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A Couple More Dealers

OK.

I plan to visit a couple more dealers this weekend.

Distinctive Kitchen Appliances
2000 Cheshire Bridge Road
Atlanta, GA

-and-

The Cook's Warehouse
4062 Peachtree Road
Atlanta, GA

If anyone has any information on these dealers that might be helpful, please let me know.

Malcolm
 
Drying styles

I'm learning a lot! Another question ... between current models of Miele and Bosch/Siemens, which dries better? I would guess Miele; even though it no longer has a direct air exchange with outside air, it at least has moving air inside the tub. I'd guess the moving air aids evaporation.

Also ... do any of these dry plastics well? Since plastics don't retain heat like glass, ceramics or metal, I'm guessing the extra-hot water doesn't do much to dry plastics.

A friend with an older Bosch said when he ran his dishwasher in the evening, the plastics usually weren't dry until the next morning. This wasn't a problem for him. For me, though, it would mean hand-drying (eek!) the plastics if I wanted to unload the dishwasher before going to bed.
 
BSH dry as well as mieles provided they are hooked to cold water line. Lately in Europe BSH has released some models with **two fill hoses** (like your washers) The hot water hose is used for washing and rinsing, the cold water one feeds the condenser while drying. Miele drying system is not affected by hot fill or cold fill so there's no need of the double hose

How to have dry plastics from these DW

1) open the door (crack opened) once the cycle is ended.

2) change rinse aid .... use this one, it works even if you forgot about the door

jd_turbo1.jpg
 
Ah yes, flash drying. It happens with commercial dishwashers when the stuff emerges after the 180F final rinse if a good rinse agent is used. Many owners of 19 series KAs resorted to this after the final rinse of the cycles lengthened by water heating instead of waiting for the non-heated dry to take up more of their time. What an abrupt descent into insanity the 19 series was.

Peter, thanks for the update on the Miele shop.
 
It is not a true flash drying

water has a lower temp (140-150°F) and after the last rinse drain there is round 25-30 minutes of fan/heat exchanger action. After that, the load is no more scalding hot.

Commercial Mieles (both tank and fresh water models) have the true flash drying (last rinse @ 180°F)
 
Malcolm: from what I've seen, it's a two-way thing -- Miele is picky about dealers, they want people to have all the support they can get, and sometimes, when clients complain about the dealers to Miele, they can lose the account and then they badmouth Miele.

Having used Miele products, I can see that they are not for everyone. They tend to be very well built and with thoughtful features, but they were built for European people who have different needs and standards. If your needs and standards happen to align with them, you'll love the products... on the other hand, if your needs and standards don't align with the appliances, you may hate them -- I've seen people complain about way too many things (like for example, some weird dishes either don't fit on the racks or take a lot of space -- that happens to other machines too, not all dishwashers fit every single dish perfectly, duh) that wouldn't go noticed on any appliance that was on the two-hundred bucks builder special range, but once you bought the TOL couple-thousand bucks, people expect the moon, a pony and a grand piano too. Needless to say, it's hard to get that.

Also, with Miele in particular, I find that people say "oh, it's all the same and same quality, don't buy the 2,500 bucks TOL, get the BOL and you'll be fine" -- you won't. It's not just the build quality, dear, it's the whole package. While I don't advocate that people should get the TOL just for the heck of it, I do think that they should actually look at the products and think. Will you be miffed if the cycles always take 2 hours? Then you may want a cycle for lightly soiled dishes and another quick (30 min) cycle to refresh stuff during parties. People are used to "all I need is a rinse-and-hold, a regular and a pots-n-pans cycle", but with Euro-style dishwashers you do tend to use the different cycles more -- American-made machines tend to have very similar cycles because they want to top the charts for Consumer Reports, which tend to test dishes that were soiled and dried overnight with the Regular cycle; Euro-style machines have a light soiled cycle for dishes that were just taken from the table and run right now, a regular cycle to run at the end of the day when you were collecting the dishes for the day, then a Heavy cycle and a Pots-n-Pans cycle, which are progressively more intensive. If you are one of those people who'll scream "everything used to come clean in the regular cycle with my old such-and-such machine" without noticing that your old machine took 12 gallons per cycle and did a wash-rinse-rinse-wash-rinse-rinse cycle (which is essentially Pots-n-Pans now), you'll be disappointed. Miele and Bosch, more so than most other manufacturers, have several different racks, as the machines approach TOL, dishes that wouldn't fit or take too much space on the BOL racks will fit just fine in the more expensive machines. You can fit an awful lot more stuff in the TOL than in the BOL Mieles and Boschs. But make no mistake, more money doesn't mean you'll love it more -- I know way too many people who absolutely hate the silverware tray on the newest machines -- make sure that your silverware either fits those spacers or that you're OK with replacing your silverware, there's very little room for compromise there. Also, some of the MOL Mieles have a silverware tray that doesn't split and the TOL ones split. There are people who love one and hate the other and you'll have to decide for yourself. If you don't think you'll fill the tray every time, the one that splits will let your remove the smaller part and then you can add very large bowls and tall stem glasses on that side of the rack, but people who use a lot of silverware tend to like the one that doesn't split. Also be aware of the fact that most largish things like spatulas, ladles etc will need to go in the other racks, so you'll end up using the folding racks for that, probably, because it's unlikely they'll fit in the silverware tray.

So, as you see, it's no accident that in some places Miele has bothered to build showrooms where there'll be trained people who can answer your questions and suggest alternative ways of doing things that will work better for you. Most stores would have a problem with people who bought and then returned a 2500-buck dishwasher, for example, and they want you to get it right the first time if possible. Most people would spend a couple of months getting used to a new way of loading their new dishwasher if they are in the 300-600 dollar range, but they get huffy if they have to relearn how to load a new high-end dw. But the ones that are patient enough more often than not love their new machines (Miele or not) and claim they feel like they should have done that sooner.

Just take your time looking at the several different brands/models etc and think about the pros and cons. And I can't stress this enough: bring several of your dishes, both common and weird-shaped ones and try the different machines on the showroom. People who were all set to get one brand or another or a specific model often end up getting something else so their dishes will fit and they are usually the ones that don't regret their purchase, people I've seen going around with the "they're all the same, what's on sale this week?" attitude are usually the ones that regret their purchases. Not, mind you, that I think we in this crowd want to spend as little time as possible in the stores choosing appliances... ;-)
 
Jon said: "Miele is big here in the Boston area, earthling took me to play in the showroom, WE need to do that again Paolo!"

We sure need to do that -- I was going to go a few months ago but heard that they were remodeling the place, we should check on that and see if they're done and what's news with it.
 
Paulo

Well said, that's the key point

Many Americans ignore we had energy crysis in mid seventies (the so called "austerity")
That's why european appliances started the energy saving path since those times.
12 gallons DWs here disappeared in mid eighties, when the average machines used 6-7 gallons
 
Miele FOUND!

Well, I found my Miele yesterday. Drove all the way to Acworth. Purchased the Miele Excella II in black. Dealership will call me with eta on delivery on Monday.

If anyone is interested, they have a floor model LaPerla in stainless for a reduced price.

Malcolm
 
Miele on the Way!

Well, I got word this afternoon that my Miele Excella should be in by the end of the week. Plan to take delivery early next week.

Malcolm
 
Congrats Malcolm

Basically it's a La Perla without touch controls. Just wondering where Miele USA marketing dept has learned to load pots ....... maybe they were former Whirlpool employees, so they guessed also Miele has the power clean module ?? ;-)

G2732SCi.jpg
 
Pots and Pans

I'm not sure what is going on with the pot on the lower rack in the picture above. It would seem that the open space in the front right quadrant of the lower basket would be a better spot to lay that thing down in.

I'm sure loading this machine will be night and day from loading the Bosch that I have now.

Malcolm
 
my Bosch loads ok

I wish it had the split cutlery basket for more flexibility. Given that my DW is a basic Integra design (only three cycles, basic racks) I can't really complain. Tines are fairly wide apart, so its capacity is lower than high end racks, on the other hand everything washes up nice and clean, maybe due to the wide spaces between tines!!

A side-hugging KA-style cutlery basket--to save space in the middle of the lower rack-- would be nice, but ah well. I got superb cleaning and a high-end feature (controls hidden in door edge) for $599. Nine years later, works great and no service problems, ever.

Favorit, not sure why the large pot is loaded like that, but there is a strong probability they were making pasta!! Unfortunately we cannot determine from the photograph what type of sauce they used.

If I had to choose again, I might trade Integra design for more features and just get a model with front panel controls. Bosch charges over $100 more for comparable models in their Integra line. For the price of a basic Integra, you can get an Evolution mid-range machine with more options and better racks. Actually, the three cycles on my current DW (PowerSCrubPlus, Normal, Quick Wash) meet my needs, but it would be nice to have better insulation/lower dB, better racks, and maybe their Eco cycle for light loads to save water and energy.
 
Malcolm. Congrats. Let us know how you like it. I too have heard complaints about the loading from two of our friends that have one.

The Excela is an excellent choice. I was told in the Miele showroom in Princenton, NJ that this is only one step down from the La Perla. The Excela does almost everything that the La Perla does.
 
LaPerlla

I would have easily ordered the LaPerla but it only comes in stainless. I needed black, otherwise I would have been on the road to replace all appliances with stainless to match. And that is not in the cards...

Counting the hours till it is delivered.

Malcolm
 
La Perla II

Malcolm, I could be wrong, but the check the Mieleusa website. I think....maybe it does come in black? As I said I could be wrong.

let me know

Ray
 
As far as I know, LaPerla is not sold in pre-finished black in USA. One version of it does accept custom panels, so one could fit a black panel to that model at additional cost.

The link below shows the model, and a black panel can be added, at a cost of over $200.

 

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