Dishwasher's gone bad

[aspiringnomad]

My dishwasher has stopped washing dishes. The detergent pools towards the bottom and the dishes look sterilized but not clean. At first I thought it was an issue with the dispenser, but now I'm thinking water pressure. I have no idea what I'm doing but found some youtube videos that show how to clean the chopper assembly, so that's my next step. Any thoughts or things I should consider? Note that it's been frigid here but as far as I'm aware, no frozen pipes. Many thanks in advance for your thoughts.

[Woodshark]

Check out the appliance samurai for troubleshooting.

fixitnow.com

[Greg]

This can also happen if the spinner gets clogged with fats and crud, or the filter at the bottom.  Cleaning a dishwasher is a thing, apparently.  I do mine 1x/year.

[zolotiyeruki]

Yup, sounds like you need to pull out the baskets, unscrew whatever's on the floor of your dishwasher, and fish out all the crud that's clogging things up.

[MMMaybe]

If water is coming in and going out, I would agree that you should clean out the filters and the spinning thing at the bottom. You have to unscrew the bottom plate to get to that. The YouTube videos show you how to do that.

I usually clean my filters every month or so because they get pretty gross. I only go in and deal with the spinner in the base of the dishwasher when things go wrong. I use a tiny brush or small toothbrush to give it a good scrub and that does it.

I would also clean the plastic spinning arms that spray water in the dishwasher as they can sometimes get blocked.

I try to avoid using the short 30 min economy cycle too often as I find that I end up with problems more often after using that a lot. I don't know if gunk gets trapped in there as a result but its something to look out for.

[guitar_stitch]

Huh.  I never have problems with that on my two arm manual dishwasher.  Even the visual inspection function has been flawless.  It also works with any brand or type of dish detergent.  ;)

[eil]

I just fixed my dishwasher for the first time ever. For free.

It started making an ungodly grinding noise while running two weeks ago and I was dreading having to either fix it or replace it. Didn't want to fix it because while I've grown accustomed to cracking open appliances to see how they tick, a dishwasher is yucky and somewhat scary because if you mess it up you can have a big wet mess on your hands. (Or floor, actually.)

Turns out I was worried about nothing. Once I pulled the thing out from under the cabinet and flipped it over, I was shocked at how simple and straightforward it was. Everything interesting is contained within a plastic sump housing at the bottom and was easy to remove, inspect, and clean. A couple of sensor, two motors, some seals, and not much else! How do they charge hundreds of dollars for these things?!

Never found out what exactly was wrong with it, but after cleaning everything and putting it all back together it's perfectly silent and cleans the dishes just fine.

[dycker1978]

This sounds like it could be a circulation pump issue.  The are easy to change, and unless you have a god awful expensive on, the pump should run about 75-100 where I am.  It will take you about 45 minutes to change.  Google some youtube videos on how to do this, and part numbers for your model

[straycat]

I agree with above suggestions - my Dad is an appliance repairman! So please if the cleaning doesn't work, let me know and I can ask his opinion for you. He has helped me fix many things over the phone lol. But I know the number one dishwasher issue is food/gunk clogged in the bottom drain so try that first for sure.

[Greg]

Free tip: check the threading on the nut thing holding the bottom spinner on, mine's reverse-threaded.  It's designed like a wing nut to be loosened with a pair of pliers, and I broke one wing off of mine trying to loosen it the wrong direction.