I have the Hafele silver pedal opener--love it! It is harder to close the door (than it would be w/out the opener) because of the bungees, but I really like being able to open the trash cab without touching the handle with icky hands. Our cab installer kept playing around to get the door to close more flush with the adjacent cabs during our install. I called Hafele and was told to have our KD/cab guys contact them and they'd arrange to send their own tech out to take a look and make any necessary adjustments. I made the appt with an area rep who came along with the tech (who lives a few towns over from us). They were both as nice as could be, made a few simple adjustments (tightened some screws mostly) and left me their cards if we have need of their services in the future. I do find that if I don't close the door tightly (with a little force), it doesn't close as tightly/flush as I'd like. Then, I just pop it open, and close it again. We have a full height 24" wide door on our trash cab BTW. The only time I ever find the pedal opener to be annoying in the least, is if I'm cleaning up the kitchen, and end up closing and opening the door a million times because I keep thinking I've thrown out the last piece of garbage, but I keep coming across one more piece of trash to toss out!

I have to say that when I had a group of young (that is, younger than me) friends over and they saw our freestanding trash compactor, they laughed and said they hadn't seen one since they were kids. Thanks! In any case, we replaced it with trash cans under the sink when we did the reno. Our small kitchen didn't have space for a pullout or we might have gone that way. How many people live in your house? When all 3 kids were growing up, the trash compactor was marvelous. When it got to be just the 2 of us, it could take 3 weeks to fill. We made separate trash runs for smelly things like meat trays. If you have a houseful of people, I say replace it until you do your reno and then reevaluate. You're unlikely to be sorry you have it, and it's so much easier not trying to blend a new element into a cabinet run that you're going to replace anyway.

Sorry to bump this after so much time. Here's a picture of the trash compactor. This is the pull out trash/recycling system that I want. http://www.pullsdirect.com/rev-a-shelf-5349-2150dm-2-5349-series-double-50-quart-pull-out-waste-container-with-soft-close-slides/p1573591. It says that it fits in a 15 inch width cabinet. It took me this long to contact a few custom cabinet makers in my area. 2 of them have told me that to replace the trash compactor with the double pull out trash/recycling that I want, I would need to not only have a cabinet door/face, but also they'd need to create a cabinet box and a frame too. However, by doing this, the width of the side of the cabinet box would mean that they wouldn't be able to put in the pull-out that I want, which needs a width of 14.8 inches (the trash compactor is 15 inches), so I'd need to select a different one, which would have a much smaller bin size. The one I want has 2 50 quart bins, and I would have to go down to 2 27 quart bins, I think, to get it to fit, which is a big difference. I'm also talking to a third custom cabinet guy who said that there might be a way to be able to put in a "floor" to where the trash compactor was, so he could install the double pull out I want (which is bottom mounted, not side mounted) without any sides, and then put some type of frame at the top only, so something that the cabinet door could rest against while closed, but said he'd have to think about how to create it, and get back to me. I'm waiting to hear from him to see if he's thought of something that would work. In addition, the price estimates I've gotten so far were substantially higher than I was expecting. Alison, I'd love to know the details of how you and your dh did this. Did you add a whole cabinet box? If not, what did you mount your pullout to, and what does your door rest against? I would appreciate any ideas. Thanks! Here is a link that might be useful: rev-a-shelf double pull out

I considered moving the trash to a different cabinet that is smaller, but I really want to keep it near the sink. (although it is currently located under my cooktop and I actually really like it there!) And I can't deduct 3" from that cabinet and add it to another because of where it's located (between supersusan corner cabinet and sink cabinet) The space will be completely divided by a wood partition from top to bottom, front to back, so I hope that garbage doesn't get in there!! However, I really only wanted to keep serving trays in there, which I don't use all that often and would probably rinse off before use anyway. Badgergal, that's exactly what I was thinking!! Was it difficult to get the trash hardware placed on the door exactly where it needed to be so that the door would fit into place correctly? That's my concern...especially since the doors are inset. I'll probably leave this for my contractor but I kind of need a plan in place to know if I should order an unattached door for that cabinet (to attach to garbage) or a regular door that opens to the side.