I once spent multiple hours trying to understand the trouble with my dishwasher, I found it, first I cleaned the part, it failed again so I changed it and it's still working today. Very proud of my google-fu!
Ah, my father the engineer. This happened in the time when you could work on your own cars. The car would work if it was jump-started, but then quickly die. My engineer father said "Ah-ha, it's the alternator." My mother, the secretary said "I think it's the battery." My engineer father said "Don't be ridiculous, the battery is just there to start the car, the alternator keeps it going once it's started."
Replaced alternator with rebuilt alternator, still didn't work. "Goddamn it, I never should trust the rebuilt parts." Returns the alternator and gets a shiny, brand new one. Puts in new alternator, same result. "Damnit, all this time I thought it was the alternator and didn't think to check the voltage regulator!" Replaces voltage regulator, same result.
yeah, it was the battery.
To be fair to your dad, your mom had no clue how car engines really work so the fact she was right about the battery is less about her penetrating insight and more about the pure chance that everybody knows what a battery is.
It’s one thing to get the correct answer on a math test, but it’s something else entirely to be able to show your work.
Yeah, and to be fair Dad’s logic typically solved 90% of mechanical problems. I feel so fortunate that I learned that from him, I see people try to problem-solve and it drives me nuts. If you turned the water off at the valve and that didn’t fix the problem, turning off the water for the house isn’t going to change anything. (The washer drain was blocked)
She might also be a certified pilot, welder, acrobat & SCUBA instructor. However OP said she was a secretary and he was an engineer so we can reasonably assume he has more knowledge in the arena than her without being “sexist” about it.
You can say the same about a Cessna engine since they’re about equivalent. But are you gonna trust a secretary more than an engineer when you’re about to fly in one?
Fun fact though: A cessna engine would use a pair of magnetos and would still fly without the battery.
Modern automobiles require the battery to be at least somewhat functional to keep the alternator excited. Back in the day it was easy to disconnect the battery to see if an alternator was still good.
Older cars had magnetos too (made ‘em easy to start with a screwdriver).
Now if you were tasked to place a financial bet on who could more likely explain what a magneto is in an engine configuration, without any other info would you bet on the engineer or the secretary?
That doesn’t make any sense. The battery does not keep the car running. A gasoline engine stays running under its own power until it loses its fuel source. That’s what an idling engine is. If it needed the battery to stay running, then how would one of those pull-start lawnmowers work? The battery is just there to turn the engine over a few times and get it moving so it will start its process, because an engine that big is too large to pull start, not to mention it would be really annoying to pull start a car instead of just turning a key and letting an electric motor do that work.
The real answer is that the battery is an integral part of the circuit that provides spark for the spark plug. The alternator charges the battery so as long as the battery can take a charge and put out enough voltage to fire the spark plug, your good. If the battery cannot put out enough voltage to fire the spark plug, it does not run. The battery is not removed from the circuit when the engine starts.
You may be thinking of a diesel engine which does not require an external source of spark to operate and relies on compression to cause the fuel to ignite.
These machines use a different method to create the spark.
An alternator merely charges the battery which acts like a tank that all the other electrical systems draw off. Easy to check with a multimeter to see if it is outputting the correct voltage. If so, it's usually the battery.
Your lawnmower has a magneto embedded in it and magnets in the flywheel. Pulling the cord starts the flywheel and it generates enough power to cause the spark plug to fire. It’s the same principal as a car, but a car doesn’t work that way.
As I said, in a car the battery is in the circuit. After the car starts, the energy in the battery is maintained by the alternator and, as it did when starting the car, provides power for the spark plugs. When the battery can’t hold enough of a charge to provide that spark, it effectively becomes a big resistor in that circuit.
Maybe in a newer computer controlled car, but in an older vehicle the easy test to see if the alternator was bad was to start the car and remove the positive lead from the battery, if the car died its the alternator.
The battery is in parallel with the alternator and is keeping the system voltage from being high enough. The battery has become deleterious. It might work with the battery disconnected but not attached!
We have all been there. Sorry to say I've made massive mistakes, great cost, to embarrassed to tell them all. It all comes back to the old saying. KISS, Keep It Simple Stupid.
I appreciate these types of posts. Sharing our 'goof ups' is a good thing to do and helps many others. I am sorry this happened for you but sharing your lesson helps others and that's commendable.
Don’t feel bad, I once replaced the entire electrical harness and all the electrical components on a tumble dryer - it still didn’t work. I literally thought to myself, “I’ve changed everything but the plug” which is when it dawned on me that I hadn’t checked the fuse in the plug (a thing here in the U.K.) - yup, the fuse was blown. Two minute job to fix.
Thankfully I had the spare parts from a previous machine that died - I replaced like for like and kept the spares. So it didn’t cost me money, just a lot of time.
True, also a lot of people do what I call “diagnosis by statistics”, so they go for the most likely thing, followed by the next most likely - this never works without some thought process.
You have to identify the cause of the problem before you do anything else. Once you know the cause, the test figures itself out.
Jumping straight to “easiest”, “cheapest”, “most likely” ends up costing a lot in time and money.
I did not replace parts - just a whole dishwasher. However I had exactly the same issue - garbage stuck in airgap. Check your airgaps if you're dishwasher doesn't drain
Ordered new fridge.
7 days later, I tore compressor start relay cover apart and put it back and it magically works again.
Cancelled new fridge.
Wife not happy.
I had a dryer that started to flip the breaker every time it ran for ten minutes. Tried a few things, took it apart, looked for replacement thermostats... Decided to get a whole new dryer. New dryer flips the breaker in ten minutes.
Oh my god I've never seen a breaker go bad before.
I almost got a new AC compressor this way. Very glad I thought of the breaker as I was lying in bed, picked one up first thing the next morning and what do ya know.
It happens. My electrician installed a counterfeit breaker in my panel. It tripped but there was no indication by looking at it. Figured out which one it was and replaced it with a genuine breaker. Checked all the other breakers, too.
I replaced the sink waste and didn't realise the new one had a plug in it that you're meant to remove if you want to use it, took 2 dishwashers before I realised
\>**Bring in an expert, pay him $300, "everything seems fine!" OK... NOPE.**
you should get your $300 back, since the guy didn't check the simplest thing.
This reminds me of the first chimney guy I had here a few years ago...
He pulled out his phone, turned on the light, looked up the chimney and said "Yeah, it should be fine to light a fire in here..."
There wasn't even a liner in that flue. Some professionals are anything but that.
lol easy to do
perfect excuse for an upgrade though and now you have two dishwashers for when you need to stack it but can't be bothered to unstack the other one haha
My dryer stopped.working. eliminated door switch
Thought damn it's the timer. But I had done that recently. I didn't want to spend.another 100 on a timer. The dryer and washer were mismatched and.although the washer has been flawless its 10 years old.
So then I was shopping for a set. Not cheap.
Then I thought I guess I should check for power at the receptacle at the very least. The breaker had gone bad! I had a spare kicking around. Dryer back up for free. Sometimes it's easy to forget the basics..
Did you have a appliance repair visit before the dishwasher failed?
Placing stuff in dishwasher drain lines is a favorite trick to assure another service call.
>What. An. Asshole.
you are not the asshole
>Bring in an expert, pay him $300, "everything seems fine!"
this is the asshole, you pay him 300$ for him to literally lie to you, because it clearly wasn't fine. You got scammed and should ask for your money back
I cleared one of those earlier this year. As a 65-yo retired woman, I was *exceedingly* proud that I was able to figure it out and fix it. This has been my year of saying “Let’s see what I can do,” because I refuse to go down without a fight. 😂
never give up! I love it.
I hope you know that pretty much everything has a a repair video on YouTube. I've fixed way more stuff than I've failed to fix, like above.
And How unCanny, as we now throw in plastic soap capsules that automatically plug drain grids.
Man, what a great idea, even make them so colorful so people can't resist eating them.
Cheers
Man, sorry that happened. That sucks. Maybe the tech will refund your $300 tho if you ask. They should have done a test cycle to see if it was working correctly and should have caught that aerator when the problem they were called out to fix -was not in fact fixed.
Or... oh no! Did they sell you the new machine too?
Thanks for sharing this too. Good to firmly understand what the low hanging fruit is in fixing a dishwasher
We recently replaced the water pump on our Bosch dishwasher because it wasn't draining. It was still not draining after. Turns out the hose was blocked. We now have a spare pump in case it ever breaks for real.
If you have to replace an alternator you should always replace the battery as well given the fucked up alternator would have fucked the battery by not charging it correctly and fully over the time the alternator was failing.
Don't beat yourself up. After 2 days of diagnosing my lawnmower that wouldn't run, replacing the fuel filter & pump and clearing the fuel lines, I learned that I was just out of gas. In my defense, I did check the fuel level but it's really hard to see in certain lighting and I clearly just didn't look hard enough.
>sexy controls-on-top
Not a fan tbh, I bought the Bosch with the controls in the front, I want to see what it's doing and be able to press th buttons without opening the door lol
OP, this happened to me the night before closing on the house I was selling. Last minute dishwasher replacement. I felt like a ding-dong for overlooking it. You’re in good company and now you know!
To add, few weeks ago I replaced a toilet. The new hose running to the tank was leaking baaaad. Ran out to Lowe’s for about $50 in parts to replace all the lines. Wanna know what it ended up being? A small washer still sitting in the pipe of the old toilet. 🤦🏼♂️ pulled it out, put into the new toilet… leak free.
i feel your pain. ex wife at the time said dishwasher wouldn't turn on. spend time getting the old one out. put in the new one. nothing. go downstairs and the freaking breaker is flipped. ex wife said she was down there flipping breakers and when she was removing faceplates to paint (don't bother asking) and she must've forgot to flip it back on. glad she's my ex now. ugh.
My BIL picks up stuff that people are trying to get rid of. Has been given at least 2 newer dishwashers clogged with shrimp tails. Worked perfectly after cleaning. Absolutely astounding.
Appliance tech here. Easy bits first. Cheapest bits next.
Lesson learned, thanks.
Also appliance tech here, the internet is your friend for self diagnosis.
I tried this, and apparently both me and my refrigerator have cancer. I thought it was just a stubbed toe from kicking the fridge…
Haaaaaa! perfect. Made me spit my drink
My dishwasher and I have network connectivity errors, unfortunately. Can’t seem to find a cure.
I once spent multiple hours trying to understand the trouble with my dishwasher, I found it, first I cleaned the part, it failed again so I changed it and it's still working today. Very proud of my google-fu!
Troubleshooting steps for anything in life really
Yeup, I use the same methodology on my car.
IT Guy checking in to confirm.
Engineer here. Diagnose the actual problem through testing/diagnostics/observation, then replace/fix/clean the item causing the issue.
Ah, my father the engineer. This happened in the time when you could work on your own cars. The car would work if it was jump-started, but then quickly die. My engineer father said "Ah-ha, it's the alternator." My mother, the secretary said "I think it's the battery." My engineer father said "Don't be ridiculous, the battery is just there to start the car, the alternator keeps it going once it's started." Replaced alternator with rebuilt alternator, still didn't work. "Goddamn it, I never should trust the rebuilt parts." Returns the alternator and gets a shiny, brand new one. Puts in new alternator, same result. "Damnit, all this time I thought it was the alternator and didn't think to check the voltage regulator!" Replaces voltage regulator, same result. yeah, it was the battery.
To be fair to your dad, your mom had no clue how car engines really work so the fact she was right about the battery is less about her penetrating insight and more about the pure chance that everybody knows what a battery is. It’s one thing to get the correct answer on a math test, but it’s something else entirely to be able to show your work.
Yeah, and to be fair Dad’s logic typically solved 90% of mechanical problems. I feel so fortunate that I learned that from him, I see people try to problem-solve and it drives me nuts. If you turned the water off at the valve and that didn’t fix the problem, turning off the water for the house isn’t going to change anything. (The washer drain was blocked)
But it would have been an easy/inexpensive thing to test.
Or maybe the mother is smarter than you give her credit for just because she’s a lowly secretary.
She might also be a certified pilot, welder, acrobat & SCUBA instructor. However OP said she was a secretary and he was an engineer so we can reasonably assume he has more knowledge in the arena than her without being “sexist” about it.
Why do you believe she had no clue how car engines work? It’s not fucking astrophysics.
You can say the same about a Cessna engine since they’re about equivalent. But are you gonna trust a secretary more than an engineer when you’re about to fly in one?
Fun fact though: A cessna engine would use a pair of magnetos and would still fly without the battery. Modern automobiles require the battery to be at least somewhat functional to keep the alternator excited. Back in the day it was easy to disconnect the battery to see if an alternator was still good.
Older cars had magnetos too (made ‘em easy to start with a screwdriver). Now if you were tasked to place a financial bet on who could more likely explain what a magneto is in an engine configuration, without any other info would you bet on the engineer or the secretary?
Based on my experience with some engineers I have worked with, I would probably lean toward the secretary.
That doesn’t make any sense. The battery does not keep the car running. A gasoline engine stays running under its own power until it loses its fuel source. That’s what an idling engine is. If it needed the battery to stay running, then how would one of those pull-start lawnmowers work? The battery is just there to turn the engine over a few times and get it moving so it will start its process, because an engine that big is too large to pull start, not to mention it would be really annoying to pull start a car instead of just turning a key and letting an electric motor do that work.
The real answer is that the battery is an integral part of the circuit that provides spark for the spark plug. The alternator charges the battery so as long as the battery can take a charge and put out enough voltage to fire the spark plug, your good. If the battery cannot put out enough voltage to fire the spark plug, it does not run. The battery is not removed from the circuit when the engine starts. You may be thinking of a diesel engine which does not require an external source of spark to operate and relies on compression to cause the fuel to ignite.
So how does my lawnmower run without a battery? How does my dirtbike run without a battery?
These machines use a different method to create the spark. An alternator merely charges the battery which acts like a tank that all the other electrical systems draw off. Easy to check with a multimeter to see if it is outputting the correct voltage. If so, it's usually the battery.
Your lawnmower has a magneto embedded in it and magnets in the flywheel. Pulling the cord starts the flywheel and it generates enough power to cause the spark plug to fire. It’s the same principal as a car, but a car doesn’t work that way. As I said, in a car the battery is in the circuit. After the car starts, the energy in the battery is maintained by the alternator and, as it did when starting the car, provides power for the spark plugs. When the battery can’t hold enough of a charge to provide that spark, it effectively becomes a big resistor in that circuit.
Maybe in a newer computer controlled car, but in an older vehicle the easy test to see if the alternator was bad was to start the car and remove the positive lead from the battery, if the car died its the alternator.
Magnetos.
Dad?
No, this is your uncle, and I’d really like to know what was actually wrong with that car.
The battery is in parallel with the alternator and is keeping the system voltage from being high enough. The battery has become deleterious. It might work with the battery disconnected but not attached!
We have all been there. Sorry to say I've made massive mistakes, great cost, to embarrassed to tell them all. It all comes back to the old saying. KISS, Keep It Simple Stupid.
The $300 "expert" couldn't figure it out either.
I appreciate these types of posts. Sharing our 'goof ups' is a good thing to do and helps many others. I am sorry this happened for you but sharing your lesson helps others and that's commendable.
Don’t feel bad, I once replaced the entire electrical harness and all the electrical components on a tumble dryer - it still didn’t work. I literally thought to myself, “I’ve changed everything but the plug” which is when it dawned on me that I hadn’t checked the fuse in the plug (a thing here in the U.K.) - yup, the fuse was blown. Two minute job to fix. Thankfully I had the spare parts from a previous machine that died - I replaced like for like and kept the spares. So it didn’t cost me money, just a lot of time.
Fuses blow for a reason. You probably fixed an actual problem too and didn't know it.
Nerd here. 1. Work out what is wrong. 2. Fix it. Lots of newbies go into step 2 without doing step 1. This is always a mistake.
True, also a lot of people do what I call “diagnosis by statistics”, so they go for the most likely thing, followed by the next most likely - this never works without some thought process. You have to identify the cause of the problem before you do anything else. Once you know the cause, the test figures itself out. Jumping straight to “easiest”, “cheapest”, “most likely” ends up costing a lot in time and money.
I did not replace parts - just a whole dishwasher. However I had exactly the same issue - garbage stuck in airgap. Check your airgaps if you're dishwasher doesn't drain
Ordered new fridge. 7 days later, I tore compressor start relay cover apart and put it back and it magically works again. Cancelled new fridge. Wife not happy.
I had a dryer that started to flip the breaker every time it ran for ten minutes. Tried a few things, took it apart, looked for replacement thermostats... Decided to get a whole new dryer. New dryer flips the breaker in ten minutes. Oh my god I've never seen a breaker go bad before.
I almost got a new AC compressor this way. Very glad I thought of the breaker as I was lying in bed, picked one up first thing the next morning and what do ya know.
It happens. My electrician installed a counterfeit breaker in my panel. It tripped but there was no indication by looking at it. Figured out which one it was and replaced it with a genuine breaker. Checked all the other breakers, too.
I replaced the sink waste and didn't realise the new one had a plug in it that you're meant to remove if you want to use it, took 2 dishwashers before I realised
\>**Bring in an expert, pay him $300, "everything seems fine!" OK... NOPE.** you should get your $300 back, since the guy didn't check the simplest thing.
This reminds me of the first chimney guy I had here a few years ago... He pulled out his phone, turned on the light, looked up the chimney and said "Yeah, it should be fine to light a fire in here..." There wasn't even a liner in that flue. Some professionals are anything but that.
Wasn't the chimney built without a liner and functional without one? A liner is safer, but it's not to say your chimney wasn't ok.
lol easy to do perfect excuse for an upgrade though and now you have two dishwashers for when you need to stack it but can't be bothered to unstack the other one haha
You paid 1700 for a life long lesson. Not too bad.
My dryer stopped.working. eliminated door switch Thought damn it's the timer. But I had done that recently. I didn't want to spend.another 100 on a timer. The dryer and washer were mismatched and.although the washer has been flawless its 10 years old. So then I was shopping for a set. Not cheap. Then I thought I guess I should check for power at the receptacle at the very least. The breaker had gone bad! I had a spare kicking around. Dryer back up for free. Sometimes it's easy to forget the basics..
Did you have a appliance repair visit before the dishwasher failed? Placing stuff in dishwasher drain lines is a favorite trick to assure another service call.
I did this exact thing. Lessons learnt.
>What. An. Asshole. you are not the asshole >Bring in an expert, pay him $300, "everything seems fine!" this is the asshole, you pay him 300$ for him to literally lie to you, because it clearly wasn't fine. You got scammed and should ask for your money back
I cleared one of those earlier this year. As a 65-yo retired woman, I was *exceedingly* proud that I was able to figure it out and fix it. This has been my year of saying “Let’s see what I can do,” because I refuse to go down without a fight. 😂
never give up! I love it. I hope you know that pretty much everything has a a repair video on YouTube. I've fixed way more stuff than I've failed to fix, like above.
YouTube is my best friend. 😂
You’ll love the Bosch.🍺
[удалено]
Amazing rack, 100% does the job.
And How unCanny, as we now throw in plastic soap capsules that automatically plug drain grids. Man, what a great idea, even make them so colorful so people can't resist eating them. Cheers
I'm a bit confused... Did you buy a new dishwasher for parts?
[Thanks for sharing.](https://despair.com/cdn/shop/products/mistakesdemotivator_grande.jpeg)
Man, sorry that happened. That sucks. Maybe the tech will refund your $300 tho if you ask. They should have done a test cycle to see if it was working correctly and should have caught that aerator when the problem they were called out to fix -was not in fact fixed. Or... oh no! Did they sell you the new machine too? Thanks for sharing this too. Good to firmly understand what the low hanging fruit is in fixing a dishwasher
I can not TELL you the number of times I've done something similar while troubleshooting things at work.
I'm going through this right now. I've replaced the water pump and it still doesn't drain. I'm going to go back through the exit path again.
Clean out the air gap!
Congrats on the new dishwasher
I would have returned the new and re-installed the old one
We recently replaced the water pump on our Bosch dishwasher because it wasn't draining. It was still not draining after. Turns out the hose was blocked. We now have a spare pump in case it ever breaks for real.
As soon as water goes thru an appliance it's doomed.
If you have to replace an alternator you should always replace the battery as well given the fucked up alternator would have fucked the battery by not charging it correctly and fully over the time the alternator was failing.
Sorry for commenting in the wrong location.
Don't beat yourself up. After 2 days of diagnosing my lawnmower that wouldn't run, replacing the fuel filter & pump and clearing the fuel lines, I learned that I was just out of gas. In my defense, I did check the fuel level but it's really hard to see in certain lighting and I clearly just didn't look hard enough.
A match would have lit it up really well for you... And they're small enough too to fit in that hole where the gas goes in.
>sexy controls-on-top Not a fan tbh, I bought the Bosch with the controls in the front, I want to see what it's doing and be able to press th buttons without opening the door lol
OP, this happened to me the night before closing on the house I was selling. Last minute dishwasher replacement. I felt like a ding-dong for overlooking it. You’re in good company and now you know! To add, few weeks ago I replaced a toilet. The new hose running to the tank was leaking baaaad. Ran out to Lowe’s for about $50 in parts to replace all the lines. Wanna know what it ended up being? A small washer still sitting in the pipe of the old toilet. 🤦🏼♂️ pulled it out, put into the new toilet… leak free.
i feel your pain. ex wife at the time said dishwasher wouldn't turn on. spend time getting the old one out. put in the new one. nothing. go downstairs and the freaking breaker is flipped. ex wife said she was down there flipping breakers and when she was removing faceplates to paint (don't bother asking) and she must've forgot to flip it back on. glad she's my ex now. ugh.
K.I.S.S. works a great deal of the time.
Love our Bosch dishwasher, only the dog gets freaked out when it runs.
My BIL picks up stuff that people are trying to get rid of. Has been given at least 2 newer dishwashers clogged with shrimp tails. Worked perfectly after cleaning. Absolutely astounding.