Before I call a repairman

[Barbara Moulton]

My dishwasher is suddenly producing so many suds that they are leaking out the front seal when I run it. I have to do an extra rinse at the end of the cycle to clear the machine of the suds.

I use dishwasher detergent, I know not to use regular dish detergent.

Can anyone think what might be causing this?

[Joe Hittle]

Couple of things you might want to check:

a) if you're really lucky, you just had your water softener recharged. If so, simply cut back on the amount of DW detergent in your next load.

b) Your drain is clogged

c) your evac pump is no longer working.

any one of those three would give the type of response you're describing, however, the last 2 usually also are detectable by water splashing onto your carpet/linoleum when you unlock the door, because the unit didn't drain correctly in its cycle.

IF you call the repairman, make sure you know what his call-out and hourly charges are. In this day, oftentimes it's actually more cost effective to replace the entire unit than it is to fix a troublesome one.

With the cost of motor-fuel, I'll bet the call-out rate has gone up since the last time you had your breath taken away by a repairman's quote.

Hope this helps!

Joe

[Dave McClung]

Couple of things you might want to check:

a) if you're really lucky, you just had your water softener recharged. If so, simply cut back on the amount of DW detergent in your next load.

b) Your drain is clogged

c) your evac pump is no longer working.

any one of those three would give the type of response you're describing, however, the last 2 usually also are detectable by water splashing onto your carpet/linoleum when you unlock the door, because the unit didn't drain correctly in its cycle.

IF you call the repairman, make sure you know what his call-out and hourly charges are. In this day, oftentimes it's actually more cost effective to replace the entire unit than it is to fix a troublesome one.

With the cost of motor-fuel, I'll bet the call-out rate has gone up since the last time you had your breath taken away by a repairman's quote.

Hope this helps!

Joe

Joe's answer is a good one, but one other place you should check before calling a repairman is the garbage disposal. Many times the drain from the dish washer is connected to the garbage disposal so that any food scraps from the dish washer will pass through the garbage disposal before going into the sewer. Occassionally, if the garbage disposal hasn't been run (it has garbage that hasn't been processed yet), the garbage will restrict the flow from the dish washer.

On one occassion, I found that the problem was actually in the trap down stream from the garbage disposal. Because the trap was filled with celery (one of the worst things to put in a garbage disposal), the water from the disposal was actually flowing back into the dish washer. Obviously, that doesn't make for clean dishes, but it can also clog up the drain from the dish washer.

So, my recommendation is to determine whether or not your dish washer discharges into the garbage disposal. If it does, make sure the disposal is operating normally.

[Jim Severns]

OK, I'm stretching here, but I have a theory.

My understanding of dishwashers and the detergents they use is that there aren't supposed to be any suds at all, just a soapy solution during the wash cycle.

It should be equipped with an anti-siphon device that forces the water draining out of the dishwasher to go only one way and prevents the stuff from the kitchen sink drain from going back into the dishwasher.

If that were to fail, some hand dishwash soap (not to mention other stuff) could have drained into the dishwasher, thus causing suds.

So, maybe it is a drain / siphon problem.

Then again, I'm not a plumber, but I have stayed at a Holiday Inn.

[Barbara Moulton]

Joe's answer is a good one, but one other place you should check before calling a repairman is the garbage disposal. Many times the drain from the dish washer is connected to the garbage disposal so that any food scraps from the dish washer will pass through the garbage disposal before going into the sewer. Occassionally, if the garbage disposal hasn't been run (it has garbage that hasn't been processed yet), the garbage will restrict the flow from the dish washer.

On one occassion, I found that the problem was actually in the trap down stream from the garbage disposal. Because the trap was filled with celery (one of the worst things to put in a garbage disposal), the water from the disposal was actually flowing back into the dish washer. Obviously, that doesn't make for clean dishes, but it can also clog up the drain from the dish washer.

So, my recommendation is to determine whether or not your dish washer discharges into the garbage disposal. If it does, make sure the disposal is operating normally.



We don't have a garbage disposal. I've put a call in to the repairman. The people we deal with are usually very good about giving advice over the phone before they send out a service technician.

Edited to add: They called and told me that the soap tablets that I had switched to had caused problems for other customers as well...too much soap. So they advised running the dishwasher empty with half a box of salt to clear all the soap build up. Let's hope that does the trick