but less noise than the Badger. It has stainless cutters which should outlast the galvanized ones in the Badger by a long time.
Works well, easy to install, great warranty, excellent customer support, great price. What more could you want!
Customer Review: Quiet, strong and cheap, best warranty. Get it.
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this to replace 20 year old ISE disposer which lost both of its blades and was pretty much useless.
Installation was almost plug-and-play except for the sink flange piece. I had to remove old one (couple of minutes), clean some old plumber's putty and make sure contact surface is clean before I put the new one on. Since I have stainless steel sink, the supplied rubber gasket was just fine to use alone. The outlet orientation and dishwasher inlet were in exact same spot as the previous disposer so I didn't have to mock around with that - perfect compatibility.
Last was electrical hook up. The disposer comes with around 2-3 feet of cable with standard 3 prong plug on one end... I had to cut it off and make electrical connection to old cable. Manual covers that and tells exactly which prong should be hooked up to which color of wire on the other cable. Similarly to plumber's putty, there were no wire caps included with the disposer.
At this point I was finished so I decided to test the efficiency of this disposer... I took all the bits and pieces of food (nut shells, carrots, etc, stuff that old broken disposer could not chew), almost full chamber of it and stuffed it into the new disposer... It chewed thru all of it in about 10s, truly amazing. No wonder since this disposer spins at 2600 rpms which is something like 2x as fast than usual disposer in its class. It is also VERY quiet. When operating in normal fashion (not full chamber of hard stuff at once), you won't even notice much more noise when throwing stuff inside since the food gets chewed into little pieces immediately and has no time to bounce around the chamber generating noise and vibrations for sink to amplify.
The disposer comes with removable splash guard that sits about 2 inches below sink line inside of the flange. It also comes with sink plug, you insert it inside the flange. It is a very effective plug too.
I think this is the best bang for the bucks these days since for one, it is all stainless steel blades and chamber walls secondly it comes with 5 year in home warranty and life time rust warranty.
For comparison, I went to Lowes/HD and what did I find for this price? The cheapest they had was ISE Badger 1 which was actually $76 + tax. That one is noisy as hell, has galvanized steel parts (will rust in couple of years) and very short warranty...
Customer Review: OK disposer
Summary: 4 Stars
I bought the Waste King L-2600 1/2 hp disposer to replace an old Whirlaway 1/3 hp (which is made by the same company) that had broken after many years of use. The L-2600 is an upgrade and was an easy replacement, since it uses the same mounting system as the Whirlaway. In fact, I just re-used the existing sink flange and support ring/mount ring hardware already installed on the sink, and the new L-2600 fit right on (it uses a "bayonet-style" mounting system, so all you do is turn a locking ring to mount it). I'll save the newer sink-mount components for use with a new replacement sink I intend to buy later.
The price of the L-2600 from Amazon was right for my purpose, and free shipping was fast enough. The power difference between 1/3 hp (the original) and 1/2 (the L-2600) is not really significant, but this one comes with a stainless steel turntable (the part that rotates at high speed) and stainless steel pulverizing (swivel impeller) hammers, which is an upgrade from the Whirlaway.
Although this unit has a plastic outer housing that is supposedly noise-insulated (it says-so right on the box), I really could not discern a difference from the non-insulated Whirlaway it replaced. In any case, I use it only occasionally and it only runs for a short time, so the noise is not an issue for me (for comparison, a slightly higher-priced Insinkerator brand that I installed for my parents 2 years ago is noticeably quieter, but would have been too large to fit the space I had). Waste King does make more expensive versions with higher power and better noise insulation, if that's important to you, but they are also physically bigger.
As far as performance, it seems to work well enough for my purposes (mostly plate scrapings, vegetable peels, etc; no large bones or other really hard-to-grind items). It is not commercial quality, but for that you would probably have to pay hundreds more. I have been using it for a little over a month now, and have had no issues with it.
This unit comes with a power cord and 120-volt household plug, for use with a typical under-sink switched outlet, but the cord can be removed if you need to hard-wire it to a junction box. Drain pipe connection is standard for home-use disposers (plastic tail-piece), from what I have seen, and it can take a dishwasher drain connection (you have to remove a simple plastic plug).