pre rinsing dishes

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I place my glass bakeware on their sides but leaning over a little. Most of the time, baked on cheese and stuff is cleaned off completely. I use the heavy duty setting with hi-temp scrub and sani-rinse.
 
Dish Designs

Washoholic is correct! I have a coffee pot that the handle is hollow. Of course when it goes in the dishwasher it fills up with all sorts of muck. I had an older cuisinart that I broke the carafe to and found a replacement from Wal-Mart. The handle is also hollow, however, the top of it has a hole in it. No muck ever accumulates in that.

I think some designer's should:

1) be shot for designing things that aren't that compatible with a dishwasher

or

2) be forced to put their design work in a dishwasher and see the pitfalls before it is released to the general public.

Just my 2 cents.

duetboy
aka Jeff

PS. My Whirlmore portable, other than leaving water on the tops of the cups in the top rack doesn't leave bits.

BTW, what's pre-rinsing?
 
"I think some designer's should...be forced to put their design work in a dishwasher and see the pitfalls before it is released to the general public"

I feel the same way about car engineers. Don't believe it when people say "old cars are easier to work on" There have been many times that if someone would have walked up while I was working on my old car and said "I designed that..." I would have knocked his teeth out (not really, I would have handed him the wrench and told him to get to work on it and see for himself why engineers should be forced to work on the things they design).
 
Pre-rinsing is

evil!

It is, essentially, washing your dishes by hand before putting them into the dishwasher.

Enormous waste of time, and more enormouser waste of water!

Just get a good machine, fresh detergent, and plenty of hot water, and let 'er rip!

And yes, I agree. I LOVE my Franciscan "Starburst" dishes, except when it's time to load them into the machine! (and I do, and my "Fiesta", too!) The "Starburst" is beautiful, but decidedly asymmetrical!

Lawrence/Maytagbear
 
My last machine in Minnesota was a 2004 TOL Kenmore talltub, same as a KA except it had the Whirlpool style washarm, whereas the KA (priced $300 additional) had the 4-way Hydrosweep. It was and is a wonderful machine. Almost silent and washed everything beautifully with no special handling.

I know what you mean about dishes though Lawrence. My roommate had this stoneware stuff, the plates had high raised edges almost like shallow bowls, and they could be a pain to get to sit in the machine right.
 
Sometimes I think some people forget that there are other cycles on machines besides normal. My Whirlpool has light, normal, heavy, and pots and pans. I don't prerinse and I usually use the heavy setting. This adds a prewash. Also people with newer Whirlpool products need to read their manuals, WP does not condone pre-rinsing. Also the detergent cups do should not be filled to the top unless you have hard water. The light and normal setting should only have detergent in the main wash cup; the one that flips closed. These cycles only have one wash, and extremely short rinse and a long rinse. My WP is an excellent cleaner.
 
Stainless Steel Pans in DW

Yep, stainless steel pots and pans will clean just fine in the DW. However, if you have some with Bakelite handles, like Farberware or Revere Ware, the Bakelite will become heavily etched and grey over time. This is because Bakelite is made of a phenolic formaldehyde resin and wood flour (fine sawdust). Since the wood flour is organic like food particles are, the dishwasher detergent works on dissolving it the same way. This phenomenon will not damage the handles beyond use, but it will make them ug and lee.

If you have handles damaged this way, I've had good luck shining them back up by rubbing them down with No. 0000 ("four-ought") steel wool to smooth the surface, then polishing them with metal polish like Brasso or Simichrome.
 
I think some designer's should:

2) be forced to put their design work in a dishwasher and see the pitfalls before it is released to the general public.


EXACTLY!!! *lol*

As far as pre-rinsing is concerned...
 
Wow Alexander, what kind of dishwasher is that. That is amazing results. Thanks for sharing. Terry
 
Great Resuts... I hardly rinse anything off and never have any issues with our TT Kenpool... It works wonders and every one likes it alot
 
We have a Bosch that is apparently marketed exclusively through Lowes. It is fantastic: I NEVER rinse, and even ugly baked-on gunk comes out sparkling.

If I ever became famous, and the Bosch people asked me to do a commercial, not only would I do it - I'd do it for free! ;-)
 
That's a Siemens dishwasher (same as Bosch really)

That dishwasher above is a Siemens. Siemens and Bosch have a joint venture company that makes domestic appliances under both companies brand names : BSH - Bosch & Siemens Hausgeräte GmbH.

The models are generally very similar / identical although the Siemens washing machines on sale in Ireland anyway seem to be aimed at a higher price point than Bosch and tend to be top of the line only. (That may not be the case in Germany)

I've a Bosch dishwasher, but have had others over the years too e.g. Zanussi and I've never had to pre-rinse anything. Any European dishwashers that I'm familiar with have fairly similar filtration systems. Basically you have a large filter unit in the bottom of the machine which contains a a series of progressively finer filters. When the machine's washing it sucks water through from the side of the filter system which forces it through all of the filter layers (including fine mesh). When the machine's draining the water flows straight down through the centre of the filter, only filtered by a coarse grid. The drain pump's designed to pass any normal sized food particles through without clogging and the coarse filter will catch anything too big for the pump.

The result is that the drain pump basically cleans the finer elements while it's emptying the machine as well as getting rid of the majority of food particles directly down the drain.

Most machines here run a cycle in the following steps:
It goes something like this:

1) Short prewash (cold, no detergent) to remove loose food particles. (These are mostly flushed down the drain) (If you select an intensive option, it will heat the prewash water in some machines e.g. Bosch)
2) Main wash (typically 65C (normal) or 75C (intensive) ) (149F or 167F) [Eco washes may be cooler e.g. 55C) (on draining, any further gunk in the filter is usually cleared out)
3) Cold rinse (quite short)
4) Cold rinse (quite short)
5) Hot rinse (65 or 75C). (With rinse aid to prevent streaking)
6) Pause while the residual heat of the dishes dries them.

At the end of the wash you may find very large chunks of food are still present in the filter, but in general it will be pretty clean. It's still advisable to clear it out once in a while though.

European machines (although I'm not sure about European machines built for the US market) also have lime scale filters built in as standard. The water intake goes through an ion exchange filter which softens the water, removing calcium and magnesium ions as the machine fills.

The filter's reset and regenerated by flushing it with a concentrated salt sollution once in a while. The machine does this automatically, you just need to keep it supplied with dishwasher salt (large crystals of non-iodised salt) which you fill into resevoir in the machine typically once every few months (depends on your water hardness). Most machines will let you know when they need more salt, by displaying a message or an indicator light comes on.

It improves results drastically though as *ALL* water is softened in the machine. i.e. all the rinses, including the final hot rinse use softened water.
This is a major advantage over just relying on the detergent to soften the water, as it's only softened during the wash cycle.

Hence, the 3-in-one with "Salt Function" products on the market here are never as good for your machine or your dishes as using the machine's internal filters and you can expect your dishwasher's heater to become caked in limescale, particularly if you're in a hardwater area as it will deposit during the hot rinse cycle.

I'm not 100% sure, but I suspect there may be slight differences in the formulations of US and European dishwasher detergents too. I suspect we might, like clothes detergents, use a lot more enzyme-based cleaning and less bleach. Older dishwasher detergents here used to be pretty heavily chlorine bleached based. The modern ones are far more effective and don't fade patterns / colours.
 
Chlorine has all but been eliminated from top and middle shelf dishwasher detergents, as enzymes have taken over on this side of the pond. Probably can go as far to say even bottom shelf products as well, as many store brand dishwasher detergents such as Kirkland's, America's Choice, and even Walmart's brand rank pretty well in Consumer's Reports testing on dishwasher detergents.

Enzyme detergents clean better, cause less damage to dishware and (thankfully), do not have one's kitchen smelling like a laundromat. Since chlorine bleach deactivates enzymes, the two cannot be used in the same formula.

Chlorine bleach was used to break down protein. Enzymes do this and also work on starches, sugars, oils/greases and a whole host of other organic substances. Detergent makers have a whole range of enzymes to choose from when making dishwasher detergent.
 
That's the ingredient list in a Sun (Unilever) 5-in-1 dishwasher tablet as sold here:

Pentasodium Triphosphate Builder
Sodium Carbonate Alkalinity Source
Sodium Carbonate Peroxide Oxidising Agent
Aqua Solvent
PPG-2 C12-15 Pareth-6 Surfactant
Sodium Sulfate Bulking Agent
Acrylate/Sulfophenylmethyl Allyl Ether/Methylalkyl Sulfonate Suspending Agent
PEG-80 Binder
Tetraacetyl Ethylene Diamine Bleach Precursor
Sodium Polyacrylate Builder
Polyvinylalcohol Crosspolymer Additive
Tetrasodium Etidronate Sequestrant
Glycerin Solvent
Styrene/MA Copolymer Anti-redeposition Agent
Zinc Sulfate Corrosion Inhibitor
Protease Enzyme
Parfum Fragrance
Sodium Acrylic Acid/MA Copolymer Builder
Sorbitol Additive
Sodium Bentonite Binder
Amylase Enzyme
Benzotriazole Corrosion Inhibitor
Manganese Catalyst Bleach Catalyst
Hexyl Cinnamal Fragrance
CI 47005 Colourant
CI 42051 Colourant
Polymeric Pink Al Colourant
Pentasodium Triphosphate Builder
Sodium Carbonate Alkalinity Source
Sodium Carbonate Peroxide Oxidising Agent
Aqua Solvent
PPG-2 C12-15 Pareth-6 Surfactant
Acrylate/Sulfophenylmethyl Allyl Ether/Methylalkyl Sulfonate Suspending Agent
PEG-80 Binder
Tetraacetyl Ethylene Diamine Bleach Precursor
Sodium Polyacrylate Builder
Sodium Sulfate Bulking Agent
Polyvinylalcohol Crosspolymer Additive
Tetrasodium Etidronate Sequestrant
Glycerin Solvent
Styrene/MA Copolymer Anti-redeposition Agent
Zinc Sulfate Corrosion Inhibitor
Protease Enzyme
Parfum Fragrance
Sodium Acrylic Acid/MA Copolymer Builder
Sorbitol Additive
Sodium Bentonite Binder
Benzotriazole Corrosion Inhibitor
Manganese Catalyst Bleach Catalyst
Hexyl Cinnamal Fragrance
Amylase Enzyme
CI 47005 Colourant
CI 42051 Colourant
Polymeric Pink Al Colourant
 

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