What kitchenaid is this?!

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

Help Support :

NICE!

Thats a neat looking KA you've got there. Before even attempting to plug in, I believe there may be a flapper for the fan assembly here that blocks water entering there. The rust may indicate it was removed or never installed in the first place. 

 

Next, you'll want to fill the tub with HOT water, up to near the top of the filter plate, you may also wish to add some cooking oil in to help lubricate stuff. This will help you check for leaks. 

After soaking for around an hour, you'll want to PLUG IN the dishwasher (outside or in your garage) and start a cycle, and confirm it is pumping water (you should hear it). I cannot remember the RPM of the spray arm, but it is something like 42rpm. (Count to four = 1RPM and keep a tally for 10 seconds, then times your answer by 6). After confirming that it is actually spraying, hit the "Cancel" button, to check Rapid Advance operation and drainage. Note: You may wish to start the dishwasher and allow it to advance past the filling stage before adding water, incase there is an initial pump out stage before the washing begins

 

Once this completes, I would proceed to connect the machine to any water supply, to test the fill valve. You may wish to add detergent to the right hand cup (with facing machine with door open) and shut that. Add detergent to other cups if running a Soak "N" Scrub cycle or Sani Cycle. All 3 detergent positions are used for Soak and Scrub (someone correct me if I'm wrong). 

Choose between Soak and Scrub or Sani Cycle - bearing in mind neither have a properly heated Main-Wash period, only a small heating element to run and maintain water temperatures during the Wash. Though being an AU model it may very well have a higher powered heater, that will run during the wash for a hotter wash, although this is unlikely. See for yourself, remembering that when you open the door, the cycle selection is reset, so you must reset the cycle you were using. 

Sani Cycle superheats the water in the final rinse. On a cold connection, it will take a LOOONG time... Don't interrupt the machine. 

During the Main-Wash period, (Check indicator light), open the door and observe that the water level is up to around the top of the filter assembly. If not, your water pressure is too low or the fill valve is caked with sediment (Unlikely in Melbourne - Very soft water over there I hear). You should be able to trip the door open switch and start a cycle to observe full fill - it should be around 9 quarts of water. Checking the fill in the Pre-Wash phase is ill-advised, as the machine goes to drain almost straight away after the first fill. 

 

When you have decided the machine is 100% serviceable and you want it in your kitchen (or someplace else as a "play-toy"), you will to remember to give the dishwasher a HOT water connection, with a temperature of at least 140ºF/60ºC. The hotter the better. Up to 158ºF/70ºC would be the most practical and will guarantee superb washing results each and every time, provided that the machine is loaded correctly. It will also save some energy, if you are heating water with a Solar heater, Heat Pump or Gas water heater (esp. on the Sani cycle - where the water is super-heated to around 75º. You don't need to use heated drying on this cycle!)

 

Please remember this is only information I've collected from reading here and the KitchenAid booklet "Secrets of the Inner Circle." Other more knowledgeable members will be able to correct me on anything I've said that is incorrect. Please take care! This is a real treasure you've got - especially in Australia!
 
KDS-17

Cool Find it would be neat to know when it was made, I wounder if your new DW is made much later than they were in the states.

 

There is no earthly reason to ever have the water coming into a home DW at more than 140F and the Sani hi temperature rinse cycle while neat has very little practical use except to make the dishes dry a little faster, so again to protect the DWs life I wouldn't use it much. Excessively hot water shortens the life of almost every important part of a DW, and newer detergents work very well in water as cool as 120-130F.

 

I look forward to hearing more about your new DW, John.
 
KDS-17

Cool Find it would be neat to know when it was made, I wounder if your new DW is made much later than they were in the states.

 

There is no earthly reason to ever have the water coming into a home DW at more than 140F and the Sani hi temperature rinse cycle while neat has very little practical use except to make the dishes dry a little faster, so again to protect the DWs life I wouldn't use it much. Excessively hot water shortens the life of almost every important part of a DW, and newer detergents work very well in water as cool as 120-130F.

 

I look forward to hearing more about your new DW, John.
 
John:

Bear in mind that in most cases, one cannot control the temperature of their solar heated water, unless a tempering valve has been fitted or the model is a "Split" style with the tank at ground level, that only pumps when needed. 

 

But, up to 60º would be fine. Any more is probalby wasteful
 
Very powerful heater

Did anyone notice that the total load is 3.5 kW. So this machine could handle a cold water fill as well as it would heat the water very quickly.
 
3.5kW

That may be the case on all KA's, or they were just taking precautions. All dishwashers of this era were connected to hot water anyhow. I'd say "TOTAL loading" could be with all features operating at once, or the motor and Sani-Heat etc. Remember the motor is 1/2HP. This being Hobart, the machine would've been built and then some (so electrically it could handle 3.5kW if one chose to install a higher powered element as part of cold connection package?). 

 

The KA book "Secrets of the Inner Circle" reveal that the machine does not heat its own water, except in the Sani cycle during the final rinse (which should be avoided, as John stated to save the machine. KA's booklet also describes this). Any other "Heating" is merely to maintain temperatures in the tub, not to raise them. 
 
KDS-17

The maximum connected load on the models sold in the US was around 1.4 KW so this Australian model must be very different, COOL.

 

On the US machines you had two 700 watt heaters combined into one sheath and a 1/2 HP motor that would drawer about 700 watts and the way the machine was designed was to have only any two of these three big power users on at any time so the machine could be run on a 15 AMP 120 volt line.

 

On my very similar KDS-16 in the mountain house I have it connected to a 20 AMP line so I added a relay to energize the 2nd water heater whenever the timer is calling for water heat from just one heater. Doing this has allowed me to keep the electric water heater set at about 130F and still get great results out of this DW. I have always thought that US DWs should be installed on heavier circuits so they could heat water much faster and get the job done in well less than an hour.
 
Flipping

I can actually remember plastic cups or containers that flipped over on the top rack of this machine when I was a teenager. Haven't encountered anything that has flipped over in years, and the DW I have now has a spray arm for the top rack. Have always wondered about that.
 
Flipping on the top rack...

....I have just gotten to the point that when I have something in the top rack that I think might flip I anchor it with something else. Ironically, it's not just plastic that gets flipped. I have these really small glass bowls that I use for prep when I am cooking and those will flip. I can't imagine the water pressure going on in there. I have thought about sticking my hand in to feel the intensity but have never done it.

There was refernce earlier to the RPMs and i think my book said it should be around 50. Last time I counted I got 52 so I could have been off by a couple but seemed pretty close to that.

I have a vid that I will post when I figure out how. LOL. I may have to put it on YouTube because I don't know how to post a video here in the forum. Does anyone else know how?
 
 
Videos cannot be posted directly to AW.  They have to be placed on some other hosting source, then linked/embedded in the post.  YouTube is the usual venue for doing that, they provide copy/paste link code.
 
Love the Sound!

As it starts to get water moving, that "Whoooing!" sound and the pulsing squirting sounds really are neat!
 
3.5 kW

Agree with you Combo52. From what you mention if you take the 700 watts away for the motor, then you are left with 2800 watts to play with. If you leave the heating element for the drying at 700 watts, then the heating element in the cabinet would be 2100 watts.
Washer111, yes that not exactly true, as not all elements would be running at once. The max draw during washing and heating would be 2800 watts leaving 700 watts for the drying.
 
You Are Right:

My only other idea is that the elements were simply made more powerful with the extra voltage to play with. It will be interesting to see if the machine actually heats its own water or not. So I suppose neither of us could be correct yet: Though something tells me it just uses more powerful elements for the conditions. As I'm pretty sure no KitchenAid before the 19 series (The Dreaded series) never used proper delay heating, except for Sani rinses. 
 
Blower Housing...

The housing in the picture may or may not fit your machine as there were 2 different neck diameters that I know of on these machines so you may want to remove yours and check it and contact the seller. If it is smaller than yours, that is okay as you can install it and then seal it with high temp silcone sealant available at any auto parts store.
If it is larger, and if you're really in a bind to replace it, then you will probably have to make small cuts with a tin snips around the tube that forms the neck and fit it into your machine's opening where the air goes up into the tank.
I have had to do both and was successful at both instances.

Good Luck
 
Water heating...

Based on my expierence with this machine I don't think it will stop to heat the water except for the Sani Rinse. The element does come on while it's washing to maintain the temperature but this model does not stop to heat before it circulates water. That is of course, unless the models made for your area were designed for cold water fills.

Stevet likely knows better but I know mine wouldn't.
 
KDS-17 Blower Housing

I think that the blower housing on the 15-17 machines is longer than the one you found for sale. The newer ones were made of aluminum for the 18 and later models and did not rust. Note the 15-17 KA DWs had an 1100 watt dry heater and the wattage was dropped to 800 watts when the 18s came out.

 

You could probably make the newer aluminum heater housing work either by adding some metal or remounting it, this item does not need to be sealed as to be water tight, just reasonably air tight. Unless your blower housing is completely rusted through I would just clean it of rust and paint it with Hi-Temperature aluminum paint.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top