Returning MVC partial view to jQuery memory leak

Question

I'm writing an application in MVC to output a table View. One of the columns in the table contains an action link that loads up a jQuery UI dialog. When I save the data from the dialog I call a GridRefresh controller method that grabs the newly stored data and returns a partial view back through ajax to repaint the grid with the new partial view html. I use the $('#mainGrid').html(data) jQuery call to overwrite the html on the page. This call does as it should and correctly replaces the contents of the Div, but I end up with a 4mb leak every-time the RefreshGrid function is called. I've tried numerous fixes from articles online including: using .empty(), .remove(), .replaceWith(), clearing jQuery.fragments, clearing the div element using javascript(getElementById). Nothing seems to work.

Note: The data size of the response with the html view is around 1.2MB, could the size be causing my troubles? I am using MVC3 with jQuery 1.10.2 and IE9

MVC Controller

[HttpPost]
public PartialViewResult RefreshGrid(DateTime effectiveDate, String searchVal)
{
    if (Request.IsAjaxRequest())
    {
        var gridModel = new GridModel();

        LoadGridDataFromDB(effectiveDate,searchVal);
        return PartialView("Grid", gridModel);
    }

    return null;
}

Ajax/jQuery

$.ajax({
  url: "Home/RefreshGrid",
  type: "post",
  data: {
         effectiveDate: effectiveDate,
         searchVal: searchVal
  },
  dataType: "html",
  success: function(data){
    alert("success");
    $("#mainGrid").html(data);
  },
  error:function(){ alert("failure");}
});

Answer 1

Have you tried accomplishing the same functionality using plain MVC - Ajax.BeginForm should do the trick. I have used it numerous times and I have never noticed any memory leaks. A simple example would be

View.cshtml

@using (Ajax.BeginForm("Action_name", "Controller_name", new AjaxOptions {
                                        InsertionMode = InsertionMode.Replace,
                                        HttpMethod = "POST"
                                        ...})
{
   Html.Partial("PartialView_name")
}