Bite Me Maytag

[da]

Our dishwasher seems to be under recall.

If you bought a Maytag dishwasher between July 1997 and Fall 2001, check that link against your serial number/model number. (apparently, US as well as Canada). I'll be finding out how exactly they plan to come and repair it... Grr.

Edit: I called the number for additional information; he said: fill in the "registration" form on the website; you will be in the queue to receive a Replacement Part in the mail, and a letter from them, which will have local numbers to call to have an appointment scheduled. They'll come and fix it. That sounds easy enough.

He didn't say anything like "you must unplug your dishwasher right now or your house will explode". Since we don't use rinsing agent, I 'm gonna assume we're OK continuing to use it until they show up. (As d. points out, it's just as safe as it has been for the last five years... the recall didn't make it explosive; the bad design did.)

Comments

[earthling177.livejournal.com]

Sorry, just saw this (yes, I'm that far behind, sigh).

Maytag appliances have not been reliable since the early 90's, more's the pity. I had one of their dishwashers in the early 90's that had the pump break under warranty, and then the rinse agent dispenser leaked (to the dishes side of the machine, not the inaccessible parts) -- we had their own technicians show up to "fix" it about 3 times until I got tired of it and fixed it myself (by the simple expedient of consulting their own books and ordering and replacing the *right* parts instead of the wrong [previous model's] ones they kept installing). I sold that machine soon after that.

But the reason I'm commenting is that I am astounded at the number of people not using rinse agent. Note I didn't say "rinse aid". All machines built after the early 90's use too little water to rinse properly and using the rinse agent is the only way to remove the rest of the food and/or detergent from your dishes. That's the way it's been for about 30 years now all over the world except North America because energy here is so cheap that using lots of hot water is not as much of a problem as elsewhere.

You may be better off than most people because Maytag dishwashers are (still) notoriously inefficient with hot water and they tend to use more water than most other brands, but I wouldn't run a machine without rinse agent anyway. Set it to the minimum necessary to do the job because excess rinse agent is not nice either, but I'd use it. Also, make sure that your next dishwasher lets you vary the amount of rinse agent dispensed, instead of dispensing a fixed amount.

Also, if/when you decide to replace your dishwasher, unless they change their design completely, I'd avoid any Whirlpool made machines (that includes KitchenAid) because they may clean well (some designs do, but some don't) but they sure as all heck don't rinse well at all, to the point of the glasses getting chemically etched unless you use the most aggressive cycle (pots-and-pans), which basically makes them completely non-energy-efficient, which is the way you find out how Whirlpool cheated to get the Energy Star rating -- by providing only one skimpy rinse instead of the ordinary two or three other brands do. And that's not their only cheat, they've been cheating on the Energy Star ratings in lots of other appliances too, so I'm avoiding them when I can.

Good luck!