Sears Best Kenmore dishwasher

Automatic Washer - The world's coolest Washing Machines, Dryers and Dishwashers

Help Support :

1983-84ish.

Not a fan of this control panel. I like the one before this best.
The TOL before this one had the same body but a different control panel with all electronic buttons.

bradfordwhite-2022111222461606572_1.png
 
Seers best Kenmore dishwasher ??

Sears should’ve never put the Sears best label on this machine, it was just cheesy dishwasher one of the worst on the market at the time. In the 80s.

Usually when the Sears best label appeared on something it was truly the best you could buy anywhere for almost any price but it was a total joke on their D&M Dishwashers.

John L
 
ohhhh

The nasty twins have arrived from MD.  lol

 

It's almost as if you have something personal against Kenmore dishwashers.  There are LOTS of junky appliances in the world under every name brand.  Many have been posted on this site over the years yet we rarely hear you kicking off about them. 

 

Well, what ever your issues, you've been around long enough to know that surely there will be yet more postings about 70s/80s Kenmore dishwashers going forward. 

 

Perhaps:

<ul>
<li>someone from Schenectady will post about a house they just bought and they need a part for one. </li>
<li>maybe someone else will post another Kenmore dishwasher for sale.</li>
<li>maybe someone will post Sears catalog scans for those who appreciate that to enjoy.</li>
</ul>
 

Will you be able to contain yourselves?  It really seems to get your blood boiling. Maybe you should seek help for your issues?  We wouldn't want you to have a heart attack over this.  I can't speak for anyone else but rest assured that I have no ill thoughts toward you when I post Kenmore dishwashers in the future.
 
D & M dishwashers

Built from the late 50s until WCI bought D&M and did away with this awful product.

Yes I have a thing against D&M dishwashers I fixed hundreds of them removed and recycled hundreds of them and even installed quite a few new ones back in the day.

Based on my extensive experience and the experiences of hundreds of owners of these machines that I dealt directly with I will conclude that this was the worst major appliance ever sold in large numbers in the United States.

I cannot think of a single part of these machines that was of high quality or lasted a particularly long time.

The only thing I can say in their defense is they did wash dishes they wash dishes about as well as a basic GE or waste king dishwasher of the time ( which is not saying a lot )

They were never anywhere in the league for a quality of a GE High Point whirlpool KitchenAid or Maytag.

BW I will continue to share my experiences with the products I have worked on we would like to hear about your experiences but you can leave all the emotional shit out if you don’t like my facts.

John L
 
Genuine FOMOCO

 

 

This was at an estate sale down the block from us.  Banished to a corner of the basement workshop, missing lower rack.  This ghastly upper rack design has to earn at least a dishonorable mention in the D&M lineage.  

 

Have had several through the years, still have a 74 Kenmore Roto-Rack.  While some D&M designs were better than others, what kid wouldn't love the Roto-Rack, I mean... water spraying, lights, and it moves!  I can still see the clear demonstrator at Sears, the top rack spinning endlessly.  

gansky1-2022111520164105589_1.jpg

gansky1-2022111520164105589_2.jpg
 
D & M DW

Hi Greg, your Philco even has the inner door panel Rusting through from the inside like they would do, lol

The only DNM dishwasher we saved is at the museum, it’s a brand new 240 V 1966 lady Kenmore dishwasher that Keven found, even though it’s never been hooked up and is in a climate control building the finish on it continues to deteriorate because the materials were so poor used in the manufacturing of it.

We will hook it up for demonstration purposes at some point, and it will be fun machine performance wise it may be pretty good compared to other machines of its era, just not a machine I would ever won in my kitchen to be cut the floor.

John L
 
If I am not mistaken, the Kenmore machines did not have insulation on the tub so they took a lot of energy to heat the water to 180F. It is sort of surprising that Sears demanded so little from D&M, but then their Roper-made electric ranges were not stellar either.
 
D&M

As I have mentioned previous times, we had the Modern Maid version of this D&M machine from 1968 to 1973. Other than the color scheme the interior was virtually the same, only the MM didn't have the utility basket on the upper rack.

Performance wise, it certainly had good scrub-ability and cleaned pots and pans very well. The problem was little nibblets of food wastes that sometimes resided on the curved bottoms of glassware. After drying at 180 degrees these baked on very nicely.

As Larry mentioned, having a rack designed to tilt glassware would have helped. Other than this we had no problems with the top rack design. It held a lot of dishes.

My sister and brother-in-law had the D&M Kenmore with the roto-rack, and never experienced the nibblet problem, probably because the centrifugal force flung the particles off the glasses top. They liked their Kenmore. The only negative comment I recall them saying was that the roto-rack sometimes got out of balance and banged when the dishes weren't loaded correctly in the upper rack.

The D&M Modern Maid was the first dishwasher in our family, so we had nothing to compare it to. My mom really enjoyed just having a dishwasher.

If I recall correctly, rust out was the cause of failure for both our machine and my sister's. Rust out shouldn't happen in only five years.

My dad replaced our Modern Maid with a General Electric Americana. Now we had something to compare the Modern Maid/Kenmore/D&M design to.

My mom exclaimed about our new GE, after a couple of uses, "I never thought a dishwasher could be so good!"

The D&M dishwashers did the job...so much better than having to hand wash dishes. But there were better options out there.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top