Our old KDC-17 KitchenAid dishwasher let out a bang the other night and now its front door suddenly feels really heavy. I figure there were some springs inside which helped to counterbalance the weight of the door and that those springs have now broken.
Can anyone tell me whether there are 1 or 2 springs in there, whether they are hard to replace, and whether they are the most likely suspects or are there other linkage parts which are more likely to be broken?
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----------------------------------------------- Jim Adney snipped-for-privacy@vwtype3.org Madison, WI 53711 USA
Happened to me too a coupla years ago. Not a kitchenaid, but I imagine they're all pretty much the same. Heavy doesn't half describe it, 'less you're much much younger than I am :)
Two springs, one on either side of the door. In my case the "hook" end of one of them had rusted enough that it broke off.
I'm lucky enough to have a next door neighbor who's heavy into cars and all of the tools. He was good enough to heat and form a new hook on the end and it was good as new, though the door a teensy bit lighter than it was. (wants to gently self close, now)
A heads-up if I may? When dis-assembling and re-assembling get everyone else out of the room, 'specially the youngsters, and wear a pair of safety glasses. They're very very strong springs, and great risk of turning into missiles :(
Your neighbor should have been able to "stretch" the spring a little bit while it was still very hot to reduce some of the tension. It's probably not worth the effort at this point for you to disassemble and do this now, but for Jim knowing this in advance may help prevent the self closure problem.
Sounds like good advice on the safety precautions.
Some dishwashers have springs on the side of the tub that act directly on a bracket or linkage that is attached to the door. Others have springs that act on steel cables that run over pulleys. You might take off the kick plate and look; if you don't see any springs or pulleys down there, then they're probably on either side of the tub - 2 springs total, usually. Assuming it's a built-in, if you can't get to the sides of the dishwasher through the kitchen cabinets, you may have to pull it out of the cabinet a few inches to get at the springs.
Follow Ken's good advice on safety when fooling with the springs.
Call up an appliance shop and ask what they list as far as replacement springs, they should be able to tell you what's in there. As for replacing them, I've never done door springs but it can't be too hard.
Thanks to everyone for your suggestions, but the dishwasher is fixed.
I had the day off, so one of the things I did was to stop at our local place that sells appliance parts. She knew what I needed, but didn't have them in stock. She could get them here in one day, but the price was going to be $10 each, and each KitchenAid has 2.
Since I didn't actually know that the springs were my problem, $20 seemed a bit stiff. I went home and decided to dive into it.
At the bottom front of the dishwasher there's a kick panel and a larger painted panel. I removed both (total of 4 screws) and there were my 2 springs, one intact and one broken.
I grabbed the 2 pieces of the broken one and drove up to our hardware store, where I found a pretty good match for $3.80. It fits fine and works fine. I worked a little LPS-3 into each one just to hold back corrosion. Time will tell how long this fix lasts, but my guess is that it will be plenty long.
BTW, the KitchenAid springs were a snap to install. No tools, just slip them into position. I was surprised; they are not particularly stiff springs.
My parents have the same dishwasher with the same problem. I'll buy another cheap spring to install there next time we're visiting.
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----------------------------------------------- Jim Adney snipped-for-privacy@vwtype3.org Madison, WI 53711 USA
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