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roto204

roto204

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Thorough combing of Craigslist turned up this little find, and after an extended de-scuz-and-un-scale-plus-fix-the-damned-timer jam session at Roger's, it's time to present the Roto-Rack!

Okay, so it's probably not from the same series as the Freedom Maker, but it felt patriotic. This one's probably the Marginal Liberator.

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Cycles

You have your choice between Pre-Rinse (hey, I thought there was no pre-rinsing!), Light Wash, Light Wash--wait a minute!

Yeah, I have no explanation for that one. Either a junkyard run by the owner at some point for a button, or impressive quality control at D&M.

The second "Light Wash" button should be "Normal Wash." And, of course, my favorite cycle--the 160ºF Power Sani Wash, which uses real, unshielded uranium rods to heat the water to unprecedented temperatures that remove unsightly glaze from stoneware, the outer layer of silica from glass, and leaves the dishes touchably barren of life.

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Hygienic rinse

For those bacteriophobes out there, this machine is for you. Plus, the Hygienic Rinse delay raises the final rinse temperature to 160ºF, and takes a looong time to do it, thus taking the otherwise fast wash (W-R-R-W-R-R-D, in minutes, 8-3.5-3.5-9-4-5-26) and turning it into 8-3.5-3.5-9-4-35-26, which feel just about the same as using a modern dishwasher anyhow. Or, an Asko with a burned-out control board. Either way.

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Pretty!

The dial, all clean. It needed a lot of toothbrushing to get the goop out from behind it that is created when the drying fan forces all the überhot, moist air up into the control panel for venting (an awesome design).

The result? Crud buildup behind the timer dial, and a healthy spread of rust behind the control panel (which you can't see, but trust me, it's awesome).

I think Speed Queen collaborated with D&M on this design.

Fortunately, no ice-cream buckets needed yet :-)

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The challenge

A veritable cornucopia of filthy dishes, all scraped, but not pre-rinsed, which means a lot of tomato chunks and bits of oregano from the spaghetti sauce that's hiding in the pot in the bottom rack. The top rack is really full, probably Bob-load™ worthy, but it's hard to communicate that fact because it doesn't pull all the way out and give you a good aerial view.

You get the idea, though.

Will the Roto-Rack come through? Or with the turbo-heated-dry bake yiblets onto the dishes, and force Nate to tell his guests in the future, "Oh, that's just a part of the glaze?"

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Top rack

..a fly-over.

I like being able to fling utensils wherever in the top rack, since there's really no wash arm to block. Plus, pretty tall stuff can go in the bottom rack for the same reason. Neat!

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Jet-Dry

This dispenser's a little different than the normal, two-winged D&M rinse-agent dispenser. Of course, it leaks (as I found out after the first load), so I guess paper towels and patience will be the order of the day for a while. Argh.

The mechanism that operates the detergent and rinse-agent dispensers is incredible and very Rube-Goldberg. One metal cantilever arm stretches between the spring-loaded rinse-agent injector and the plastic-tab catch for the detergent door, and pivots on a pin. One solenoid dispenses both the detergent and the rinse-aid by first releasing the catch for the door (which dumps the detergent), then ratcheting once more to arm the rinse-agent dispenser (so, two solenoid "firings" so far). Once the rinse hits, the solenoid fires for a third time, which releases the rinse agent (perpetually, apparently), and resets the arm for the next cycle, wherein it's ready to latch the detergent cup again.

Good grief!

It's amazing, and absolutely nothing about it even remotely makes you want to remove it to work on it :-) Engine swaps in cars have to be simpler.

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Hope it works. I bought a "new" (used" dishwasher and installed
it a few weeks ago and it did a terrible job. Had to wash
everything by hand afterwards. Maybe it was the dishwasher
soap or the way I loaded it, but unlikely to use it again
unless I test some different soap (Cascade is what I had.)
 
Yup a BobLoad. That's exactly how I used to load our bottom rack. But I would have anchored that disposeable plastic thing in the top rack along the side. It will go flying
 
Washing away

Two full cups of detergent; one enzymatic, and one chlorine-based, and a lot of crossed fingers.

Unlike the KitchenAid next to it, which operates on the principle of long washes and a lot of decent filtration, the D&M Roto-Rack uses the "hit and run" dishwashing methodology, wherein a fast cycle is accompanied by a lot of water changes. Note the rinses--they last only 3.5 minutes!! Right after it starts washing, it's draining again, because forty-five seconds of those three-and-a-half minutes are fill time!

The machine has the steel macerator blades below the wash impeller, but no filtration, so cleaning is accomplished through fast washes and rinses that serially dilute the living heck out of whatever's in the machine.

As the cycle progresses, you can see the waste water getting freer and freer of microchunks and yiblets. The hope is that the inside of the dishwasher and the dishes are, too.

An interesting side-note is that this machine has pot-metal impellers--not Bakelite ones like my Magic Chef. I've never seen this. On the good side, they are impervious to broken glass, which is always an issue with these machines (cleaning the wash-arms produced a couple of glass chunks, as always). Unfortunately, much like Greg's GuacaQueen, the pot metal is corroding away from the inside out, so I will need to get an impeller and pump seal kit at some point. That's just as well--I like the peace of mind that comes with minty fresh impellers and a nice, new carbon-porcelain pump seal.

Of note, this is the ONLY D&M I've found so far that didn't sit and leak off the motor and need a pump-seal kit from the get-go. That's pretty impressive, and is probably attributable in part to the metal impellers. Since the plastic impellers were vulnerable to being damaged by hard objects, they could lose vanes and become imbalanced. The resulting vibration, though imperceptible to the operator, would compromise the carbon-porcelain seal eventually. Then, it peed on the floor!

Fortunately, the motors on these have good slinger rings, as if it was D&M's way of saying, "Hey, we figured that would happen."

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I think one of those buttons has been replaced since original. There shouldn't be two "light wash" buttons lol. Does the temp delay only happen in the final rinse on the 160 degree Power Wash?
 
Spotless!

Everything is absolutely spotless! I even decided to live dangerously and let it go through the heated dry in its entirety.

The top rack results are better than the KitchenAid, which is impressive. (Of course, you'll never get dirty corners when you eliminate the corners altogether, right?) :-)

Only one piece of tomato skin (very clean tomato skin) is stuck in the silverware basket, but that's okay, because the KA does the same thing. Think of a silverware basket as a super-coarse mesh filter :-)

Everything else is clean--yay!!

The plastic thingy is a good point, Bob--it didn't go flying this time, because I had hooked the edges of it under a couple of glasses, but that doesn't photograph well.

Happily, none of the plastics were damaged by the heated dry, and they're all nice and free of water-drops!

Bob, you were so right about the heated dry protecting the sumps on these machines--I lucked out (again) that this machine has a perfectly intact sump, but I'd never used the heated dry before...wow, it really does get rid of all the sump water! There's just the tiniest trace left down there--not the veritable swimming pool that the heated-dry-optional machines of later years left behind.

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Whee!

I think it's a keeper, for now. All though I'm going to start a bet with Greg about dropping-in an au gratin casserole and then letting it go through the heated dry ;-)

It's fun, and I love the quirks of D&M machines, so since I left the Magic Chef behind, I had to find something to scratch the itch.

Woo-hoo! :-D

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Hi Bob!! :-D

Yes, you're absolutely right, the heating delay occurs during the final rinse--apparently the "power wash" and "hygienic rinse" are really just one in the same.

The thermostat that detects the tank temperature is hidden in the door-liner, in a tiny bracket. You can't see any trace of it from the inside, unlike the tiny probes in a KitchenAid.

I think you're right--I think someone snagged a button :-)
 
Terrific!! Glad the plasstic didn't get melted post-flying, albeit it stayed put. Now you see why I loved those dishwashers
 
Naughty bear, giving that rack a spin like that. I was known a time or two when the mother wasn't around to put something extremely disgusting in there. Put it on the final rinse with heat delay and let it do a power soak. Run for like 40 minutes with detergent. Amazing results. And all that time, yibblits got ground up eventually lol. Then after that drain, turn timer around and start at beginning for it to complete the whole cycle.
 
:-D

LOL, it is more fun than should be allowed! I love the look on people's faces when you open the door while it's washing and the top rack is still going a million miles an hour. Hey, no water left on top of your coffee mugs! I guess if spinning is good for the laundry, why not give it a go in the dishes!

Speaking of which, yes, I was naughty and gave it a spin ;-) LOL

That is a REALLY GOOD idea for using the heated rinse as a super-prewash. I'll have to cook-up something ultra-disgusting and give it a go!
 
And since the detergent dispenser and rinse aid are integral, a closed detergent cup SHOULD open up on that last rinse as the rinse aid is dispensed.
 
Nate I do think this one is a keeper. I had the very same dishwasher, in fact it was the first one I ever bought. The knob was a bit larger but other than that the same. I got that in 1971. I must say it was always a fantastic washer, better than my new GE tall tub that is for sure. You are also right about the spinning rack, no water let in most of the wells on glasses and cups. Thanks so much for sharing the fun with us.
 
But it's not green.

I dig the gray/green racks - to match the buttons, how cute!

Steve1-18 (a member here) took the cover plates off the timer in his D&M Kenmore and filed down the cam so that the sani-heat delay would trip in the main wash cycle as well as the final rinse. This modification and the resulting increase in run-time to a day and half made for some very, very clean dishes. I've thought about doing that with mine. This machine can do a fine job with dishes from one meal, or even a busy dish-day, but when we let dishes "build up" to a full load over several days, the KM has a tough time with dried-on soils.

The dispenser system you describe is pretty funny. I wonder if you take the tank and valve assy. out for a good cleaning and long hot tub in the sink if that would melt and remove any build-up in the valve & assy. Sometimes it works and sometimes, not but worth a try. Don't be afraid of working on that system, parts haven't been available for years and I'll win the "au-gratin" bet by default - hee hee.... Maybe a better bet would be to see how long it takes to sneak back into using the KitchenAid - I already know how long it took me! The next time you see a Danby countertop dishwasher on Craigslist, grab it. They are really fun to play with - another appliance Roger wouldn't use to...well, you know... Have fun playing with it - a must for any dishwasher connoisseur. Consider it a swig of Boone's Farm instead of Dom!
 
Great find Nate, I've never used a roto-rack before. That would be a great candidate for making a plex-glas door and video (hint, hint)! When you said Two full cups of detergent, I sure hope you mean two DW Cups and not 2 measuring cups of dishwasher detergent LOL.
 
Mike, the rack is moved by water pressure. A tube comes up the middle of the back of the tub, right under the rack. Some jets spray directly up to spray the contents in the rack, other jets spray at an agle and cause the rack to rotate because they hit the rungs of the rack. I'm not sure how many rpms it does. But I would say once the intertia forces begin, maybe 20 or so a minute. It all depends on how balanced in weight the top rack is. Also, I noticed that if it was evenly, heavily loaded, it seemed to spin a bit faster.
 
Nate, now that I think about it, I probably would have seen if I could put those glasses in the bottom rack under the big mixing bowl and if the height of the glasses and bowl didn't prevent the top rack from rotating, I'd have left them there. Probably raised the top rack to the high position too.
 
:-)

Dale: If your dishwasher performance is bad, there can be a lot of reasons why. What make/model is yours? Factors affecting performance (aside from detergent and its state of freshness, as you noted) include incoming water temperature (it needs to be 120-140ºF, and for my D&M, hotter is better), filter design and cleanliness, making sure the water pressure is sufficient so that it gets a full fill, making sure spray arms turn freely and the jets are not plugged, and so on. Let us know what you have and we might be able to help you out.

Bob: That's neat about the detergent cup--I hadn't thought of that :-) I need to get the rinse-aid dispenser to stop passively barfing Jet-Dry, and then we'll be good to go.

What isn't pictured are the cereal bowls and glasses that are hiding under the big bowl and the colander in the bottom rack, so I made sure to flex my BobLoading muscle ;-) The only thing that isn't "nested" is the saucepan in the lower-left, because the tines are so numerous and closely-spaced that it was just too pissy about fitting anything underneath.

Oh, that's another thing. Try fitting a jelly roll pan in the bottom rack on the far left or right. The 1/2" distance between the rack wall and first row of tines forces everything to bend inward, and then you're hosed. Grrrr. I wish they had made a more spacious layout.

I have to be careful with putting glasses in the bottom racks of these machines, though, unless they are very thick-walled--I've lost many an item to the patented "blast-and-bump" washing action.

Terry: How cool! I wonder what year this one might be? You're very welcome--just a little bit of clean dishes for holiday mirth :-D

Robert: LOL I will cut a Plexiglas door for this one and video it. I have to admit I'm intensely curious myself! And yes, that's two full physical detergent cups, not two measuring cups of detergent :-) (though, with our hard water, the difference might not be that great...)

Greg: :-P I love the gray racks too--I'm used to the butterscotch yellow that came later. That idea about filing the cam is EXCELLENT, though I'll have to work up the chutzpah to do it. I'd swear I remember my grandmother's 1983-ish D&M Kenmore with the Water Miser/Pots&Pans/Normal/Light/Rinse&Hold/SaniTemp/HotDry/CoolDry bonanza as having a spot in Pots&Pans where it would hang-out in the middle of the Light wash cycle and sit forever to heat, but I could be wrong. That Sani Heat option would be so much more appreciated in the wash than in the rinse.

We have some über-icky dishes accumulating that will feature the finest in dried-on soils, so I'll have to give it a whirl and report.

I'll try to go after the Jet-Dry dispenser--I think I know where it's leaking and what it will look like, and I'm already unmotivated to fix it. But, I need to repaint the unit anyway, so I may as well investigate. And thanks for the encouragement--there's nothing quite like taking comfort in the knowledge that it's bad now, but could be rendered completely dysfunctional and impossible to replace ;-) ROTF

I will keep an eye out for one of those Danbys! They sound like loads of fun.

Is the au gratin bet nullified if I mod the cam on the timer? ;-)

Can I call it a nip of Arbor Mist instead? :-P

Mike: Yes, the top-rack moves through water pressure alone, and a very freewheeling bearing in the middle. Bob's description was spot-on :-) It is a very substantial unit--and quite fun to heave around across Saltillo tile grout lines (argh!) :-)

I find that my rack spins at about 80-100 RPM--that's how fast I've clocked it when the door opens and it's just spinning down from being powered by the wash tube underneath. We're all amazed that it doesn't break things. When the dishwasher stops to drain, you can still hear the "whoom-whoom-whoom-whoom-squeak!" of the rack still spinning away.
 
Date and docs?

So, Sears cataloguers, any idea what year this is? And, does anyone have any documentation for a Roto-Rack, so that I can maximize my efficient loading skills and learn about all of its feature-packed goodness? :-) I'd be infinitely grateful for any info!
 

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