Follow up: The Dishwasher That is Finally Repaired

 

Some of you may remember in May when our dishwasher arm stopped moving and we had to deal with "Twiddle Dee and Twittle Dummy" appliance repair. 

The two from Twiddle Dee showed up twice, baffled, and more or less shrugged their shoulders.  "We got no idea what's wrong with that," they said leaving our house, but leaving their body odor behind. 

To use the dishwasher, because the arm was stationary, we had to load it carefully, making sure the worst of the dishes and silverware was centered exactly over one of the three wash heads on the arm.  

That worked until the arm started moving on its own, and that lasted about two weeks, then we were back to square one.  

Not repairing this unit wasn't in the cards.  A dishwasher uses very little water compared to running water through a faucet.  And water in Baltimore is horribly expensive because our water department is totally fucked up.  So we had to get the machine working.

So Cookie put on his best "I demand satisfaction" attitude and went back to the warranty company and filed a third claim. 

They want to send the feckless duo out a third time, but I explained - this is wasting my time, their money, and nothing is getting fixed because those two can't even tie their own shoes.  When I said my next call was to the Maryland AG's office, they snapped out of it, went off-script, and scheduled a factory service warranty guy. 

This man was organized, prompt, took twenty minutes, and came back and said "When you gave me the model number over the phone and told me what was going on, I knew exactly what it is."

Well, what was it?

EVIDENTLY, the inverter - that piece that drives the impellor that moves the arm was fried - a common problem with these dishwashers with the advanced armature models.  That was the good news.  The bad news? "It's a really expensive repair, but it's under warranty."  Then he showed me the video he took with his phone of the motor just whirling away, but the inverted shaft doing nothing. 

What to do? 

"I'll file the paperwork, if you hear from me, they are replacing the part.  If you hear from them, they are replacing the dishwasher." And with a wink and a smile, he was on his way. 

And you know what, I didn't hear from him, or the warranty people, but a big ass box showed up on our doorstep with the part.  We scheduled a time, he showed up and fixed the damned thing.

It's been running fine for the last couple of days.  Now I have to drive that heavy-ass broken part to the dump.  Do I care? Not one wit. 

One thing he did recommend was to stop using detergent in gel packs. 

"Stick with the powder or the liquids."

Sir, yes sir.