What kind of dishwasher do you have?

[yaM yaM]

Is it working well for you? What do you like/not like about it?

[ChetMC]

Miele

We had a Miele in our old house. We loved it.

I loved that it had a third rack for cutlery. It took a little longer to lay the cutlery in one piece at a time, but it got cleaner, dried better and was faster to put away. It also meant that babies and toddlers were not able to reach knives that were in the dishwasher when it was open.

I loved that it didn't have an element. Stuff couldn't fall down and melt.

I loved that the top rack had two height settings so you could make more room for big stuff on the bottom rack, or you could have more room on top to stack stuff double high on the sides (on the little flip down shelves).

I loved that it was super quiet. I would often have to look at the lights to see if it was on.

I also liked the top solo option. It used less water and power and would just wash the top two racks. We didn't use it much though, and I could have lived without this feature. It was mostly useful when it was just DH and me.

Mieles are very efficient too... but they are EXPENSIVE. I think they start at $1200.

[yaM yaM]

Wow, those are very awesome...

[es1967]

We have a Kitchenaide. Think we paid around $800 for it about 6 yrs ago. The top rack rusted and they sent us a new rack. The door when you opened it broke and would just flop open. We had to hire an appliance repair person to come in. Also, lately I find it does not clean well. Very diappointed. Read online similar complaints. We also have stove same brand-just ordered a part for the front that was all rusted out. Cost me $40.
The cheap dishwasher I had before we renovated worked better. Just to tell you that the quality of Kitchenaide is not great. Thats my experience. Good luck.

[yaM yaM]

That is very good to know, thank you. They sure look impressive.

It seems like there are so many brands that are promoted and approved of simply because of the brand name, you know? I am thankful to be learning about which features matter most to me and to have those intentions guiding my search.

[just_lily]

We have a Frigedaire.

I like it because it cost $50 at the local resale store. The store is like Habitat for Humanity, but supports a local housing initiative.

It is nothing fancy, but is way better than washing by hand, which I did for months before we finally replaced my old one. We don't have a lot of disposable income at the moment, so I was thrilled to get a new to me dishwasher for $50 and a couple of hours of labour for DH.

I was worried about buying used, but we had 30 days to return it if it wasn't working. And for $50 I figure even if it only lasts a year, we will still be way ahead than if we bought a new one. Plus, as all the items in the resale store are donated, our $50 went to help people in our community. Score!

[greenmansions]

we have a miele too - sounds like the same model mentioned by Chet since we have those features. I don't use the top solo as much as i thought I would but we do use the delayed start all the time.
Love it - it is 7 years old now and we have never had a problem with it, still going strong. They are supposed to last at least 20 years so we'll see.

[ASusan]

We have a Bosch. It is supposed to be super quiet. It is fine, but I expected it to be quieter. We can run it while we're in the kitchen/dining area, though, which is much more quiet than any other dishwasher I've ever owned.

It has a stainless steel interior, which I really like. Plastic takes on colors (tomato) and odors. I've not had to wash the inside in the 2 years we've had it.

It does not have a "rinse & hold" cycle, which I miss. I suppose that it lacks this feature for water-energy-saving purposes, but I liked being able to rinse the dishes after breakfast or dinner if I wasn't running a full load at the time.

The silverware basket and racks on the top have sharp edges. Yes, small detail, but I'm constantly poking my fingers with the plastic, and it's almost sharp enough to cut.

I've never liked how hard the door is to pull open, and DH just pulled it off the other day. He fixed it, but I'm sure it will break again in the next 6 mos.

It does get dishes more reliably cleaner than the cheap (<$350) dishwashers I've had in the past, but there were some features they had that I wish the Bosch had. (And, we now use Electrolux/Finish tabs that we buy at Sam's Club. Totally not natural, but they WORK, and I rarely have to send a dish or glass through a second time.)

[Katie T]

We have a very basic Fridgedaire that came with our house. We have been here 4 yrs and it was not brand new when we moved in. You can get this same dishwasher at Best Buy for $199.

I have to use either the finish tabs or my homemade soap and every dish usually comes out clean. I don't rinse and so every yr or so DH has to clean out the bottom of it but it is a great dishwasher. If it were to break I would buy the same thing in a heart beat.

[Turquesa]

I realize that a lot of people poo-pooed the LG, but we like ours. Admittedly, we did have some leaking issues at first, but they were good on honoring their warranty, and it's worked for us since then.

[fierrbugg]

We also have a Bosch (stainless steel inside and out) - but it stopped working mid-cycle about a year and a half ago, so I was hand washing dishes until recently when we bought a cheap dishwasher on CL. We did pull the kick plate off of the Bosch and it turns out the wires in the wiring harness (?) melted together. As we found out about the time it stopped working - there are a ton of Bosch models that have been recalled for service because of fire hazard issues. When I called to see if ours had made it onto the list, the operator told me that she was happy to inform me that ours wasn't in the recall (and therefore not at risk for catching on fire?).

Now, when it did work, I LOOOOOOOOVED it. We're moving next week and will probably take it in for service shortly thereafter because again I did love it - I'd just never leave it running when I'm not home or right there again - just in case.

[ChristyMarie]

Originally Posted by ASusan

We have a Bosch. It is supposed to be super quiet. It is fine, but I expected it to be quieter. We can run it while we're in the kitchen/dining area, though, which is much more quiet than any other dishwasher I've ever owned.

If you can hear it running you should have them come out to service it. It might be off balance.

We used to have a very new, basic Bosch and I loved how quiet it was but it had issues with draining. It liked to not drain all the way then you'd have to manually push the button to reset and drain. I loved that the controls were on the top of the door so not accessible to little hands when closed.

Now we have an older Miele (came with the house) and it is the best dishwasher I've ever had. It cleans everything and the third drawer on top for silverware is pure genius. Could never buy another dishwasher without that feature. I do not like that the controls are very easy for little hands to mess with. But that is my only complaint.

[mirlee]

I am sad to hear all the issues with the Bosch. We have one and it has been perfect since we got it. We have had ours for three years. This is the one I have, http://www.lowes.com/pd_314474-39047...R%20SHE43P16UC.

I have two friends with KitchenAids and they like them very much. I would personally avoid Whirlpool like the plague. We have had two. The first one was over 20 years old and it is understandable why it ceased to function properly. It actually did a nice job until it keeled over. The second replaced the first. It stopped automatically dispensing soap exactly 1 year and 2 days after we got it. I switched to soap tablets and tossed them in for another 2 or so years and then it broke down. The repair was more than original cost of the dishwasher. That was when we got the Bosch.

[yaM yaM]

Thank you for all the replies. This is all very good information.


Both Miele and Bosch seem to get excellent reviews all over the internet but I talked to Miele and they actually use vinyl-coated racks (interestingly, it is the one part of their dishwashers that they outsource for). Vinyl is an absolute deal breaker for me so I think I'm going to look at the Bosch models and decide which has the features I'm looking for. All Bosch models come with nylon-coated racks which is MUCH better.

[yaM yaM]

Another couple of points that have been concerning to me --


Do you have to do a lot of rinsing of your dishes before washing them in the dishwasher in order for the dishwasher to do its job effectively?


Do you feel like your dishwasher is truly labor-saving?

[p.s]

in the home that we own we have a Bosch. Current home we rent has a piece of Junk not worth mentioning.
The Bosch was a more expensive model, not absolute top; but don't know the number off the top of my head. We checked ratings OL and got the one with highest ratings. Going on 5 y with no problem. You can immaculately wash a full load of food caked on dishes. And the first time I ran it was so quiet, I couldn't figure out why it wasn't running. Our model does have a rinse and hold.

[ibusymomto5]

We have a new Kitchenaid(installed last spring), and I've been very happy with it so far. It has the stainless interior, is super quiet and holds a lot.

[ChetMC]

Rinsing

Originally Posted by May May

Another couple of points that have been concerning to me --


Do you have to do a lot of rinsing of your dishes before washing them in the dishwasher in order for the dishwasher to do its job effectively?


Do you feel like your dishwasher is truly labor-saving?

We do not need to rinse our dishes. Our dishwasher would wash pretty much anything off, with the exception of stuff that requires five minutes of scrubbing with an SOS pad.

I've heard that needing to rinse is the mark of a poor quality dishwasher. I've read that you can expect any decent dishwasher to cost a minimum of $700, but I have no idea if this is true.

I do feel that a dishwasher is absolutely a labour saving device.

[yaM yaM]

Originally Posted by p.s

Our model does have a rinse and hold.

What is rinse and hold?

[yaM yaM]

Originally Posted by ChetMC

We do not need to rinse our dishes. Our dishwasher would wash pretty much anything off, with the exception of stuff that requires five minutes of scrubbing with an SOS pad.

I've heard that needing to rinse is the mark of a poor quality dishwasher. I've read that you can expect any decent dishwasher to cost a minimum of $700, but I have no idea if this is true.

I do feel that a dishwasher is absolutely a labour saving device.

Is this your experience with the Miele that you're referring to?