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Best dishwasher


Michael M

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The longest cycle for me has been the normal cycle at 1 hour and 58 minutes.  It's definately long.  the economy is much less but doesn't dry as well, and the short program for very lightly soiled dishes is only 30 minutes.  But yes, it can be a pain.  If I'd had room, I'd have put in two dishwaswers, since mine seems to run all day long!

How do you kick off that short cylce? I've (of course) lost the manual and no button I push seems to make the stupid thing run any faster.

(And while I'm at it, I'll confess that I've never actually timed it--so maybe it is only 2 hours--just seems like forever!)

Feast then thy heart, for what the heart has had, the hand of no heir shall ever hold.
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There's no doubt they are long cycles. And mine may be a different model than yours since I have an electronic screen and it scrolls through the whole different 19 cycles and then I select one.

Edited to add, if you have your model number, you should be able to go to the Miele site and download the manual as well. :smile:

Edited by Marlene (log)

Marlene

Practice. Do it over. Get it right.

Mostly, I want people to be as happy eating my food as I am cooking it.

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the thing that interests me most about this discussion is everyone putting crystal in teh dishwasher. what kind of crystal are you using? one of hte banes of my dinner party existence is facing a counter full of wine glasses the next morning. i use spiegelau and reidel and i can break these quite easily hand-washing. do they really stand up to a dishwasher? i do have a friend who is a winemaker who found commercial glass trays (those big plastic ones) that fit his dishwasher. he screwed little dishwasher wheels in and uses that to replace his bottom rack.

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Russ I have put my reidel in the dishwasher for years and have never broken one. My good crystal for dinner parties is by da Vinci, and no problems with it either.

Marlene

Practice. Do it over. Get it right.

Mostly, I want people to be as happy eating my food as I am cooking it.

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The only crystal I do not put in the dishwasher has gold surface design - it is fired on but the gold leaf would be ruined in the dishwasher - the detergent is much too harsh for it and also for my antique procelain china which is hand-painted and gilded.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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Andiesenji, I'm jealous of your Hobart, but I'm afraid we have to fit the new dishwasher in the conventional 2-ft, under-the-counter space of the old one. At the moment I'm thinking I'll go with the Kenmore recommended in Consumer Reports and hope they've improved it in the last dozen years. Has anyone had any experience with the LG appliances that Home Depot and others carry?

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Andiesenji, I'm jealous of your Hobart, but I'm afraid we have to fit the new dishwasher in the conventional 2-ft, under-the-counter space of the old one. At the moment I'm thinking I'll go with the Kenmore recommended in Consumer Reports and hope they've improved it in the last dozen years. Has anyone had any experience with the LG appliances that Home Depot and others carry?

Mine fit right into the space the old one occupied. Hobart undercounter

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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No high-end appliances in my kitchen.  We got a Maytag (I think they usually make the Kenmore stuff too) from Best Buy a few years ago and love it.  Nice and deep and designed to hold a ton of dishes.

No, Maytag doesn't make Kenmore dishwashers. Whirlpool makes the regular Kenmore dishwashers while Bosch is responsible for Kenmore Elite. This is probably a good thing for Kenmore since Maytag has been having quality control issues for the past few years. According to Consumer Reports, Kenmore dishwashers are highly ranked, and have garnered the best buy spot. But, when I went to buy one, Sears discontinued the line that CR had called its best buy. Instead, according to the sale associates, what had replaced it was this model that was the most expensive model for the regular Kenmore dishwashers, more than a hundred dollars more expensive than the discontinued model. At that price, its no longer a best buy. And, I still have my doubts if this model was actually the successor to the discontinued model, or if Sears HQ had decided to tell its sales associates to steer all customers clutching Consumer Reports to its most expensive and profitable model.

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Just had installed a Maytag Quiet Series 300. It is very quiet. It replaces a Maytag that we ran very hard for 12 years with some minor repairs. The wash cycles are long but the cleaning is excellent. Only time will tell if there will be quality problems. The total cost with tax delivery and installation was a little over $500.

The Philip Mahl Community teaching kitchen is now open. Check it out. "Philip Mahl Memorial Kitchen" on Facebook. Website coming soon.

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Leviathan--What did you end up buying?

I ended up buying that particular model since Sears was having a sale on its appliances, and I was able to get a good deal on Kenmore appliances. I had also checked out Sears outlet, where they sold dented or scratched appliances, but passed on those since the difference in price, after accounting for the sale at Sears, wasn't that large, especially considering the condition of the goods at that outlet.

If there had been no discount, I think I may have passed on that particular model and either gotten a lower priced Kenmore or a low end Bosch since the difference between this particular Kenmore and a low end Bosch weren't that great. If I had been paying full retail price, the total cost including installation, would have been over $800.

But, if you do decide to go with Sears, you can probably save some money by not using Sears to install it. Sears ends up subcontracting it out to third parties, and you could save money by directly contacting those third parties. Sears just increased its delivery and instalation fee, but didn't even share any of that with these third parties who have seen their costs rise with the increase in fuel. The installer shared with me his costs, and he ends up getting less than half of what I paid Sears for installation, delivery, etc..

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the thing that interests me most about this discussion is everyone putting crystal in teh dishwasher. what kind of crystal are you using? one of hte banes of my dinner party existence is facing a counter full of wine glasses the next morning. i use spiegelau and reidel and i can break these quite easily hand-washing. do they really stand up to a dishwasher? i do have a friend who is a winemaker who found commercial glass trays (those big plastic ones) that fit his dishwasher. he screwed little dishwasher wheels in and uses that to replace his bottom rack.

We switched to the Schott Zwiesel Tritan Diva series for this reason -- we got tired of breaking wine glasses faster than we could buy new ones. But the style I chose has a nice long stem, which wouldn't fit in in the top rack of most dishwashers.

So, about six months ago, after 15 years of faithful, mostly trouble-free service, when our Asko dishwasher was going to require a repair of a few hundred dollars, I went shopping, wine glasses in hand. I hadn't expected to buy a high-end model, and certainly not another Asko, but darned if the only one that would securely hold my long stemware was -- another Asko. The model we ended up with is the D3251XLHD (I think). Sorry, I couldn't find a nice picture on the web of it's spacious interior racks.

Things we really like (in no particular order):

- You could fit dishes and pots for a family of elephants in this thing.

- The flatware container is spacious, has a nifty pullout cover for small items, and can be placed anywhere in the bottom rack.

- It's so quiet we can't tell if it's running.

- Everything comes out really clean, always.

- It's handle doubles as a nifty towel rack.

- You can set it to start running automatically in five hours, so you can keep adding the inevitable glass here, spoon there, and not worry about forgetting to turn it on before you go to bed.

- The controls are simple, even though there are more cycle variations than you could possibly ever use. Like you can run a load for just the top rack or just the bottom rack. Why, I have no idea...

- We shake off or scrape large pieces of food, but otherwise don't rinse or fuss.

- We use tiny amounts of powdered detergent from 7th Generation.

- It uses very little water, and dries pretty well even on energy saver.

- Top rack holds long stem wine glasses securely, and adjusts to hold small bowls and stuff like that.

- The bottom rack pulls *all* the way out, so you can load conveniently all the way to the back.

- The "food catcher" thing in the bottom is *vastly* improved over older models and trivial to pop out and rinse, should any really large chunks of food (or a stray piece of jewelry) get into the load by accident.

Only down sides:

- Stainless steel door surface attracts waterspots. (I ignore them. A more fastidious housekeeper might care.)

- Controls are completely hidden when the door is closed, and it's so quiet, you can't tell when it's finished! We set it to beep, but the beep is so civilized, we never hear it. Mostly, we feel the door for any machine vibration or heat, and just kind of guess how long ago we started it. We usually run it at night, anyway.

- It holds so many dishes, sometimes we have to run it before it's full because we've run out of bowls or something.

When I bought it, I also asked about the cost of parts, and yes, they cost maybe $10 or $20 on average over say a Miele or Bosh, but the labor is the main cost anyway, and that's going to be the same. When the installer came, he showed me how cleverly they had designed access to the main parts that would have to be serviced. I was impressed.

Besides which, it came with a three year full warranty, parts & labor; 5 year parts; and lifetime on the stainless steel tub and inner door panel.

And no, I haven't lost a single wineglass since we made the switch, and they get stuffed carelessly into the dishwasher daily.

- L.

Edited by Lapin d'Argent (log)
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From my m experience Zanussi never caused me a problem and only left behind when I moved.

In the new place I went for top of the range AEG and it's been nothing but trouble (the same goes for the washer/dryer) it seems, from my experience and others tales when AEG involves anything plumbed in has problems.

AEG - jam detector keeps failing, dishes/pans come out unclean (and we're not talking baked on stuff - or at least it wasn't till it went through the drying cycle). When it does work it's great quiet, red dot on the floor to show operation, easy to load with multiple options just not reliable.

However for things not plumbed in the AEG induction Hob, Steam/Conventional Oven, Microwave and Espresso Machine are brilliant.

Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana.

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  • 1 year later...

Bumping this thread up to see if anyone has anything new to add in the last two years. Our KitchenAid is finally having serious problems, after about 17 years of pretty good performance. It wasn't quiet, and didn't even do a fabulous job of cleaning, but it was satisfactory and until now the only problem has been a broken latch for five years that necessitates the use of a grapefruit knife to open the door. But it worked without a singe service call for 17 years. (No replacement latches exist.) It replaced a 30yr old KitchenAid that was in it's death throes when we moved in.

I'm looking at low-end Bosch and KA. I've eliminated the snazzy looking LG on the basis of some dreadful reviews. My husband is intrigued by the Bosch drying system--me not so much. It appears that the hookup is pretty different, and perhaps the hookup would be easier w/another KitchenAid. One thing about the KA I liked was the "energy-saver dry" button, which simply stopped the machine before the heat-dry. In another hour or so the dishes were dry enough to put away. I don't know if the new ones have this option.

I want quiet, but I don't need silent. I'm sure both would be quiet enough for us. We are now only two people and don't even run the dishwasher every day. My most important criteria are reliable performance, longevity and good design. We rinse well before loading and don't put pots and pans in as a rule. I want stainless interior and a top shelf tall enough for salad plates and wine glasses. I was sad to see that all the new dishwashers have seemingly cheesy racks. Our 17yr old racks appear to be steel coated with a very durable material and still look excellent.

I prefer the look of the stainess panel, but it sounds like white might be easier to keep looking clean or free of spots (white is what we have now.) Do you think that's the case? I don't want to constantly be noticing the panel. White is cheaper of course. The kitchen can probably live with either stainless or white, since the range is ss and the fridge is white.

So any new thoughts on these two brands? Also, any thoughts on the idea of the fully integrated controls as opposed to controls on the front panel? Thanks!

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I now have a Bosch SHX43M for several months and I love it.

It replaced a Hobart commercial undercounter unit that had been in place since '94 when my kitchen was remodeled.

Unless dishes are heavily soiled and/or I am washing greasy pots and pans, I use the Quick Wash setting (35 minutes) and it does a terrific job.

It is very quiet, in fact it is difficult to be sure when it is on - the controls are hidden when the door is closed.

It beeps when the cycle is finished.

I don't use the drying cycle as I prefer to simply open the door a few inches and allow the residual heat to dry the contents. This works fine for me and I prefer to save the energy.

I did not like the flatware basket that came with it so I called Bosch and they sent me (at NO charge) the basket that comes with the SHX45M which can be taken apart and one can use just half of it, which allows extra space for other things in the bottom rack.

One of my neighbors has the basic Bosch unit and is not as happy with it as I am with mine. She has a rather frugal husband who didn't want to spend the extra $$$ but finds that sometimes she has to repeat a wash cycle without detergent as it leaves some soapy stuff behind.

I have never had that problem, even with the quick wash cycle.

I use the Electrasol Powerball Tabs and have no spotting or streaks on crystal or china.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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Well the Bosch, like all Euro DWs, doesn't use a heated drying system. I think if you're used to the heated drying with your KA you might be disappointed in the Bosch.

As a note, no current DWs need pre-rinsing. You just need to scrape or wipe large pieces of food into the garbage can and load the DW. Saves water and time!

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I have had a bad run with dishwashers.

We had a Miele that the electronics fused in just after it ran out of warranty. $500 to fix it so even though it was an expensive dishwasher I wasn't prepared to throw good money after bad. It never washed that well anyway.

My wife followed the Choice (Australian Consumer Association) recommendation and bought a Westinghouse / Electrolux sight unseen.

Terrible dishwasher. Stupid rack layout, didn't wash properly, made me swear a lot.

Then to top it all off it caught fire. Luckily we had a fire extinguisher.

The cleaning bill was $2400 which Electrolux paid + another $250 for damages and they refunded the purchase price.

This time I chose the dishwasher, a Bosch.

It is great.

It washes well, the dishes come out dry, the racks are versatile and I am happy.

For now.

Edited by Michael B (log)
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The Bosch is versatile.

I have a lot of half-size sheet pans. I remove the top rack and fill the bottom rack with the sheet pans and they wash beautifully.

That was one reason I was reluctant to part with the Hobart but I was assured the Bosch would clean greasy or sticky baking pans and that is does on the Power Scrub Plus cycle - 117 minutes.

The only think I really miss (except for the sound of a 747 taking off) is the 90 second cycle of the Hobart.

However the virtually silent operation is a huge plus as now I don't have to close the kitchen doors when the dishwasher is operating.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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A few months ago, we got a high end stainless steel LG. You can heat the water, has a sterilization cycle, run just the upper or lower rack or both. You can select the rigorousness of he washing cycle. Its so quiet the only reason we know its running is the lights on it!

doc

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Thanks, these comments are very useful. Tomorrow we are going to look at Kitchen Aids and Bosch and others. I called a friend who has a Bosch this morning to get his take and he said, "Funny you should mention this..." and he informed me that there's just been a recall of nearly 500,000 bosch dishwashers--including his--due to an electrical element that can overheat and cause a fire. I don't believe it applies to dishwashers sold in the last couple of years, but make sure you didn't let that letter from Bosch get buried in a stack of mail. Those with problematic models are being told not to use their machines. Anyway, he's very happy with his Bosch, recall aside.

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We got a lower end Bosch a few months back and I can't stop myself from bragging about it to anyone who will listen. I rarely use anything but the 30 min. quick wash and it puts my previous dishwasher to shame.

Anna Nielsen aka "Anna N"

...I just let people know about something I made for supper that they might enjoy, too. That's all it is. (Nigel Slater)

"Cooking is about doing the best with what you have . . . and succeeding." John Thorne

Our 2012 (Kerry Beal and me) Blog

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Got the Kitchenaid architect series II to match the stove

Not quick but cleans really well and dries nicely. The four-hour delay feature is nice for ovenight runs .Quiet enough to watch TV with and a great step forward from the GE unit that the builder put in.

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It was really hard to find good information last year when our washer failed. Ended up at Sears as a (almost) direct replacement but I was able to put it in myself saving $.

They are so much more quiet now. Incredible.

The internet "review" sites are horrible for appliances to get the real scoop. I may not know where to look though.

Keith

My family has started a new website and I am looking for great content for our newsletter and blog. Also, suggestions on products to stock and reasons why are very welcomed. Thank you all > Stainless Steel Cooking

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After another half day of shopping at the showroom with the most dishwashers and the best floor help and very good prices (plus free hotdogs, popcorn, bottled water, and just-baked cookies if you can believe this) we have determined our kitchen remodel of 1992 will probably haunt us into the grave. The space in which our old KitchenAid just fit will not accomodate any new KitchenAid and almost nothing else. We're talking about a quarter inch of space here.

Aside from some very short low-end American models that don't have stainless tubs (which I want), would require inventive carpentry to hide its low stature and which exist only to comply with the American Disabilities Act, there are only two models that are adjustable down by that critical quarter inch we need: a high-end Bosch for something like $1200 and a lower end Asko which we can get for $850.

If anyone has anything nice to say about Asko, now's the time. I did read this full thread, and it sounds like A) not too many people have them, and B) they may need more repairs than KA and Bosch and may not last as long but C) if you're lucky you will get a good one and be happy with it. $850 (white ext. panel, not ss) seems like a good price for an Asko. More money than we were expecting to pay, but the racks are really nice and you can stick on a strip that's in French to explain the cute little icons on the front. And since we're not French that seems cool.

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My Bosch is almost 5 years old and I still love it. It's the only appliance that I reinstalled in my otherwise new kitchen this past summer. Extremely quiet, cleans beautifully. I love that you can adjust the height of the top rack, which lets me fit stemware and medium size dishes up top. You can pull it out entirely for tall loads below.

I had no problem adjusting to the non-heated dry cycle, but I typically run mine at the end of a dinner party or before I go to bed, so I don't need to run loads back-to-back. If you do, you may want to think about that feature. The payoff is in energy efficiency, it makes a big difference.

The recent Bosch recall was mentioned upthread. It doesn't effect me, thankfully. I would still buy another, regardless.

Katie, there were some compliments about the Asko below. That's a big price differential between the Bosch and the Asko.

My favorite thing about this thread is learning that there is a dishwasher, the Hobart, that cleans on a 90 second cycle. I was sure that it was a typo when I first read it. How is that possible?? No wonder it sounds like an airplane.


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