Our dishwasher (D/W) decided to act up recently. It was making ugly noises when doing something (I never figured out a pattern). It also wasn’t completely draining at the end of a cycle. I could hit the “Cancel” button and it would drain, but that bothered me and made me wonder just how clean it was if dirty water was left there after a part of a cycle.
This topic came up for discussion while I was laying on the physical therapist’s table getting my ankle worked on. Her recommendation (based on personal experience) was to put some white vinegar in the bottom of the D/W let it soak for a while then run it thru a cycle. I told her that I would try it.
We bought a gallon of white vinegar ($2.67) and I poured 3/4 of it in the bottom of the D/W this morning. I left it in there for at least 2 hours while we ran some errands.
After we put away all the groceries, I started the D/W. It ran thru a cycle with nothing in it. Actually I put the coffee maker filter basket in there since it had all that vinegar and I could kill two birds with one stone.
Well it drained completely! I also watched the force of water coming into the disposal drain and it was significantly stronger than before. Yay! I’m running one more cycle now (with a few items in the racks) to verify that it is indeed fixed. The noise is gone too.
$2.67 is a whole lot cheaper than a new D/W.