Question for the experts on early dishwashers

[miele_ge]

Hello,

I have watched "Dinner for Eight", the 1934 color film about the benefits of the modern electric kitchen (Love that Kitchen!). In the film, Mrs Mortimer simply turns a knob and the dishwashing is done. But, reading the manual for the G.E. Dishwasher of 1937, it was rather a manual operation, with the user opening/closing drains/water supplies. Also, I remember a Bette Davis commercial for the dishwasher from 1933 or 1934 that did not involve the manual operation. Was the manual for the 1937 machine for a lesser model?

Who had the first "truly automatic" dishwasher, one that you could "set and forget?" Was it G.E.? Or was it someone else? Since G.E. had the Telechron timer setup on the range - would it be that much of a stretch to make a timer mechanism to control a dishwasher?

just one of those things I think about sometimes....

Regards,

Alan

 

[brucelucenta]

I have seen many pre 1960 GE and other dishwashers. All the ones I have seen were automatic and required no manuel operation. Even a couple of GE dishwashers in an old house built in the late '30's had two automatic dishwashers that were original with the house. They both were fully automatic also. Most had fairly short cycle times, with one or two washes and two or three rinses. The entire cycle took about 30 minutes or less, so how clean could it actually get really dirty dishes? All the old automatic dishwashers except Kitchenaide, Frigidaire and possibly a couple of others, had Impellers at the bottom that threw the water upward to clean the dishes. They had to be loaded in a circular pattern on the bottom rack and were only marginal as far as cleaning on the top rack. It sort of depended on how the lower rack was loaded in most cases. The top rack sort of got whatever splashing water was left. Things have certainly changed since then!

 

[turquoisedude]

Dishwashercrazy (Mike) would know this for sure, but based on what I observed among his collection, GE (and Hotpoint) dishwashers from the 1930s were semi-automatic models.  The operator would open and close fill and drain valves for the washing and rinsing parts of the cycle (this method carried over into the first GE portables from the late 40s and early 50s).  I think it was only in the post-war production that GE dishwashers had a timer to permit automatic cycling.  And funnily enough, the timer was not a separate electric-clock style of timer.  There was a reduction gear mechanism that ran off the drive motor to run the timer cams.  It was a very unique system!

 

I wish I knew more about the dishwashers of the late 40s - I'd have to guess that other manufacturers were scrambling to develop machines with timers also!  

 

[combo52]

First Fully Automatic DWs

I actually don't know [ yes that's a first ] but I agree Paul Mike [ Dishwasher Crazy ] would probably know, I do know that the fully automatic Kitchenaid KD-10 was available some time in 1949, I suspect that this is about the time that GE, HP and a few others all started to market fully automatic DWs.

 

[turquoisedude]

Thanks, John!  I wasn't sure about when the first KA fully automatic home dishwasher surfaced - I had 'guessed' early 50s.