Can I replace my dishwasher's drain pump myself?
July 29, 2015 4:32 AM   Subscribe

The dishwasher that came with the home we bought 9 years ago started making a crunching sound, and then it stopped making the sound, and now it doesn't drain. I suspect a bad drain pump. I know where to buy the replacement part online; is this a repair I can do myself or must I hire someone?

Pros:
I am meticulous about following directions.
I'm also really good at putting screws and parts in a safe place as I work.
I'm awesome at watching video instructions and using the library and internet.
I know enough to unplug it and shut off the water valve before I do anything else.
This would save me some money. The part is less than $50. I'm guessing a service call would be a good deal more than that, plus the inconvenience of scheduling it.
I have tools. (Okay, most of them are my husband's.)

Cons:
I have not tried anything like this before - I'm not a natural tinkerer or the kind of person who takes things apart for fun.
I could be wrong about its being the drain pump, and then I'd have a kitchen full of disassembled broken dishwasher while I try to figure it out.
I said above I'd unplug it and shut off the water, but isn't there still a risk I'd hurt myself or cause damage to my floors or the downstairs condo? (We're the upstairs owners in a two-family condo house.) Could I electrocute myself even if it's unplugged? I don't want to die just because I wanted to save a few hundred bucks.

Other:
I don't remember offhand if the dishwasher was new, or ding-and-dent new, or used. The home was a gut-and-rehab and the developer included all the major kitchen appliances, but I think he got a deal on some of them.
I am tempted to just buy a new one. Also very expensive, but brings the peace of mind of a new thing.
posted by dywypi to Home & Garden (16 answers total)
 
i replaced a pump on our washing machine. it was pretty easy (and fun) tbh.

you can't electrocute yourself if it's unplugged (only very old TVs do that because they needed huge voltages across capacitors).

(if you're thinking of buying a new one any way, why not try? at worst you buy a new one...)
posted by andrewcooke at 4:50 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


It was pretty easy on my Miele dishwasher. Isolate the power, have a small basin to catch any leaks on hand when you disconnect the pump. It's as simple as a couple electrical connections you need to pull off and then undo the seals to the pump. Just do the reverse when you connect the new one. Make sure you towel off the inside of the dishwasher if any water has leaked out before turning power back on. I think I got the part for £10 here in the UK. Oh also remember to level it again when you push it back under the counter.
posted by camerasforeyes at 4:52 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


You haven't done anything like this before? If you want to start, why not start now? As per your pros list, there are resources available - and if you like video resources, more and more accessible than ever. Whether the dishwasher was new or nearly-new when you got the house, either way it's well out of guarantee now so it's going to cost to get someone else to fix it.

If it's not the drain pump, it's not the end of the world, you will just still be in the same place as you started. If you get to a point and then get stuck, you can always either put it back together again or put all the bits inside the dishwasher and then revert to Step One and follow a different path (call someone / buy new dishwasher). If you take it apart and find it has a [teaspoon] stuck in it, you may (theoretically) not even need to buy a part.

I would probably start by putting an old towel on the floor, bailing out any water I could see and, like camerasforeyes, have some sort of bowl to go under anything you disconnect that might end up with water coming out of it. But I have never done this myself (what I have done is tried replacing a broken belt on a washing machine. Turned out the belt was only a symptom of the considerably more tricky problem, bought new washing machine, do not regret having spent £20 on a part that didn't fix it, definitely don't regret not calling a service engineer.)

Taking photos as you go along is always handy - this kind of screw goes there and that kind of screw holds the other panel on, that kind of thing. When you put it back together, run it empty on a quick/express cycle and check carefully for leaks. Good luck!
posted by Lebannen at 5:14 AM on July 29, 2015


This will be a fun learning experience. Seconding take photos as you go along. Seconding the idea it could be simpler than you think- "hey, look at where that teaspoon got stuck!"

Worst case scenario, you get a service guy in or a new dishwasher.
Go for it!
posted by slateyness at 5:21 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


If I were your downstairs neighbor, I would want you to hire a professional.
posted by myselfasme at 5:30 AM on July 29, 2015


Another "yes!" vote. All good advice above. YouTube is a goldmine of instructional videos. You've got nothing to lose, except the cost of a new pump. To me, that's a good gamble.

(Unless you're looking for an excuse to buy a shiny new dishwasher. In which case, nooooo, don't even try! Too hard!!!!!)
posted by The Deej at 5:31 AM on July 29, 2015


Another 'go for it'. I've replaced pumps on dishwashers and washing machines. In all cases it's been very simple. They're extremely modular devices.
posted by pipeski at 5:54 AM on July 29, 2015


I would say go for it. You might get it half apart and find a small bit of plastic or gristle fouling the motor. Keep in mind finding the right part in your town can be a matter of calling several appliance shops.

Only work on it disconnected from electricity and water pressure.

Be sure to try to drain it as much as possible, and have a variety of towels handy to catch water where you find it. I meticulously caught the drain pipe, but forgot about the supply when I did this.

Be careful pulling the washer out, as it might scar your floors (a sturdy mat on the floor can help here).
posted by nickggully at 6:24 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


Assuming it's not a portable, I think getting the dishwasher out from under the counter and then reinstalling it (and yes, levelling it again afterwards) will be the actual difficult part of the job, and if the clearances are as tight as they are with our counter and dishwasher, it could be a challenge. (Sometimes dishwashers are installed without the convenient roller wheels, depending on the height of the counter, and DIYers sometimes use wooden shims to level the units when the levelling screws are not sufficient.)

I replaced a door spring years ago on our old dishwasher and it turned into quite a project, though the actual spring replacement was trivial. But I understand the impulse, since decent dishwashers are $600+.

Whatever you decide, good luck.
posted by aught at 6:56 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


I had an unusual failure mode in my dishwasher - it would fill with water and not drain. I called an appliance repair person and they could come for a few days. He ran it and it worked fine. The next day, same behavior. Turned out, there was a piece of gluten-free pasta stuck in the inlet to the drain pump. It would swell when it got wet, plugging the outlet and when it dried it would shrink letting some water through until it swelled again.
I found this out by shutting off the water, pulling out the dishwasher, disconnecting it, and removing the pump. On my machine, removing the pump was easier to do with the machine flipped upside down.

For the most part, this job consists of removing/replacing screws and disconnecting/reconnecting wiring and is not particularly hard. Pro-tip: put big towels down, there will be water.
posted by plinth at 7:00 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: All these answers are so helpful. Thank you!
posted by dywypi at 7:58 AM on July 29, 2015


Why not try? A similar thing happened to me very recently, we bought a home and the dishwasher would not drain.
My fiancé tried to fix it and diagnose the problem himself... he's VERY good at fixing things and gave it his best try but just couldn't.
In the end I called someone out and he fixed it, but it took him 2 1/2 hours and said it was one of the toughest issues he'd ever dealt with in a dishwasher.
It cost me about $200 but I was happy not to have to replace the darn thing.

My point is, if you're happy to call someone out eventually, what do you have to lose by trying yourself? And without sounding patronizing, I really admire your "Gung Ho" attitude :)
posted by JenThePro at 8:08 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


How long can you go without a dishwasher? When ours died, we knew we could not last more than a few days - a toddler generates a host of washables - and we made the decision that while I could probably have installed the new one, a pro would do it faster and with more peace of mind.

Though it stung my pride a bit, I am 100% happy that we did. The old washer was piped in with copper rather than PEX and it would have taken ages for me to get the damn thing out, let alone hook the new one up. It took the pro long enough that we started to feel bad for him.

If time was not an issue, I would have probably taken a stab at it than called in the cavalry with the full understanding that getting a (decent, non-gouging) pro out could add as much as a few weeks until we could use a dishwasher again.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 8:29 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


Go ahead and do it. The worst that will happen, since you're a careful person, is that you'll decide you can't finish the job and you'll end up calling in a specialist.

Watch repair videos on YouTube to see what's involved. You might have to view a lot of bad ones before finding a couple that are thorough and useful. You can buy parts on a Amazon.

I've replaced an inlet valve in my dishwasher and a thermostat, and I didn't have any better qualifications than you have. I think that once you've completed the repair, you'll feel very good about yourself.
posted by wryly at 8:49 AM on July 29, 2015 [1 favorite]


Yes, this is a repair you could do yourself.

But, have you gone through various on-line troubleshooting guides for that particular model?

Anecdata:

Last year in a similar situation, I suspected a pump problem. Some on-line digging about the dishwasher in question turned up a slew of control-panel issues. Decided not to do the repair myself because of the weight and fragility of the decorative front/cabinet material that needed to be removed from the door in order to do the work.

Angie's List was not helpful in finding repair help; nobody wanted to touch this machine. Although the machine was long out of warranty, I ended up using the manufacturer's contracted repair person. To my surprise, this was 1) easy and quick to schedule, and 2) far less expensive than I'd feared. Best of all, the guy didn't charge extra for removing and replacing the decorative panel on the door.

Also, I learned 1) that it's necessary to clean the dishwasher every few loads, and 2) how to do this.

Good luck, and please update to let us know how this went!
posted by wonton endangerment at 4:13 PM on July 29, 2015


Response by poster: Update! Success, so far at least. Pipeski (plumbing-eponysterical?) was correct: it's a modular part, you just detach the bad drain pump at a few points and pop in the new one. It didn't take us too long, and best of all, at least one video of our exact type of pump showed that we could do it without pulling the dishwasher out from under the counter. It was a little tricky but not awful.

Tips for future querents: 1. search YouTube by model or part number to see videos of your actual machine (instead of any old dishwasher); 2. get into the habit of turning your home's water valves off and on a couple times a year to keep them working correctly. Our valve for the dishwasher was stuck due to mineral deposits from the water. We managed to loosen it with WD-40 and some careful loosening of the bonnet nut, but as a homeowner I had no idea about this bit of regular preventive maintenance and it would have saved me from wondering if I was going to need to shut the water off at the main and replace the valve too.
posted by dywypi at 11:30 AM on August 8, 2015 [2 favorites]


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