Damn The Dishwasher!

Well, it’s finally happened. I’ve been expecting this for some time, actually. The dishwasher is dying.

Now just about two years ago (actually not quite, if I recall — anywhere between 18 and 24 months), I broke down and bought one of those $200 countertop dishwashers which are few and far between, but just perfect for our amount of real estate. I’d actually skeptically looked at it for quite some time prior to the purchase…but always held off — for fear of it just being junk.

Much to my surprise, it wasn’t “junk” — granted, it’s nothing special to look at — but it works quite well actually. And it doesn’t get daily use…a few times a week at most. It did what it was supposed to, and things worked quite well…

… until tonight.

After supper, I prepped it and started it just like normal. It filled and began to run, at which point in time I knew something was wrong. It wasn’t running at the same ‘speed’ as normal…and seemed to be making a funny noise. So I tinkered with it to some degree, and ultimately found that the plastic nut which joins the rotating (stainless steel) spray arm to the body of the dishwasher was cracked and broken.

Could this be the culprit? It’s very possible, especially since the water pressure itself is what rotates the spray arm. Upon further investigation (e.g. removing the spray arm assembly and running the machine), I discovered that the low water pressure means the pump ‘sucks’ a lot more (e.g. the pump itself provides a good deal of pressure)…and the basin was actually sucking itself dry frequently.

So, I looked up the nearest parts/service dealer…and at the same time looked up the product online.

It was in my online search of the product that I discovered numerous comments from owners of these particular models…namely in regards to things going wrong…ironically enough after over a year’s worth of use.

Included in this information was somewhat frequent replacement of the water pump…and the same plastic nut breaking. Now, I’m guessing here, but our mileage on this dishwasher may be about the same as those who would’ve used it very frequently over the course of a year or so.

So I’m in a bit of a bind…and need to make some calls in the early morning to see if I can get replacement parts. Fortunately there are two outlet stores in Alexandria (just 45 minutes from here) which can provide service…so between the two, I should be able to get the problem figured out.

And in the meantime, it’s just gonna have to chug along until it truly dies…or gets fixed.

I would say that it could get replaced by another (or different) unit, but that completely depends upon price and size…

This post was upgraded to the MZ Online Blog on 8/25/07