AIBU to ask why the fuck my dishwasher won’t clean anything?

[AlohaMolly]

It’s a Bosch dishwasher, maybe six years old. I have, in no particular order -

• repeatedly rinsed through both dishwasher arms
• cleaned the filter
• filled the dishwasher salt
• filled the rinse aid

Neither the top nor the bottom racks are remotely clean, I put the dishwasher tablet in and it doesn’t clear it away, when I open it at the end of the cycle it’s sitting their looking at me.

It’s been almost a week, I’ve tried everything I can think. I’m going to take a sledgehammer to the bastard thing if I have to open it one more time to find still dirty dishes.

Please help!

We had this. The pump’s gone. Easier to replace than get an engineer to fix. Sorry

Thisis today, midweek last week I do it regularly, at least once a fortnight, if not once a week during my kitchen clean. Sometimes DP puts empty jars in so there is papery pulp etc but I prefer to try and keep on top of it rather than be confronted with loads of it!

Do you mean the jars at the back? The little one is tomatoey sauce from a portion of chilli for my little boy and the other one is residue from mashed up banana - honestly no actual food, just the saucey bits in each!

I've just switched to smol and haven't had any issues... yet. Slightly worried now

We had exactly this problem with our 5 year old neff a couple of weeks ago. Some combination of the following resolved it:
-ran a couple of really hot washes
-properly cleaned the spinning things
-opened a new packet of tablets (using fairy platinum plus but old packet had possibly been open too long)
Seems to be behaving itself for now...

you showed a picture of an undissolved tablet.

this will occur if it has not been immersed in hot water.

Does it get hot? If you open the door 12 minutes into the wash cycle, does hot steam billow out?

OP you need this

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/3058228-household-objects-that-are-pricks

UPDATE - 13 minutes into the cycle, the arms still have not moved!!

It does feel warm in there, but not roasting... I’ve only got it on the short half hour cycle though and I don’t think that’s meant to be hot hot.

I've just switched to Smol which solved this problem for me. It seemed like the tablets were getting wet in the holder thingy and then the dissolvable bit was sticking the tablet in place. Smol is a bit more low tech and we seem to have sorted to problem.... you want an easy dissolve tablet.

@AlohaMolly
MY DH JUST SOLVED THISPROBLEM WOTH OURS!!!

He took out the spinny things with the holes in that distribute water and most of them were blocked. He cleaned them all, put them back and our dishwasher works perfectly now! Dishwasher is about 8-10 years old.

honestly tip

Mines a Bosch too and can be temperamental. The tipping can reset it.
I have to use tablets such as fairy as the hard powder ones do not seem to work in mine. I would also check the inlet hose, mine has been squashed before and prevented my dishwasher from working properly.

THE ARMS HAVE NOT MOVED

THE ARMS HAVE NOT MOVED

ITS THE AAAAAARMS

However, the tablet (in the top cutlery tray) also has not dissolved even though there was steam coming from the machine when I opened it.

Where do I goooo from here??
(Now that the eeeeend is near...)

Bonus points if you know where that’s from!

you say the arms have not moved

assuming they are not jammed, and you can spin them with a fingertip, this means that water is not squirting through them.

So either the pump is not working, or they are totally clogged. That would explain why the items in you photo do not look even rinsed.

Is there actually water in the bottom of the cabinet, and filing the strainer?

But if the water is not hot, the heater is not working. You can give it another ten minutes. Mine reaches 70C in 11 minutes from starting the heating part of the wash cycle.

Can't help with the arms, but I've gone over to using powder instead of tablets and I never have any trouble with undissolved lumps any more. Plus, it's much cheaper and much more eco friendly. Everyone should do it!

My old Bosch dishwasher was crap, it was replaced under warranty once for a leaky seal, then the new one broke within 2 years. I gave up on it and bought a different make.

Our Bosch one did this. Was the pump so we had to replace it. We got another Bosch against my wishes

The instruction manual for my dishwasher actually says to put the tablet in the cutlery holder not the flap bit. I use powder usually but if I ever have tabs I do this.

YOU probably didn't put the arms back on properly when you last cleaned them!

I used these -
www.amazon.co.uk/Limescale-Detergent-Remover-Dishwashers-Machines/dp/B01LTIP5KQ/ref=mp_s_a_1_14?dchild=1&keywords=doshwasher+cleaner&tag=mumsnetforu03-21&qid=1603743507&sr=8-14

Also I would like to say that Morrisons value dishwasher tablets are fab. £2 something for millions of them.

They do not have a plasticy gel coating, more like a bit of chalk texture!

May, as has been mentioned, be not heating the water.

I had this. You can tell by looking straight after a wash- things will be either quite cold or not as warm as usual.

The cost of a new water heating element or whatever it is called, may not be worth the repair.

Six years isn't too bad for a dishwasher, especially if used a lot.

In the end I bought a new one.

I wonder if I possibly haven’t put the arms back on properly... I’ll have a fiddle and see!

I’ll have another clean and double check water is coming out of them, but I’m 99% certain that it’s not that they’re clogged, so if it’s the pump, is that something I can do myself?

I had the same make of dishwasher changed 3 times. But one engineer said use Fairy Platinum tablets & had no problem since.

you need to tip
the engineer will tip

Not relevant in this case but DH kept complaining the d/w wasn't cleaning the dishes properly, heating the water or dissolving the tablet. Turned out he was putting it on the 'rinse only' setting every time.

See, I genuinely can’t be arsed to pre rinse, but I always scrape food and sauce off and religiously use the rinse setting before the full wash setting

This might be part of the problem (though it sounds as if there are other issues too). The enzymes in modern dishwasher detergents are designed to cling to dirt. If plates are too clean, there is nothing for them to hold on to. Try scraping but not rinsing.