If you run a restaurant, you will need to keep a close eye on your kitchen plumbing to make sure it stays in good working order. A key part of effective maintenance for a restaurant kitchen is regular grease trap pumping. The grease trap is a plumbing device designed to prevent fats, oils, and grease from entering your pipes, as these substances can easily solidify and create clogs.
In the same way that solid waste remains in a septic tank until it can be removed, grease will remain in the trap until it is removed, too. Most restaurants will need to schedule grease trap pumping every one to three months, but you may need to get your trap pumped in between regular sessions as well. In this article, our team at Degler Waste Services will go over a few signs that it’s time to get your grease trap cleaned out.
- Slow Drainage – One sign you need to schedule a grease trap pumping session is slow drains. If it is taking your kitchen sink a long time to fully empty of liquid, then it’s likely your drain pipe has become clogged with grease. Our team will remove the clog and get rid of all the accumulated fats in the grease trap to prevent the issue from occurring again.
- Foul Smells – Another sign you should schedule grease trap pumping as soon as possible is your kitchen taking on an unpleasant odor. Accumulated grease, oils, fats, food waste, and other sludge in your grease trap will start to smell over time, but you can get rid of this odor and prevent it from coming back by simply staying on top of your grease trap pumping schedule.
- Timing – The last sign we’ll go over here is simple timing. If it’s been longer than three months since your last grease trap pumping session, we encourage you to give us a call right away to schedule the next one.