August 18th, 2008
Sound Advice: What I learned from the dishwasher repair man
It was a classic problem, dishwasher’s not running properly, call the repair man. I was sure the machine was defective, or perhpas that pipes weren’t properly connecting, causing one in four loads to end up with standing water after the cycle was complete. You can imagine my embarrasment when I learned that the dishwasher was only performing poorly becuase I wasn’t running it properly.
The repair man, let’s call him Pete, opened the door in midcycle to show me a half foot of suds. This is not good, Pete instructed. The suds are hurting the machine. But all I ever do is fill the suds up to the fill line, swing shut the lid and give a firm press to the rinse aid. That’s the problem, Pete explained. Apparently the detergent companies are in cahoots with the dishwasher manufacturers to get us to over consume on detergent, maybe even in hopes that you’ll break the machine and have to get a new one. Pointing to the extra detergent reservoir — the one you’re supposed to use for those particularly nasty Thanksgiving style loads, he said the detergent companies pay the manufacturers to design that spot. Next he pulled out a permanent marker and drew a notch about 3/4 of the way down the fill basin - that’s where you should fill to, about two tablespoons. And the rinse aid, ditch it. Not only does the rinse aid contribute to oversuddsing, it’s applied during the final rinse so basically, when your dishes come out, rinse aid is still on it. When I checked the rinse aid bottle for ingredients to better understand what I was consuming, all I found was a long list of chemical warnings and first aid recommendations. Next we’ll learn that rinse aid causes cancer in addition to removing pesky dried water spots.
Now to see what that noise is in my washing machine…
