rust in Hotpoint Dishwasher

[maytaga806]

Hello All, i have this old Hotpoint Potwasher Dishwasher with Water Temp Boost and look at how rusty it is! As you can see the lower spray arm it is all brown and rusty. Well im not sure what color it used to be? i think it used to be silver? does anyone know what color the lower spray arm should be??

 

[stevet]

Iron Staining

Looks like your water supply has a large amount of iron in it. I would be willing to bet that you have the same staining on or in other water using appliances and fixtures in your home.

If you can get your hands on some Oxalic Acid Crystals I would say to use 2-3 tablespoons of it in the main wash portion of the cycle and add the heat option so it will run longer and let it finish the rinses after the wash. That should get rid of most of it. If it does, then run a complete cycle with detergent in both cups and let it complete. If not, do it again and see what the results are like.

If you also have excessive lime scale as well, you will have to address that issue separately. DO NOT MIX ANYTHING ELSE WITH THE OXALIC ACID WHEN DOING THIS.

Hopefully this will reveal the machine's original color or close to it.

I would try a good Paint Store for the crystals. It is used for rust removal on concrete and stucco. You won't find it at the home centers so don't bother going there.

 

[varicyclevoice]

spray arm....

Yes, the spray arm would have been silver since it is metal. If you want to thoroughly polish and clean the interior, I would use Wink's rust remover. I have used this before and it strips the rust right off the porcelain tank...and restores the finish.

For hard water stains, you can use Soft Scrub or Zud liquid and a green scrubby pad and that will clean all the hard water deposits off the tank. I did this on one of my KitchenAid tanks and when I was done the tank was so smooth and shiny it was like glass! Mike (dishwashercrazy) recommended this to me...so I am giving him credit for this.

Good luck!

 

[maytaga806]

Thanks everyone! i will try some day to use the crystals!

 

[maytaga806]

we dontuse it alot. we only use it on holidays. we didnt use it yesterday for thanksgiving. the motor gets seized after monthes of not running. I will try to run it everymonth, and i did hear that orange koolaid will help with your dishwasher. just put a little orange flavored koolaid in the detergent cup and run a cycle with nothing inside of the dishwasher. But that didnt help this issue. im going to try someday these crystals i hear about alot.

 

[stevet]

Jimmy Jones's fix?

Cool aid is nothing more than a weakened version of Citric acid.. Tang will work better but years ago my aunt had one of those roll-out GE undercounter jobs with the pink insides, but we all thought it was brown. I told her to try the Tang first and it hardly did anything. The next time we visited, I used the Oxalic acid and it came out looking like it had just come out of the box. She was tickled "pink!"

 

[maytaga806]

thanks! i will try using that someday!!!!!!

 

[maytaga806]

i am going to try everything i can to make it look WHITE again. This week im going to try lime away on it and seee if it will work. will it??

 

[stevet]

Why the hard way?

Forget the lime away! What you buy in the supermarket is so watered down it is nearly ineffective on severe lime deposits. Do the Oxalic acid and see how it works.

When we had our KDS15 Kitchenaid dishwasher in the 60's we lived in an borough of the city of NY that still had private water companies and our water was so hard that we had at least 1/32-1/16 of an inch of lime deposits on our dishwasher racks and the glasses would come out looking like you had poured milk in them after they were washed and dry. I used the oxalic acid whenever the buildup was intolerable and it did help get the lime off as well as any other staining.

You have nothing to lose by trying. Don't pussy foot around the problem. Attack it head on. And use that darn machine at least once a week even if you run a rinse and hold cycle to keep the motor turning and the seal lubricated and the hoses from clogging up with dried mineral deposits and other debris from the machine.

 

[rp2813]

Lime Deposits

So Steve, if I want to address lime deposits or do a little preventative maintenance, should I skip white vinegar or Lemi-shine and go with oxalic acid?

 

[stevet]

IF IT WORKS..

For you to use the vinegar wash as KA call it, then do it to keep the lime at bay.

Oxalic acid is used more for rust removal with an added plus of taking some lime with it as most acids will do. You can try it and see how it works for you but, don't make it a constant thing. I would not want to tell you to use it and then have something go wrong with the porcelain. Our machine back then was only 3 or 4 years old so the porcelain was very resistant at that time to just about everything.

 

[maytaga806]

ok i will try soon!