It's Too Fast Baby

[rinso]

Howdy fellow appliance afficionados. A question for you:

My new (9 months old)GE Profile dishwasher, not only has had a myriad of problems such as a stuck drain valve and a defective filler valve, it really never has done a decent job of washing the dishes.

Out of curiosity, I did the Saran Wrap thing just to see what was going on. Why my dishes don't come clean was immediately evident. The lower spray are was spinning, (and I mean spinning) much too fast causing its water spray to shoot almost sideways and not up into the rack. The upper spray arm was going plenty fast as well, but at least the spray was getting up into the items on the upper rack. I've seen dishwasher demos with the requisite plastic bubble, but none of them had wash arms that zoomed around like these.

Have any of you appliance specialists ever heard of such a thing? I'd appreciate any input, and no, I don't smoke pot. (well, anymore) Thanks, and love ya all!

 

[johnb300m]

We have a GE Triton XL with the same wash system. The spray arms do spin at a good clip, but what your describing sounds too fast to me.
I'm not sure. All I know is our Trion XL performs flawlessly, so the speed isn't too much on an issue.

It sounds to me the drive jets that were made in your machine were molded at too steep an angle.

 

[maytagbear]

What do I know?

It might be worth taking it up with the "GE Answer Center," but I don't think I'd mention the Saran

I'd put it as a "I like it, but it's not perfoming quite as I had expected" thing.

Could be, as John suggested, an improperly made lower wash arm....

All I know is that I LOVE my GE Nautilus.

Good luck.

Lawrence/Maytagbear

 

[rinso]

Thanks for the input. I bought the machine because people who owned them spoke so highly of them. Also, my cousin in another Idaho city has one that is identical to mine. I've listened to it and popped the door open quickly while it was running. It definately was turning at a good clip, but not spinning like mine. Mine won't even clean sticky cat food off forks and I have to space plate and large soup bowls two spaces apart, or they won't come clean. ******Groan!***** I have the worst luck with new appliances. It's a good thing I seldom purchase them brand new. With this kind of luck, I'll bet if I ordered the Ronco Dr. Death Automatic Suicide Express machine, and they'd send me a rotiserrie instead.

 

[fa_f3_20]

A thought: There are probably several water ports along the length of each spray arm. Most likely, the propulsion to spin the arm is produced by the outermost ones, while the innermost ones are pointed more in a straight-up direction to spray the dishes. If some of the inner ports were partially or completely clogged, all of the water would be forced out of the end ports and the thing would spin like crazy. Try taking a close look at the arm and see if the ports closest to the hub need cleaning out.

 

[rinso]

||| fa_f3_20 BINGO! I intially looked at the arm and none of the ports looked clogged. I even rapped it on the counter and blew through the input. Looking under my magnifying light, inside the arm was a small turquoise pebble from my aquarium that was stuck in one of the ports and hard to see at first glance. It was a beotch trying to remove it, but it's out now and I can audibly hear the spray moving slower. (Not going to do the Saran Wrap thing again. I'll save that for toilet seat practical jokes) I'll let you know how it washes, but thaksabunch.

 

[andrewinorlando]

Rinso -

Also, remove that lower wash arm, remove the plastic pipe that connects to the upper wash arm, and remove the round, plastic filter mechanism and make sure it's clean inisde. The little pipe that leads into the filter chamber is kinda small, and it can get clogged easily, causing your filter to basically stop working, though the machine keeps going as if nothing is wrong, except that all the fine particles get redeposited on your dishes and/or the dishes don't clean. Just clean by running water through it if you notice debris inside.

 

[rinso]

Will do, thanks for the tip!

 

[johnb300m]

not recommended for novices

but i noticed that the hole in the upper feed tube was much larger than the hole in the XtraFine filter chamber. So i took a drill bit, and slightly enlarged the filter chamber entrance hole. I don't know if it makes much of a difference. I'd guess it would. The two holes are now similar in size.