Dishwasher recommendations?

The less than 8 year old Kenmore Elite dishwasher is about to bite the dust. Hoping I can fix this one but have my doubts. Any recommendations on a new one ($400- $600 range)? I've looked at Bosch so far- the reviews I've read are either really positive or they are worthless ... not much middle ground.

Recently bought a Frigidaire unit. It's alright, I mean how hard is it to be a washing machine? I will say for the entire market, everything has gotten really cheap. Cheap as far as construction, the feel and preciseness of the slides and racks is lacking.

Recently in a kitchen remodel we replaced our 10 year old construction grade GE unit. Everything you touched in it felt and operated more solid than the more expensive higher end Frigidaire we have now. There were some wear issues with the GE, the soap door was broken and the coating on the racks was missing in a couple places thus the metal construction of the rack was rusting.

One thing I do like about the Frigidaire washer is how quiet it is. The old washer was loud, we would often turn it off after dinner if cause it made the TV difficult to hear. The new unit is extremely quiet. If quietness is desired pay attention to the dB ratings between units when shopping.

Depending on manufacturer you might be able to discern if the product is actually made here in the USA. Though both Bosch and Frigidaire are foreign owned.

http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2011/04/which-appliances-are-still-american-made/index.htm

As with almost all appliances these days, dishwashers are cheaper built but they are more efficient and have better sound deadening. Watch out though, some are quiet by eliminating the food particle grinding feature so you'd need to frequently clean a food filter/trap. Bosch is one of those brands.

Diseasel wrote:

As with almost all appliances these days, dishwashers are cheaper built but they are more efficient and have better sound deadening. Watch out though, some are quiet by eliminating the food particle grinding feature so you'd need to frequently clean a food filter/trap. Bosch is one of those brands.

Don't put dishes loaded with leftover food scraps in the dishwasher, and voila... problem solved.

Two votes for Bosch... I have one I bought as a refurb/rebuilt unit, and my folks have one they bought new more than 12 years ago. Both work flawlessly, and are nearly impossible to tell when they're running (they're really that quiet). Never had to clean the traps on them, either.

No doubt that works but many would rather let the dishwasher do the work rather than waste time and water pre-rinsing dishes. The new dishwashers are very quiet without losing that functionality. The main complaint in Bosch reviews are the lack of a built-in garbage disposal.

I'm not big on GE products, but the GE one we have, was in our house when we moved in back in 2004, and it's still going strong. I don't rinse the dishes either, and it gets them nice and clean.

As with all major appliances, regardless of brand, the basic one will be more reliable than the 3X cost fully loaded with electronics ones. Reliability I thought whirlpool before I brought up this link, as we always use them in our spec homes and hear of little problems with them. Believe it or not the PCB on fancy models can be 1/2 the cost of a new appliance to replace. Anyone who knows electronics can appreciate how ridiculous that is.

I'm not a big fan of GE either, except the plane engines on the plane I'm being transported continue to run without issue until I get off the plane.

GE CEO Jeff Immelt is our Jobs Czar (who's great idea was it to use Communist nomenclature to title political appointments?), who's not paying any corporate taxes, exceptions for GE coal plants abiding by EPA regulations, and shipping jobs and manufacturing overseas. Jobs Czar, oxymoron in our face.

Not sure yet but we may have dodged a new dishwasher for the time being. We usually run a cleaner through it every 4 to six weeks .... I couldn't remember the last time I did. So I did ran it through a couple of cycles with cleaner yesterday and checked for foreign objects. Seems to be working- most all the noise is gone and the dishes came out clean on the one load I've ran since. Keeping my fingers crossed ...

How are things, Rick?

Rosie the pitbull does a great dish prewash for us. Our LG front loader is having a door lock issue sister researched it and has part on the way

The replacement price from the insurance got us a GE Quiet Power III, a decent 3-wand basic machine.
Fortunately there was a recall. The technician replaced the offending part and cleaned the filter which has to be removed because the water goes the other way than it looks to go.... and it works better.
I say better because I have yet to replace the water filler valve which causes it to not completely fill, so I hand fill a coffee pot of water at each cycle for now, so the advice is to have a water softener.

I bought a Frigidaire Gallery last year and it doesn't clean for crap. My wife wants me to buy a better one that cleans the dishes without having to run it twice!