I love that there are people who will go into this much detail on stuff. It's really cool that they do. But the whole thing is that if you follow some sequence of steps, powder will clean as well as or better than pods for a third the cost. All right, this isn't a significant portion of my expenses so I'll pay the 3x cost since my dishes come out clean anyway.
I wish the description of the video was like an abstract.
> But the whole thing is that if you follow some sequence of steps, powder will clean as well as or better than pods for a third the cost.
YMMV. Based on the earlier videos, I did switch back to powder, and I did follow the steps of putting some powder in the main compartment for the pre-wash. And i did try several powders.
Yet, none of the powders were anywhere near as good as the tablet we use.
It also doesn't contain any nasty chemicals, unlike several of the powders[1].
So we went back to our tablets. It might cost slightly more, but hardly a significant expense by any stretch.
Now, there might be some powders that work better which aren't available here in Norway. But I gotta work with what I got.
Powders should perform better for the reasons explained - that was the reason he prefers powder, not the cost. The problem is that the powder in the pods is better than the loose powder.
The solution might be to put powder in the pre-wash tray and a pod in the dispenser. Or you could cut the pods and split the powder between the prewash and the dispenser.
He demonstrates this in the video as well. Powder/tablet from the same company performed differently, the powder seems to be deliberately underpowered.
For long videos, I have a script that fetches the transcript using yt-dlp and pipes it to an LLM for keypoints. If the content sounds interesting, I watch it; if not, I save 45 minutes.
I did something similar a while back, but I treat it as "text thumbnails" and kind of replace YT frontpage with this. I don't use it all the time, but sometimes the clickbait is too much.
Also I should add Gemini (the app) is able to access YT transcripts most of the time, so sometimes I'd just paste the link and ask for a tldr. One of the few reasons to go for Gemini app, not google ai studio.
That said, Technology Connections is worth watching just because videos are very pleasant, it's probably my favorite YT subscription right now.
There's more to the video than just that. For example: you should run your hot water tap before turning on your dishwasher, and you should experiment with the dishwasher settings, because they can make a big difference.
Running the hot water tap beforehand assumes that the dishwasher is hooked up to the hot water in the first place, which isn’t common everywhere.
Where I live this feature is called hot fill, I believe, and a lot of dishwashers don’t even support it. For those that do support its still generally not recommended to use it since the dishwasher now can’t do any rinsing with cold water, which is not only wasteful but I’ve heard the hot water can damage the water softener in your dishwasher.
But if you do hook it up to hot water (which is a lot more common in the US, I think) this makes a lot of sense.
And lo, there is verily even more information presented in the video than this thread has yet revealed. For what Alec says in the video is that this purge-the-cold-water advice is specific to North America, and he even explains the reasons why!
He mentioned that it's not due to voltage but rather low current circuits. A 15 amp circuit translates to around 1,800 watts in the US and if you derate it to 80% of that like the NEC requires a continuous load you'd have around 1,440 watts available.
His argument is that appliance manufacturers are trying to simplify their lineup by making models that would work in homes without a dedicated circuit (15 or 20 amp). Although I can't think of a better argument that still doesn't quite sound right to me. The NEC has required dedicated circuits for dishwashers for quite a while now and IIRC that requirement has been for a 20 amp circuit for a few decades. Even though you typically only see 15 amp receptacles, kitchens have required 20 amp circuits for somewhere north of forty years.
I think a lot of his video is simply based on testing with crappy Whirlpool and AEG dishwashers. There's a reason why Bosch (and these days LG) dishwashers are pretty much universally recommended.
It's the same issue, if you have a higher voltage then you can get more power without increasing current.
For example in Australia a standard house circuit is 10 Amps, but because it's at 240V we can get 2400 Watts (realistically more like 2300) out of a _standard_ wall outlet that is in every room of your house.
Meanwhile, here in Germany, we have 230V, but every standard wall outlet is rated for 16A continuous load over 1 hour so you can get 3.6 kW on each circuit.
Your standard home has a supply of 3 phase power @ 35A (southern Germany) or 63A (northern and western Germany), I think only the former GDR is at standard 3x25A, because like in many former Communist countries they had to save on expensive copper and aluminium, and since a lot of the GDR was heated by steam-based central district heating systems, you didn't need that much power anyway.
It's not the same issue. The vast majority of kitchens in the US have 20 amp circuits (so 2,400 watts peak, 1,920 watts continuous) exclusively. It's a bog standard receptacle (NEMA 5-20R instead of 5-15R) that's backwards compatible with 15 amp plugs. In fact these days most 5-15R receptacles have identical guts to their 20 amp counterparts save for the additional provision for a horizontal blade.
The electrical code (NEC) has started moving towards requiring 20 amp circuits in other rooms and more 20 amp circuits in kitchens.
the hot water can damage the water softener in your dishwasher
Most dishwashers in the US don't come with water softeners. AFAIK European made American market Bosch 500/700 series ones do, but the American made ones do not. Both would be designed for connection to a hot water supply.
As heated air drying (in the US) has fallen out of favor, hot rinse water will help things dry faster. To that end my Bosch dishwasher has an option to increase the temperature of the rinse water.
This is an aphorism, not a truth. But it’s true that dish washing machines are often badly designed, especially when there are multiple opaque options that can be turned on and off. Consider the example presented in this very video, where the “Eco” cycle uses more water and more energy than the normal cycle and where the “High Temp” option adds more wash cycles as well as heating the water for longer. No amount of design can save the user from misunderstanding what these options do. The only way for the user to use the machine correctly is, at a minimum, to read and learn from the service guide (or other documentation) which gives explicit details about what each wash cycle is supposed to do. If you watch the supplementary video you’ll find that even that was incomplete and had errors; full understanding required hacking the dishwasher to reveal which parts of the machine were active (inlet, heater, pump, etc) and for how long.
Therefore I stand by my assertion that if you refuse to learn the details of what your dishwasher actually does then you will probably be using it badly.
I don't understand, though. You make the point that the user needs to read about the machine, but the very fact that the user needs to read about the machine points to bad design. A well-designed machine wouldn't have called a mode that user more energy and more water "eco".
I think one of his earlier videos suggested doing what I have always done. Load the dishwasher then do the hand washing. This ensures you have hot water ready to go since you’ve already been actively using it. When hand washing is done, run the dishwasher.
My kids would routinely put in too much powder, which would gunk up the dispensing mechanism, requiring my time and effort to clean it out and fix it. Eventually the dispenser broke entirely and had to be replaced. We since switched to pods and haven't had any problems with the dispenser. The pods are worth every extra cent.
I've used a washing machine like this.
For the feature to be useful, it has to be correctly implemented. Unfortunately, all r&d budget apparently, goes into developing vendor's mobile application and wifi connectivity, not on basic mechanics inside.
That’s how my Miele washing machine works and I love it.
You put two large detergent containers in (one for whites and one for colours) and then forget about them. The machine reminds you when you’re running low and allows you to reorder more thru the app.
I have no idea if it’s cheaper or not, but anecdotally they feel like they last a long time. Ultimately, I don’t care, because of the convenience and the fact I know the machine is working out the correct dose per wash (the machine has a touchscreen interface that allows you to state what’s in the wash: T-shirts, denim, towels, etc. the level of soiling, etc. Then it works out the temperature, duration, drying time, and correct detergent type and dosage)
Miele has home dishwashers that do this now. But like all things consumer, it's a proprietary system that's designed to keep you locked into a subscription relationship with the company.
I looked at Miele, saw the requirement for using their refill containers (TwinDos†). Noticed an option for using not theirs as a fallback but it all seemed a bit convoluted.
Then I took a look at some high-ish end LG and they had sort of the same principle (EZDispense††), except the dispenser sits like a usual tray that you fill in with regular off-the-shelf liquid stuff, and then you're good for a while. The whole wifi/app stuff is entirely optional, the machine is fully functional through the panel without the app. So I got that one, very happy so far.
I have one of these. The detergent gizmo is a hard plastic shell with an interesting shape, powdered detergent inside, and a plastic film cover that looks like it’s heat-sealed on. It contains no electronics whatsoever. You can refill it, and the only limitation is that it’s kind of awkward to open, fill, and re-seal. The easiest way IMO is to cut a large flap in the hard plastic on the sides, then tape it down after refilling. It works fine.
Also, the Miele powdered detergent, in my personal opinion, sucks. And it leaves some residue behind. Yuck.
True for their dishwashers. But to their credit, Miele's washing machines actually come with two additional cassettes that you can fill with your (liquid) detergent of choice. You don't have to use Miele's proprietary ones.
PowerDisk? As long as you load salt and rinse aid, it works like a charm. As you said, if you want to save a bit of money, you can 3D print a replacement. But they last long enough that I don’t mind the cost.
What do salt and rinse aid have to do with it? Those have been things you load into a reservoir when prompted for years. And for those of us who live in HN’s homeland where the water is very soft, you may get better results by not loading rinse aid (there’s some moderately compelling evidence that rinse aid is rather toxic to digestive tracts, and it doesn’t even have much rinsing benefit if you’re rinsing with soft-enough and low-enough-TDS water), and the salt is also unnecessary with soft water. You do need to poke at the dishwasher settings to make it happy without rinse aid and salt, but this is well documented in the manual.
My Samsung bespoke combo washer dryer has that feature. It uses less detergent than we are used to so my wife uses pods, but I think this is better un general since the clothes come out clean even if they don’t smell like detergent. So not only do I not need to load detergent, I don’t need to transfer to the dryer. Still have to load sanitizer in unfortunately.
In the few months I’ve had the Samsung All-in-One my experience has been at least a 50% increase in time spent drying compared to an LG stack I had previously. Also, when complete, if you do get to it within 5 to 10 minutes of finishing, it feels damp, but that clears on its own after 15 to 30 minutes or so if it sitting in the dryer with the door automatically opened.
Very pleased with the experience personally. I am very happy to trade not having to transfer the laundry in the middle with it simply being done when I get back to it a few hours later. YMMV.
I had that on a GE Profile from I think 1999 if I remember right. It was pretty nice. I think it's still a feature on some of them.
That dishwasher was great and lasted over 20 years. The previous owners had definitely abused it and never cleaned it. I repaired it and had about the best dishwasher for a few more years. Eventually the main logic board went out (can't blame it too much, had electrical issues that killed a few things) and a replacement board was going to cost a few hundred dollars in parts even from questionable third party sellers. Seemed to be a good bit to sink on what was a highly abused >20 year old washing machine at the time.
as someone who's gone down the rabbit hole of dishwasher home repair, I've created more problems than I've solved. I agree that maintenance is important, but when you get into replacing the seals and gaskets that can result in water flooding into your kitchen, i decided recently to draw a line. I'm now the proud owner of some fancy leak detection / moisture detection IOS products as a result. (and yes I'm aware there are better, low tech solutions like the "frog" on the market, but I chose to torture myself instead)
Put a drop of food colour on a paper towel. Let dry. Then leave that where drips might happen. The colour will run. I leave it for a few days after every plumbing repair.
Yeesh I'm starting to sound like a Bosch shill but they've had leak detection in all but their bottom rung dishwashers for a few generations. The current ones will actively pump the water out when a leak is detected.
I was almost tempted into buying an all-in-one unit that washes and dries. Only a few brands are releasing these heat-pump based models currently and it doesn't seem quite ready for mainstream release. But the LG model I found did have the ability to preload it with detergent and run up to 60 cycles before filling again. I almost bought it just for that feature. But went with the older more reliable model instead. Maybe in 10 years after this washing machine dies the feature will be more prevalent and reliable.
I think long term, having two "all-in-one" combo washer and driers would make way more sense than separate washing and drying units. But the price for functionality just isn't there yet.
Both the LG and GE heat pump all-in-one units come with auto detergent dispensers. For the life of me I can't imagine wanting one more thing to break, especially on an LG product as LG is notoriously poor with parts availability.
He says that having the ability to tailor the amount of powder for the size of the load is one of the selling points of powder. But I'm guessing most people would much rather waste the few cents of savings in exchange for not needing to think about their dishes even that tiny bit extra.
My process is to use cheap Walmart powder for prewash and Kirkland pods in the dispenser. Avoids any over filling issues.
I used to just use the Kirkland pods and they worked fine too. The reason I started using powder in prewash is to get any loose fat dissolved so that it doesn’t clog over a period of time, not sure if that’s a valid concern. And yes, I do run hot water before starting the dishwasher.
My issue is the pods fail to dissolve ~5% of the time and leave a gunk that clogs the dispenser which again requires time and effort to clean. I'm convinced by the video to try powder again but I've had the filming issue with almost every powder I've tried. So, we'll see what happens...
I have a pet theory this is due to a wet pod tray: the pod's film partially melts and sticks to the tray before it's released. I made a habit of wiping the tray dry with a piece of paper before loading the pod and this stopped happening to me.
I (as is common for many middle-class South Africans) have a domestic worker who cleans the house, and in general you just have to accept that domestic workers will tend to use quite a bit more cleaning products than is necessary. At least with tablets, they will always use a set amount.
It's not their money that they're needlessly wasting and the thing not being clean is a more immediately noticeable problem with their work than you finding you're spending a lot more than usual on cleaning products.
It also wouldn't work to try give them a budget on cleaning products as then you're encouraging them to skimp on using enough so they get more money in their pocket.
Although our domestic worker is a lovely person who I help out as much as I can, at the end of the day she has limited skills and education, so can't demand very much of a salary, hence why she and many others in her position is a domestic worker.
When you're the one who does all the cleaning yourself and pay for the products you use, you'll try find the amount to use that definitely gets the job done, but isn't needlessly wasteful.
I also like the convenience of the tablets, you don't have to think about the amount or possibly making a mess or pouring too much powder in, etc.
It's interesting - YouTube does show AI summaries now - here's the one for this video:
This video explores dishwasher detergent, focusing on a new powder formulation. The creator details the science behind effective dishwashing, including pre-wash cycles and water temperature. Independent testing results comparing the new powder to leading pods are revealed.
I've noticed that they all seem to not give away too much so you still have to watch the video to get the conclusion. It makes sense why they do this for creators, but I do agree it would be awesome to just read the conclusion on many of these.
Videos are for fun. Nobody needs to know the conclusion in isolation. If you wanted a stream of boring facts, there could be a service for that, which nobody would use.
> I've noticed that they all seem to not give away too much so you still have to watch the video to get the conclusion. It makes sense why they do this for creators
Oh summer child, they do that because they'd serve less ads.
While I’m sure dismissing the video is easy for someone with a dishwasher that already works fine with pods, having worked through all four(?) of those dishwasher videos, I have finally made an enzymatic powder work after months of effort when pods did not help.
Heavy Duty + Hot Wash doesn’t usually work. Doesn’t finish washing.
Heavy Duty + Sani Rinse doesn’t usually work. Weird residue issues for entire top rack.
Heavy Duty + Hot + Sani doesn’t work. Both of the above issues at once!
But, as it turns out —
Normal + Hot + Sani does work, perfectly, repeatedly.
The takeaway from the latest video for me is that the options aren’t Boolean on/off flags for different cycle-specific parameters, the cheap U.S. rental dishwasher comprehensively alters the entire program based on which total set of options are selected in non-intuitive ways.
So I have to use Normal not Heavy, Hot Wash and Sani-Rinse, or my wash cycle doesn’t wash properly. Which is absurd and obnoxious, but TIL, and suddenly I’ve had two consecutive loads of dishes come out clean for the first time in a year of trying.
No, the pods didn’t work either, as it turns out my dishwasher doesn’t reach the “enzymatic cleaning” temperatures off my rental’s barely-120F water using Hot Wash alone. No, the filter isn’t dirty. Yes, it drains fine. Yes, I’ve run cleaning cycles with several cleaning powders. Yes, run the tap to hot. Etc etc.
TLDR for the entire video: If your dishwasher isn’t cleaning fully, even if you use maximum powder or pods or cleaning it, make sure you’ve tried counterintuitive combinations with Light/Normal instead of Heavy, or Sani Rinse to improve the wash cycle, etc. Ruling out unlikely combos because they seem illogical may prevent you from finding a working set. (And if you’re using a powder formulated by anyone who sells colorful dishwasher pods, it’s probably designed to be less effective than the powder in their pods.)
Hah! I had watched this just last night. I have a Fisher & Paykel Dishdrawer so this prompted me to check the instruction manual and sure enough, I had been putting Rinse Aid in the pre-wash area. I don't even really know what Rinse Aid is honestly but it's fun having some things be a black box. Turns out the correct spot is turning a knob, pulling it out and pouring it down a hole containing a glowing red light. I had assumed there was just some sort of circuitry down there and doing so would be a horrible idea. Thanks Technology Connections!
It's a volatile surfactant. Thus, it allows water to drip off your dishes before drying, so you don't get spots, but also doesn't produce a residue of its own.
I wouldn’t use rinse aid. It’s not good for you - damages your gut and may contain dioxane byproducts. I also would avoid detergents with ethoxylated alcohols (AEs).
What to look for is any powder or powder-filled pod with a) no AEs and b) does contain amylase and protease , two food-eating enzymes that are often omitted for who knows why.
We absolutely need rinse aid here, even with a water softener. But we make our own with ethanol and citric acid. For us works just as well as the pricey stuff and costs us…. A large bottom shelf bottle of vodka (sorry, don’t drink and don’t buy this enough to remember) and about $0.50 in citric acid will last me 6 months.
Yeah, I have very soft water. I tried using a liquid rinse aid when I switched from a name brand pod with a rinse aid to the cheap Kirkland pods. The rinse aid made things worse and I did end up with a residue on my glassware.
It’s cheap enough to try it and see if it helps but don’t feel obligated to use it if it doesn’t.
Household usage levels are probably fine [1]. That being said, we don't use rinse aid and I don't see any issues with glasses. I can see how it could be a problem in areas with harder water.
Edit: i see the linked pubmed in a child comment now. But it seems to be not in humans, so saying it "damages your gut" is not an appropriate conclusion.
The guy in the video disagrees with you. From his other video, 23 mins in,
> next, rinse aids. use them. this isn't a scam.
I'll trust the dishwasher expert until there's some proper citations.
You have to realize that every time you sip a glass or eat off a surface that's provided by a commercial entity, you're getting items that have come in contact with industrial appliances that dispense rinse aid.
I have a difficult time believing that something so ubiquitous is as harmful as you claim, but I'm open to being convinced.
The creator argues that most dishwashers are designed to use a pre-wash dose and a main wash dose of detergent, a fundamental often ignored by single-dose pods, and presents independent ASTM testing confirming the new powder matches or exceeds the performance of a leading premium pod. The video also features a detailed demonstration using temperature logging and peanut butter to stress the importance of purging cold water from the hot water supply line before running a dishwasher, particularly in North America, to ensure the water reaches the optimal enzymatic temperature needed for effective cleaning. This is further reinforced by showing how adding pre-wash detergent dramatically improves the initial cleaning phase, especially with fats and oils.
This has been his stance for a long time. He has a lot of dishwasher videos for some reason!
One thing I can't get a good answer to is whether the "prewash" step is universally the case or not. I have a good Bosch dishwasher and there's no compartment for a bit of pre-wash detergent. I don't even know if my dishwasher cycle has a pre-wash step. I would assume the dishwasher manufacturer knows what's best.
The owner's manual gives advice about not pre-rinsing the dishes because the food bits actually help the wash cycle, so I'm wondering if it works differently from the two-step process in this video.
What your manual says is common to most dishwashers.
You can tell if your dishwasher has a pre-wash cycle if it does a short run, then you hear it draining, and then it does a longer full run. I expect it probably does.
Also, you can always add a bit of detergent to the main compartment of the dishwasher for prewash. The normal detergent compartment has a lid so the the detergent stays dry until the main wash cycle, and most prewash compartments are just an open tray.
Come to think of it, if there is a latching door on the detergent tray, your dishwasher definitely has a prewash cycle, or else they’d skip the door entirely
> Come to think of it, if there is a latching door on the detergent tray, your dishwasher definitely has a prewash cycle, or else they’d skip the door entirely
Alec also mentions this briefly in the linked video; if manufacturers could avoid the cost of a latching mechanism, they absolutely would. Its presence means a pre-wash cycle exists.
My GE seems to skip the prewash cycle on the default setting for whatever reason. It does use a prewash on its "heavy duty" cycle though. Incidentally "heavy duty" also works infinitely better, with no more damage done to my dishes. YMMV of course.
I have a Bosch as well, i sprinkle a bit of powder on the door. It has a pre-wash run which goes quick.
The manual is likely referring to not hand rinsing dishes before loading them which was very common 30 or 40 years ago. I had to train my Mother to stop doing that.
his dishwasher detergent videos are a good example of an "improved" product being more expensive and less effective (like disposable razors).
With better understanding you can achieve far better results. I no longer rinse or even scrape dishes. with the right approach my dishwasher performance has been stellar. The user manual also includes proper tuning to local water hardness levels.
Poor dishwashing also discourages people from cooking at home, which leads to less healthful diets. So it's an important thing to get right.
I find his videos to have quite a bit of hand waving and poor methodology together with being overly verbose.
For example, he kept on saying that pods are not better in previous videos, but in the study he presented in this video, it showed that pods are performing significantly better than powders in every category. The study (which was not linked and I couldn't find it) was sponsored by a powder maker which the video recommends, but even this study showed just on par results with pods.
He does mention that a number of manufacturers aren’t making powders at all anymore, and also suspects out loud that they just aren’t trying with their powder detergents anymore, or are not bothering to apply improvements to their formulae to the powder form because manufacturers would rather sell the powders anyway.
He also specifically calls out Great Value brand powder as one he finds to be consistently on par with pod performance
He said a lot of things that are not backed up by the study he shared but didn't link, where powders clearly underperform pods.
At the end of the day, it'd have been much better for this community if we could have just gained access to a proper study comparing different cleaning options and learn from it instead of watching a 40 minutes video that doesn't say much and doesn't link to the study which is briefly mentioned there.
That has not been my experience with pods. When we switched back to powder the difference was night and day. Even my husband who used to swear by pods eventually gave in and agreed powder is much better. It is a bit fiddly yes but powder getting 99.9% of our dishes getting cleaned on the first run sealed the deal for us -- previously we were always having to add dishes to the next run or falling back to doing it manually. What makes it even more intersting is that even the cheapest powder beats every brand of pods etc we've tried. And we have a shitty cheap dishwasher that came standard with our new build house.
The owners manual for my Bosch 500 says prewash detergent is not necessary. But it does have a prewash cycle as I can hear it draining before the main wash.
Note: This dishwasher provides the optimum cleaning performance without the use of a prewash detergent and further enhances our standards of sustainability and efficiency.
I have a Miele dishwasher. Not only is there no place to put prewash powder, but I can hear the little door for the detergent pop open like 2 minutes into the cycle when on the default program.
This dishwasher also came with a box of Miele pods (and they encourage you to buy more). I think it's designed first and foremost to not use powder.
I keep my Bosch set to Auto and Extra Dry and use Kirkland pods. Rarely do I have anything that comes out less than perfect.
The Extra Dry setting seems to help with getting the glass and ceramics dryer. Plastics still come out quite wet since it uses a hotter final rinse rather than a heating element to get dishes “dryer”.
Pods have become so ubiquitous that many companies ditched that powder compartment altogether. But you don't need one anyways just pour it into the cabin.
The video explains why there always is a pre-wash step. Regardless of whether it comes with a pre-wash-powder compartment or not. I will try his solution.
omg thank you. my dishwasher has a prewash compartment so it's fine, but my clothes washer has a prewash step but no prewash detergent place. this elegant solution never occurred to me
I have installed several dishwashers for friends and find them fascinating. All of the ones I have seen basically dumped the contents of the closing soap compartmens as soon as it started washing. Some dishwashers (looking at bosch) even have a little tray in the upper drawer that catches the pod.
It depends on the cycle for some. Mine one doesn't do a prewash for the 45mins QUICK cycle. But the ECO cycle does follow the normal prewash-then-wash process as described in the video. Hence I normally use the ECO cycle and put the correct amount of powder in both components. However in a hurry I sometimes just use the QUICK cycle and only use the main component as I know there is no point in adding more. The manual explained all this.
I'm fascinated at the number of people on an ostensibly techincal website who don't learn how their equipment works. You've summed up in a few sentences exactly how mine works, but there are dozens of commenters in this thread who appear to be unaware of the basic funcationality of their dishwasher.
All I would add to what you've said is that when my Bosch does include a pre-wash in a cycle, it checks how dirty the water is and only drains the pre-wash water if is dirty. If the dishes haven't caused the water to become dirty, it keeps the same water for the main wash cycle.
Also, I want to expand upon my first paragraph a little: I'm not having a dig at anyone who doesn't understand their dishwasher. I am just venting/observing that the world is filled with all kinds of different people and reminding myself that I shouldn't make assumptions about people as often as I do.
I've had this realisation many times, but it doesn't hurt to have it again. Communicating with people is lot quicker and easier when I remember that.
I have a previous generation Bosch 500 series dishwasher. For my use case I get the best results with the heavy cycle. However I found that adding loose detergent in there for the "prewash" resulted in soapy residue being left on the dishes if used in conjunction with the heavy cycle (but not with the normal and auto cycles).
Alec's dishwasher videos are based on some rather primitive dishwashers. For instance he talks about his test unit not flushing out the spray arms, but Bosch/Siemens filters the water going to the spray arms so it wouldn't recirculate dirty water anyways. Same deal with the prewash. Bosch uses a turbidity sensor to determine how many "prewash" cycles to run and when to reuse the water, something his test unit very clearly does not.
Some US washers don't but many do. However, US washers tend to not heat water as quickly or to as high of a temp. The video cites two reasons: 1. US power being 110V vs 220v. 2. US dishwasher heating elements being limited to 800 or 1000 watts because many are designed to potentially share one 20A residential circuit with an oven and/or fridge due to possibly being retrofitted into a kitchen built before built-in dishwashers were standard and manufacturers not wanting to create different models for retrofit vs new installs.
This plus the comment about sharing a circuit with an oven. If the oven is electric, even in the US it is 220v. If it is gas only, then it could be 120v as it only needs to run the igniter and other circuitry without running any heating elements.
I think he said sharing a circuit with a fridge, which are generally 110 in the US -- i think this is how my apartment is wired (2-phase 30A to oven dedicated, one 20A for the whole rest of kitchen)
Trying to run a resistive heater on the same circuit as a fridge compressor without tripping leans towards very conservative wattage
That's funny. Code in Ontario Canada is that the fridge needs to be on its own circuit. It's funny because we have an extra-big-ass inverter drive fridge that never draws more than an amp or two, even at startup because it's inherently soft-start.
But also helps avoid the case where your coffee maker trips the breaker shared with your refrigerator and you don't notice until the food in the refrigerator is warm. (which was a risk in my previous apartment - the counter circuits were shared with the refrigerator). I think it makes sense to have it as a separate circuit.
> counter circuits were shared with the refrigerator
Ouch. Code here (Ontario) is that not only does the fridge need a separate circuit, but counter outlets need two separate circuits: each socket on the duplex outlet is required to be on a separate circuit (although multiple outlets can all share the same two circuits, but you're supposed to alternate top and bottom).
Of course, if your home is older than I am or it's a handyman special, all bets are off. If I run the microwave while someone is vacuuming in another part of the house it'll trip the breaker.
Good point. I haven’t tripped a GFCI in a long while but I don’t actually know if my fridge will lose power when I do trip the GFCI. My guess is that it will since it does have a water line and ice dispenser so probably requires being wired into the same circuit.
Electric ovens in the US have required dedicated 40 or 50 amp circuits for decades per the NEC. Dishwashers, as well, have required dedicated circuits for a while but the 20 amp requirement is a more recent development (although it's probably been at least a couple decades).
Kitchens in general have required 20 amp general purpose circuits since at least the early 80s. However the NEC (but not the Canadian equivalent) allows for 15 amp duplex receptacles on 20 amp circuits so home builders looking to save a few pennies often use those. Besides, there are few if any, residential appliances out there that have NEMA 5-20 plugs. Then again hardwiring dishwashers was pretty common up until recently.
in traditional times it was customary to buy a few outfits high quality clothing that would last, and wear the same clothes for a week at a time, and then really boil them clean. This is the European market.
post world war 2 consumer choice culture in the US led to people buying cheaper clothing but varying their outfits every day and cleaning them (with copious availability of water) with less intensity.
once these patterns are established in the market, they become more like customary and it's what consumers expect of their appliances, detergents, etc.
I can’t speak to Australian dishwashers, but trying to skip the video by catching a summary has failed you. Heating is discussed extensively in the video
My fairly cheap dishwasher in the UK has its own heater, but you can attach it to a hot water supply, which may save money as gas is so much cheaper than electricity.
American dishwashers are typically hooked up to hot water. Some will have heaters but they're not that powerful and they may only run for the main wash cycle
This has always struck me as dumb, as until recently it was far cheaper to use your existing (gas-fired) hot water than to use a resistive element. However, with gas going out of fashion (and already hugely expensive in the Eastern states), and abundant solar PV, the calculus has changed.
The problem is that the first few litres of the water coming from the hot water pipe may be cold or warm. Therefore adding a resistive element is a better solution to guarantee a specific temperature.
Gas (especially just in time) still works well for water heating even if you can use heat pumps for everything else. No sure when that will flip, I assume it will eventually.
Gas is already outlawed for new builds in Victoria, despite vast gas resources in the Bass Strait. Presumably that's the direction other states are heading too.
It was a direction some states in the USA were heading before Trump, but now… anyways there will come an economic/technological point where electricity just makes more sense like it does for almost everything else. No need to legislate a transition when one will happen naturally, but we aren’t there yet.
The video explains that dishwashers sold in 110V countries often has a hot water connection as it's too slow heating water off a 110V/10A circuit so it is more efficent to utilise the hot water pipes. However we live in NZ, a 230V country so we get dishwashers that can heat water from cold fine off a 230V/10A circuit so no need for a hot water connection.
Modern heat pump dishwashers will heat water on 110V just fine, but you are looking at 3 hour wash/dry times anyways. My Bosch isn’t connected to hot water and even has a sanitize mode.
I feel like it's probably pointless. The dishwasher will be full of water before the hot water starts coming out the pipe. Depending on how far the dishwasher is from the water heater I guess.
In most kitchens I've seen, the dishwasher is pretty close to the sink. In fact the sink and the dishwasher often share a shut-off valve. So if you run the water at the sink until it's hot, then start the dishwasher, it will get hot water.
Problem is, that most dishwashers have a prewash and a main wash. By the time the prewash is finished and the main wash starts, the water in the supply line will have cooled off quite a bit.
Is that the point of the air gap? I can't even get a straight answer from plumbers on what it's for. I don't see how that could possibly help with a clogged drain, just seems like a secondary point for the drain water to come out.
I'm fairly sure the point of air gaps on drainage is to prevent sewerage water from backing up in to appliances if the sewerage line is blocked. It will instead spill on the floor where it will be more easily noticed and cleaned.
That’s exactly what it’s for. If you block the sink drain and fill it with water, you can have water flow down the dishwasher drain hose and into the sump in the dishwasher. If that happens during the rinse cycle you’re rinsing with grey water.
Pumped out water has to go somewhere . With the airgap, it will either back out your garbage disposal or pour out your airgap into the sink basin, depending on the location of the blockage.
The airgap causes the pump to be physically incapable of backfeeding the drinking water supply with dishwasher waste
iirc its less about contaminating drinking water (there is a valve and pump to get through. rather tricky) and more about waste getting into dishwasher during cycle and you getting contaminated dishes.
my wife once decided to dump into garbage disposal a bunch of uncooked broccoli at once. it clogged garbage disposal and drain. when i tried to unclog it with plunger it backed into dishwasher (was hooked directly to garbage disposal bypassing airgap). took me hour to get everything out of dishwasher.
Thus the video's advice (also in my dishwasher's manual) is to run the water from a nearby sink until it's hot before starting the dishwasher. Because it helps significantly to get hot water at the input when US dishwashers are limited to 1200W of heating.
When I do the dishes I hand wash those that can't be put in the dishwasher before I start the dishwasher. This ensures that the water that goes into the dishwasher is already hot.
I don't think the dishwasher will be "full of water" as it doesn't actually fill up - rather, it only uses 2 gallons maximum per cycle, about the amount that would be the bottom of basin of the washer.
That's what I meant. The water drawn from the dishwasher is small enough to not even purge the cold water from the line in many houses. So you would just be wasting heat by filling the pipe with hot water while only taking the cold water from it.
This seems like something that only makes sense when water is scarce but electricity is cheap. You’d be constantly losing heat to the poorly insulated pipes.
They do. I didn't realize this until my natural gas supply company decided to replace my meter on a Friday. Without alerting me ahead of time so that I could, you know, plan to be gone while my house had no hot water.
Whenever natural gas supply is turned off in the US, for any reason, only the gas company can turn it back on. And they can't do so if there's a leak at all. You have to call a plumber to come out, detect the leaks, and fix them. After that, you can call the gas company to come back out (but not on a weekend) to turn it back on. And a same-day request for service requires someone to be home ALL DAY after it's called in.
And this is how I ended up showering at work for three days that week after not having had one over the weekend.
My parents used to have an old cooker which rather than having a spark button, had individual pilot lights for all of the hob burners and the grill. My mother was forever worried about whether one of the damn things had gone out (which they occasionally did). I think if you switched the supply off, switched it on again, and someone has left their house for a week, it might build up a significant amount of gas. Although they are supposed to be small enough not to. Presumably there were hardly any of those left now, but they can't assume they're all gone.
Pilot lights are often designed so that the heat from the flame holds a bimetallic switch in the open position. Should the light go out, the bimetallic switch will shut as it cools.
TBF the amount of gas used in old style pilots is really tiny. I’m sure it’s possible to accumulate dangerous quantities somehow, perhaps in a sealed subterranean basement if using propane instead of natural gas.
Natural gas is mostly methane, which is lighter than air and easily escapes most structures.
Natural gas today is mostly methane, but in the past it often had large concentrations of CO. In 1950 you can turn the gas on and stick your head in the oven as a form of suicide - won't work anymore (unless you get the house to explode).
Fascinating. I double-checked with ChatGPT (FWIW), and it confirmed. It said that currently, natural gas is extracted and shipped in its mostly pure form. In the mid-20th century, natural gas was "town gas," manufactured by heating Cole in the absence of oxygen. That produced a lot of carbon monoxide.
>Whenever natural gas supply is turned off in the US, for any reason, only the gas company can turn it back on
I had a seismic shutoff installed at my gas meter and the plumber who installed it had no problem turning off the gas and turning it back on when he was done. (and then turning it off again to demonstrate to me how it worked).
He re-lit the water heater pilot light before he left. The gas company was not involved at all.
Every country I have ever discussed with its residents has something that, on its face, is a reasonable safety precaution (I definitely don’t want to blow up my house), but in practice is just a way to make your life miserable while helping the people who work there have an easier day.
This just happens to be the one that affected me. Like modern gas water heaters that have electric ignition instead of pilot lights, because the one serious reason to have gas water heaters is that they work when there is no electricity. Now it’s just a price distinction.
often around here in texas, when the gas is turned off due to an issue, the gas company disables the meter, or even removes or bypasses it. And I live in gas land, where we have natural gas piped in to the kitchen, bathrooms, laundry, outside for grills, as well as the furnace. We've seen it a lot, if you call the gas company about smelling gas, they come and remove your gas meter until you hire a plumber to go find the leak.
traditionally (in household washing machine time) US houses were large and had a lot more hot water capacity for the whole house, and putting a heater into individual appliances was not necessary/cost effective.
retrofitting old traditional houses (especially stone) with higher capacity plumbing was expensive and infeasible, so putting heaters in appliances was a cope for markets that needed it.
A dishwasher cycle is usually only going to run for a specific period of time. Its more effective it if starts that time closer to the proper temperature rather than relying on waiting for the heater to get the temperature up to that time. Especially on the pre-rinse cycle, where the heater may or (probably) many not engage.
The ones that do vary in ability by overall dishwasher quality.
The ones that don't are hooked up to the kitchen's hot water line.
This is considered more energy efficient because a home's hot water heater (whether electric, gas, or another fuel) is better at heating the water in a bulk capacity than a tiny heater in the dishwasher.
The downside is that the cold water between the big water heater and the dishwasher has to be purged first for it to be really effective. If your hot water heater is in the other side of the wall, no problem. If it's six rooms away, problem.
Also, I’m way too lazy to look it up right now, but I’m quite certain I’ve heard of dishwashers that run the hot water for a little bit before letting it fill the basin. Like, I’m pretty sure this sort of thing is commonplace.
It’s not like the engineers for heaterless dishwashers are just too stupid to realize there’s an obvious workaround for having to purge the line before filling the basin. Especially when the performance is so much measurably better when you do it.
Like I said though, it’s a guess. It’s also possible efficiency certifications ding you for the excess water use.
Most of the new ones (at least higher end ones?) have heat pumps that heat water and handle drying. They are efficient enough to work on 110V, and the trade off is longer cycle times. Bonus: no more plastic utensils melting because they fell to the bottom resistive heating elements.
Hot water from the house supply isn't that hot though? My dishwasher gets MUCH hotter than the hot water supply... and I don't think the heater is "tiny" I think it's a rather substantial element. The dishwasher also doesn't need to heat up a "bulk" amount of water, just the amount of water used for washing the current load of dishes.
Watch the video; it makes a huge difference even though the hot water input is not as hot as the water can get when the dishwasher runs its heating element.
Also the size of the heating element is irrelevant. What matters is the power dissipated. Most dishwashers in the US will use only about 900 watts of power even when plugged into a circuit that supports 1500 watts. In the EU they often hit 3000 watts. Even when just heating up a gallon or two of water that makes a huge difference.
Sure, but most people don’t have a modern dishwasher. It’s an appliance that lasts 20 to 30 years ergo most people have old dishwashers that were manufactured decades ago.
My cheap GE dishwasher uses a hot water line, but also has an internal heating element to "boost" it, and help dry. My electric bill definitely suffers if cold water is used.
Hot water from the house supply isn't that hot though?
Depends on how you have it set. My current and previous hot water heaters had thermostats which permitted adjusting the temperature.
They also had warning labels on them about scalding water. If it's hot enough to scald, it's hot enough.
The dishwasher also doesn't need to heat up a "bulk" amount of water, just the amount of water used for washing the current load of dishes.
If you're washing dishes and someone is, or has recently, taken a shower; or someone is, or has recently, done laundry; or someone is, or has recently shaved or done any of the other dozen things that draw from the hot water heater, then the water is already hot and available and doesn't need to be heated all the way from cold by the dishwasher. A properly insulated hot water heater can retain heat for quite some time.
Interestingly the Gemini summary is nowhere near as good. But when it is... how helpful will that be! So many things with a very good summary will save so much time / avoid having to dive into unless truly in need of the details.
But the quality of the summary - and maybe the ability to expand it if slightly more details are required - and the low latency with that - are all super important. In that sense, AI can potentially save a lot of time in getting the right information quickly.
I summarise YT videos with Gemini all the time. You can easily control the length and depth of the summary & get it to focus on particular things etc, before investing time in watching it, only to find out it's promotional, superficial, clickbait, or some combination of all 3.
I've micro-optimized my dishwasher setup to have all my 100+ pods and other in-bulk dishwashing-chemicals stored in a compartment between my two dishwashers.
I'm also firmly in the camp of having a flat cutlery compartment at the top and not that inefficient, and uncivilized, scarring, basket in bottom section.
Until seeing that video I thought I was crazy. I've found my master.
I recall reading, I think in a comment here long ago, of someone who did that. He had just enough items to fill one dishwasher. By having two he could use one for storage and one for cleaning, with the two alternating roles.
I.e., he started off with all his things clean and in dishwasher A. As he used things he pulled them from A and put them in B. When B is nearly full and A is nearly empty, run B, move any remaining items from A to B. Then B becomes the storage space and A becomes the place to put the dirty items.
i have miele dishwasher with detergent powder cartridge that allows dishwasher to dispense it at will. it never used during pre-wash cycle in any of the programs that dishwasher has.
I inferred a trick from his original video. Dish soap and dishwasher detergent are not the same; the latter contains an enzyme that breaks food down. If you have something that is completely wrecked, fill it with piping hot water and put a dose of dishwasher detergent in it. Leave it overnight.
I strongly doubt the stuff is good for your skin, so I've only done this a few times.
This works for cleaning a lot of things. I regularly clean the coffee maker (a Bialetti espresso thing) by putting some powder detergent in the water compartment, then „make coffee“ without actual coffee and leave it in overnight. Neutralize with white vinegar (which has the added benefit of descaling) and rinse thoroughly. It‘s as new afterwards.
And yes, it’s not good for your skin, so avoid immersing your hands in it or wear gloves.
I don't think boiling water with dishwasher detergent in it is a great idea (because of potential fumes). I might have misunderstood what you mean by "make coffee" but maybe something to look into if you do this regularly.
By „make coffee“ I meant „use the coffee maker as usual, without ground beans but with detergent in the water“. The fume/steam is surely not healthy if inhaled directly and up close, but then again your dishwasher vents those same fumes into your kitchen untreated in much larger quantities than a 200ml coffee maker possibly can.
I regularly use things to clean that I am more worried about, such as bleach, acetone, turpentine and the likes…
Depending on what thing you’re talking about, often the easiest way to clean various pans is to just fill them with water and bring them to a boil for a few minutes
Unfortunate that he's advertising an expensive powder...
That said, based on his advice in a previous video, now I run the hot water tap until it's hot. I put a pod in the dispenser, and I sprinkle some powder into the dishwasher. My issues with the dishwasher getting the dishes clean went away.
- One of the key factors in powder over pods in his prior videos was cost. Cheap powder runs about 6.6¢/oz. The brand he’s promoting is $1.11/oz, nearly 17x more expensive than traditional powder. When comparing per-load costs, Cascade pods are about 39.5¢ per load and the promoted powder is 58.5¢ per load, or 48% more costly than pods. The price to performance is terrible and could only be justified if you also consider external factors like their sustainability practices and the donation of all profits to coral reef restoration. Not discussing price seems like a huge gap to me.
- I was disappointed that he only personally compared and tested washing performance against a pod and the promoted powder, rather than also evaluating a traditional powder. Could he have replicated and compared the subpar performance reported by others?
- I would have assumed that, if the pre-rinse is supposed to get hot, the heater would run until it reaches the temperature target. Is it normal for a unit to simply not care? Last I had done reading on this, whether to attach to the hot or cold side is actually a contentious issue, mostly around the gas vs. induction-based heating costs in water heaters, in addition to temperature losses in the pipes. If the pre-wash expects hot water, then that’s an extra point for the hot side backers. I guess one should always check their manual to determine best-practice on the purge and line placement.
The price was also an immediate turn-off for me, and I really don't like he's advertising it. It feels like a product that is marked up crazy amounts, greenwashed with "profits get donated" (profits AFTER the people involved get their salaries, obviously).
It feels like his channel suddenly changed to go into "let's make some money", carefully packaged in a "non-profit / charity" deal.
I wonder if its possible to press powder into pods, and use them. I mean, pre-make a bunch of them from store brand powder, and keep them ready for use.
Not sure if water can be introduced to bind the press, or maybe some other material.
I remember watching this[0] video by the OP a couple years ago. Never would have thought I could listen to someone talk about dishwashers for 30 minutes but it was surprisingly fascinating!
This just leaves me wondering if I’m the only one manually wiping off the dishes before they go in the washer? I’ve never had a dirty dish issue and pods work just fine, the powder works just fine, etc. pods are just a little more convenient so I use them. Also, if you rinse your dishes first there’s no large food going into the washer and I’ve already got the warm water primed.
That beats the point of the dishwasher for me. I don’t really want to do any pre rinsing or scrubbing/wiping. If I’m doing that, I might as well just use a sponge with soap for an extra five seconds and wash the dish completely.
If the dish has bits of e.g. vegetable matter beyond a certain size which would ultimately need to be manually cleaned out the dish washer's filter after some time, then I will at least scrape off the contents of the plate first, and occasionally I may do a 2 second rinse of a plate under my tap.
One surprising thing I got from this is that the "Energy Saver" mode used just as much energy, and even more water.
But he said that almost as a throwaway, with almost no explanation of his methodology in determining this, nor discussion about how common this problem might be.
My dishwasher came with a booklet that showed energy and water consumption for each setting. Eco mode is about 20% - 50% more efficient in comparison to the other programs.
Tl;dr He actually tested each cycle, timed what it did, and measured the energy with a Kill a Watt. He also found the repair manual, which included a diagram of each cycle that matched his tests.
His ultimate finding was that all of the cycles and modifiers did wildly different things, none of which correlated in any way to their name.
I've found it harder and harder to find powder dishwasher detergent in my country. I think they intentionally pull them off the market, I used to buy a large Finish container and now I can barely find a place that sells _any_ sort of dishwashing powder.
I, too, went through like 18 months in the UK with the big stores not selling any until one reintroduced it recently. Alternatives on the internet were like 3+x the price, at least. It was incredibly frustrating. I now stock up and have 2-3 boxes of the stuff, in case it does vanish again.
Doubly frustrating since mine is a small, single-drawer dishwasher, so pods are even worse since I can't break them down. It leads to me having way too much detergent in the dishwasher and I end up with residue on the dishes.
I thought about it but wasn't sure if it would really do the trick. I kinda don't wanna buy more detergent right now because I'm stuck with a lot of pods
Yeah, in Poland two "premium"-ish brands stopped selling powder in favor of tablets, and the cheaper brand is often missing from shelves, I need to order it in delivery separately. Situation is funny, since salt and rinse liquid are still widely available along with supposedly 3-in-1 tablets :) . I guess they are not so 3-in-1 as the ads say. But I will continue buying powder for as long as it will be manufactured. It's cheaper and more efficient. Same with washing machine power.
Tables are much more expensive, and their quality varies afaik. And out of the 5 different dishwashers I've used, none had a pre-wash dispenser, only one single dispenser. But it doesn't really matter, powder cleans up everything perfectly, on any program and without additional powder in the main area of the machince. The only time when dishes were dirty after the wash was when the impeller had some gunk mechanically blocking the holes for the water. So, I see no reason to buy overpriced detergents.
Interesting, here in New Zealand every supermarket has at least one brand of powder. Normally Finish is one and competing brands includes locally made and/or eco-friendly ones. Hopefully that practice doesn't reach here!
I wonder if that's why my now something like nearly 40-year-old dishwasher is so bad for leaking, on certain cycles? Maybe the pods foam up too much, because it seems hell of a foamy inside.
At some point, I'll maybe post up the pics of repairing the door hinges - previously it was leaking badly because the chunky metal hinges had cracked and bent, pushing the door up enough to not squash the bottom lip seal. Unobtainable parts now, but if you have a welder...
If you don't use a JTAG cable and a MIG welder on the same project in the same day, can you really call yourself "full stack"?
> Maybe the pods foam up too much, because it seems hell of a foamy inside.
Dishwasher detergent doesn't make suds. Dish soap does. Are you sure you're using the correct stuff? Or prewashing the dishes for some reason and not getting all the soap off?
Anecdote: My spouse and I visited some friends for supper at their place. After the meal, was when they decided to try out the dishwasher in their apartment for the first time.
With dish liquid.
It's almost like the movies where the wash machine fills the house with suds, and the occupants go floating out the front door.
At 40 years, there is an expectation that the rubber and most plastic components have become embrittled. The hinges likely only wore out after the spring had reduced function (and lack of lubrication)
After your weld, I hope you consider replacing all rubber with silicone, and add lubrication to at least an annual list.
i replaced few years ago dishwasher that was at this point of time 20 years old (GE). When it was removed from below countertop plastic connector on top of dishwasher (water hookup) fall apart into dozen of small pieces.
Anecdotally we started using these dishwasher sheets and the dishwasher started erroring during the cycle and also leaked slightly. On observation when it errored it looked very foamy inside.
Simply changing back to powder completely stopped the error and the leaking and this was in a 1 year old dishwasher
I haven't got space for a TIG. However a couple of weeks ago Hofer had an inverter gasless MIG about the size of a Commodore 64 power brick, not including the spool of wire. Can't say I wasn't tempted to get myself a hot-glue-gun-for-metal kind of tool.
I hate when people use that term the G in MIG stands for Gas. If you are not running a Gas (argon, CO2...) it isn't Mig. There are flux core wires that are commonly used and called Mig, but they are not Mig (unless there is also a gas flow - this isn't uncommon) and have very different weld properties.
Pods work great for me, and I love not having crumbs of powder under the sink, or a bottle of liquid detergent with encrusted drips down the side. It's just gross.
They are more expensive, but I buy them on sale at Costco for about $16/100, so at $0.16 per load I really don't care if powdered detergent is only $0.03 per load or whatever.
There is clearly a revealed preference for pods among consumers for these things, and "proving" that everyone is wrong for liking them is just not a very interesting exercise imo.
His specific thesis is that pods fundamentally clean worse than powder because they're inherently single-stage releases of detergent in machines designed for two-stage releases. Despite this, he still explicitly says that pods have their uses. So I'm unclear on how his goal is "proving that everyone is wrong." Did we watch different videos?
Out of 5 machines I've used at different apartments, none had a separate pre-wash dispenser. And I've saved manual for my current one, it says nothing about adding detergent additionally to the dishes. And all of them washed just fine with powder, without any additional mumbo-jumbo.
i have dishwasher that is loaded with cartridge that has 400g of powder. ideal scenario for dispensing detergent at will. yet, never mind what cycle I am using, it dispensed only during main wash cycle.
i also had in past machines from 5 different manufacturers. none of them had mechanisms that facilitate 2 releases or pre-wash compartments
> i also had in past machines from 5 different manufacturers. none of them had mechanisms that facilitate 2 releases or pre-wash compartments
did you check the manual?
I think in a previous video he mentioned that for machines like that it was stated in manual to add powder for prewash directly in the machine.
they all washed dishes just fine without any prewash powder added. somebody "here" even quoted bosch manual that there is no need in prewash powder. i most of the time use cycle that doesn't even has prewash
I'm 1.5 minutes in and I already learned to purge cold water from the pipes before running the dishwasher. Assuming this is evidence based and true, I mean come on! Is it really so alarming to see someone deep dive hard and do the work to mass educate the public?
It seems like it would be trivial for the machine to pump water in, turn on the heating element, and wait until it reaches optimum temperature before beginning the cycle.
My understanding is that energy efficiency requirements prevent this. Dishwashers have a fixed energy budget they are allowed to expend, which may not be enough to heat cold tap water up to the optimal cleaning temp.
So instead it pulls in hot water, but not for long enough to purge the line, so all the 140F water it pulls from the water heater sits in pipes till it cools off.
That’s pretty wild, since the energy needed to get it up to temp would still need to be expended on the water heater side. There are no real energy efficiency gains unless they can somehow engineer an effective cold water cleaning.
Read the manual of your washer. I’m willing to bet it instructs you to run the tap until it’s hot before you start the dishwasher. This is common for American dishwashers, because they can’t get the water hot enough, fast enough, for the prewash cycle
i also went to american lg website and checked manual of cheapest dishwasher that they have. it doesn't instruct to run water either. it says that if water is not hot enough cycle will run longer.
anticipating comments that LG is not american enough, i went to GE and checked manual of cheapest (349) dishwasher. it doesn't instruct to run tap either. it does say just like LG that if water not hot enough, cycles that use hot water will take more time (because water needs to be heated)
depends very much on where you are, unfortunately. in USA, this is definitely not the case, they're almost all incredibly dumb. especially the cheapest-possible models that most renters are forced to use (and renters account for about a third of all households).
as a concrete example, the video has a section in it where he shows that his doesn't so any sensing - hot or cold water have exactly the same timing on the heater's use (and resulting water temperature graphs).
so like. I agree with you that it should be true, it's simple and cheap to implement and it obviously works better. unfortunately it's not a sane reality for tens (hundreds?) of millions of people.
i am in usa. rented few times here. both in apartment complexes and houses.
cheapest GE dishwasher that i found now - $349 heats water. of course, for video he could go and find some ancient dishwasher that doesn't heat water just to make a point (or maybe he has a broken one ? ), but i think it will be outlier today.
many (vast majority I've seen) have a heater, but won't heat the water sufficiently for the pre-wash cycle from cold. or, frequently, the second / wash cycle, unless you set it to a high temp mode, and even then it's questionable / often just a timer and not thermometer-based.
check your user manual. huge numbers of them tell you to run your nearby tap until it's hot before starting a cycle because of this exact reason. this is also part of the video, and it has been true for literally every washer I've lived with (I read essentially all manuals), including the "good" ones.
pre-wash cycle meant to remove chunks of food/scraps. not to wash. my dishwasher doesn't bother to heat water for it. but for main wash cycle it heats water. i don't think i ever used dishwasher (american, eu, asian or turkish brands. some of them in country where they are hooked up to cold water) that bothered to heat water for pre-wash cycle. i think it's a feature and not a bug.
my dishwasher manual doesn't say to run tap. in fact it says "The dishwasher can be connected to a hot water supply for further economies. If the water is heated by for example, solar panels, this would be energy efficient. However, if your water is heated by electricity we would recommend connection to cold water.
"
i also went to american lg website and checked manual of cheapest dishwasher that they have. it doesn't instruct to run water either. it says that if water is not hot enough cycle will run longer.
anticipating comments that LG is not american enough, i went to GE and checked manual of cheapest (349) dishwasher. it doesn't instruct to run tap either. it does say just like LG that if water not hot enough, cycles that use hot water will take more time (because water needs to be heated)
In the video he mentions that the machines heat for a set time and not for a target temperature. So as majority of machines (in US market) are meant for hot water input. Then if you feed cold water they don't heat it enough
if you have powder crumbs under your sink you might need to improve your technique.
This reminds me of how some of my house guests will accidentally splash water all over the bathroom counter and even the mirror when they wash up in the morning. I don’t say anything, to be polite, but they clearly lack technique lol.
This works for me:
0. store the dishwasher powder (box) under sink.
1. Open dishwasher door
2. grab box, place OVER the opened door.
3. dispense powder into cartridge in door (with spoon, tilting box, etc)
4. put spoon back in box OR fully tilt box back upright. “Crumbs” will drop onto the door, that’s OK.
5. move box back under sink.
Even if I was messy, I personally couldn’t make myself spend 5x on pods to avoid cleaning crumbs under the sink once a month. When i think of convenience i think of a dishwasher saving me hours every month. Not saving 10 seconds a month to wipe crumbs under the sink. :-)
We clearly all have different preferences and ideas of “convenience”. I respect that.
I have a bad habit of not fully drying my hands when retrieving pods. The pods all clump together if they get wet. This is one of the many reasons I prefer powder.
"if they get wet". Ok, so don't get them wet. If not wet, did you ever consider using chopsticks to pick one out of the bag/container? That might work well.
With pods you can’t add some detergent to the prewash while adding the rest to the main wash cycle. That’s the thing that makes one of the biggest differences.
I used an old container with a 3" lid and a handle, and fill it regularly with the cheap dishwasher powder that I buy in bulk. I put a whole in the screw on lid so I can just pour out the powder. 98% clean and much much cheaper than any pods and much better for the environment because the packaging is all paper.
I watched the video, but may have missed this, but shouldn't the testing have shown that the powder was substantially better?
Or did they not test the "putting some powder into the prewash" thing and so it was just "powder released all at once" vs "tablet released all at once".
Even there I'd expect some mild improvement from the powder mixing more easily than a plastic wrapped tablet (though maybe if the content inside is liquid this factor is reversed?).
Does this mean the big corps do have some chemical advantage that cancels out the crappy delivery mechanism?
Or does it mean that a mechanical spray prewash step isn't meaningfully improved by chemicals in most circumstances?
I was more alarmed by the wrappers being plastic. I had assumed they were some clever biodegradable thing but they're not.
I have been using Dirty Labs dishwasher powder for about a year, since we got a new dishwasher, and inspired by some of his older videos on this topic. The performance has been good, no complaints. I don't torture-test my dishwasher like Alec does :). With the powder, I can do the whole some-on-the-door, some-in-the-dispenser thing mentioned here, or just use less for light loads. It is without a doubt not a budget option.
One aspect I like about it is that they have a fragrance-free variant, and even the "fragrance" one is not too bad. A second aspect I like is that it's biodegradable, et cetera. So a bit lighter on the environment, I hope, and the SDS is prominently available on the website.
I think another thing which is under-appreciated is that you need to know how to do the basic cleaning chores for your dishwasher-- for example if it has a filter, learn to clean it! Otherwise its ability to clean will probably be compromised.
I went to my Costco right before they banned phosphates in the dishwashing detergent and got a pallet of Cascade with 5% phosphates. People looked at me like I was was crazy. I'm still going through my pallet 15 years later and my dishes are always clean :-)
I just throw a bit of the detergent in the tub for prewash rather than put it in the cup, as it will leak out anyway.
One thing you could probably do for the phosphate-free stuff is to add a "teaspoon of TSP" to the detergent and that would probably help - not sure if the formulation in today's detergent would agree with it though. I'll find out in another 5 years I guess....
Coral reefs are dying because of the water temperature increase coupled with increased acidity. And that happens not because someone uses a dishwasher detergent, they are likely not even in the same hemisphere. But because none of the governments are implementing any working green tech at scale, so the emissions are only ever increasing and the rates of increase is accelerating. Paper straws and bad detergent won't help when new coal and gas plants are constructed daily.
I started using powder about a year ago, because of this guy. It legitimately works so much better than pods, because of the bit you 'spill' into the pre-wash part; and it's cheaper!
My only addition to this discussion is that the Dirty Labs dish soap has been legitimately better for our baby stuff and other plastic stuff that sometimes gets oily. I recommend it.
even the cheap costco pods are 3x the cost of powder. And his point is that the pods undermine the dishwasher because they don't let you control when and how much detergent is deployed during the multiple washing cycles.
powder deploys during rinse and wash. pods deploy only during wash (or only rinse if people put the pods into the tray, which is common)
And the dishwashers are designed with a hardness index in the hopper . you're supposed to line up the soap with your local hardness level to avoid residue.
But the multi-pod strategy means you can give the machine soap to use in various cycles. Put some in the little flap, and some just in with the dishes.
I'm not sure if my machine even has a hardness marking, but when I used liquid dishwasher soap, I simply filled up the compartment every time.
As to the cost, yes it's 3X, but if you're reading this and you have a Costco membership, it's still a rounding error.
Pods just make life simpler and cleaner (no messy powders and gunky liquids in the soap cabinet), which is why I even have a dishwasher in the first place.
Referring to yourself in a title twice strikes me as mildly narcissistic and otherwise it's obvious click bait. Doesn't put me in a mood to watch the video. But judging from just the title this person seems to have figured out a few obvious things that are probably well known and entirely unsurprising for people that know anything about the virtues of soda in household applications. That's not exactly a well kept secret.
I thought that the multi-solution pods - they're usually have differently-colored, for I presume marketing reasons - have pockets with different dissolve rates, so that the solutions are dispensed in sequence. I've not tested that, though.
Making part of the pod out of 3mil PVA and bonding it to another part made of 1mil PVA does not sound like unachievable technology to me. In fact, the first Google result for PVA films that I see sells them based on their various dissolution times.
It would be probably very difficult to engineer a good dissolution rate that takes into account the different length and water temperature of the pre-wash cycle of the many many different dishwashers out there. So no, as the video in the sibling comment shows, it's just fancy marketing.
I didn’t downvote but not a fan. Reason is Completely rude and subjective but I just can’t really stand his voice or how he speaks. Never seen him before today but oddly this video has found me through 2 different avenues today
I was a long-time adherent of powder for all the reasons in the video. I used the Seventh Generation powder that is widely available, or once was. One day I couldn't find it, so I got Cascade Free & Clear Pods. I was completely blown away by how much better the pods work. And they work faster, too, because my dishwasher cycles are based on water clarity and they end sooner if the detergent is working faster. So I permanently switched, nevermind the cost difference.
Perhaps part of the issue is that the presenter in the video is using a somewhat primitive machine.
We attempted an experiment in our own dishwasher after the video, trying Cascade Platinum boxed powder (only stuff available here) and Cascade Platinum Plus pods (which we had been using before). The experiment showed that, for our dishwasher and our water, the pods just worked significantly better. The main difference was in the silverware (tiny bits would occasionally be left with the powder).
A couple of months into the experiment with the powder, the dishwasher started to smell a bit foul, which usually indicates time to clean the filters, which I did. But this happened vastly sooner than I was used to with the pods.
Even if the powder's performance sucks intentionally because Cascade made it worse now, as a sibling comment suggested, ultimately that's the only powder option still available here.
I used pods and tried out powder after one of his previous videos on this, it was pretty terrible even following his advice and using rinse aids.
I like chocolate milk, made by mixing chocolate powder (Nesquik) into milk, and somehow everything except pods manages to leave a film of the chocolate powder over everything. I haven't watched this video yet, but my suspicion is he's using bad pods - ones that really are just packaged detergent without the extra chemicals they often include in the pods nowadays.
Because the pods are so much more expensive, it means they make more money on them. There’s a very real incentive for the companies to intentionally reduce the performance of the powders just so they can sell more pods (as people notice the performance difference, they think it’s because powder is naturally inferior instead of being manipulated into being so).
Same here. Tried using just power, and his other advice and it didn't work out. Didn't clean as well and many dishes (especially plastic) ended up with a white film despite trying multiple brands of powder and dish dry solution.
I wonder if part of it is differences in water hardness and such.
In the video he ran a similar test and had similar results. IIRC his conclusion was that the manufacturer is deliberately sabotaging the performance of powders in order to direct more sales to the higher margin pods.
It's also why he's endorsing a new powder product he was involved in developing: it performs as good or better than the pods.
i used multiple dishwashers in multiple countries. blomberg, ge, bosch, miele, lg. used pods for as long as they exist (with exception of miele that has detergent cartridge that is good for two dozens of cycles). the only times when I had problem with dishwasher performance it's when either dishwasher had physical malfunction, dishwasher arms were blocked by some object or when i forgot to put pod.
pods are about convenience. exactly same reason that i got dishwasher with detergent cartridges and washing machine with build in container for detergent.
but if we talk about powders, they can be very different with different performance. There are commercial powders (for restaurants and such where dishwashers run on very short cycles) that I afraid to put in my dishwasher and there are eco powders that are made from unicorn tears (tried once, they cleaned dirt but leave stains on clear glass). i went through sds of a bunch of them. most of them have same similar basic ingredients, but in different proportions
I can't remember if it was main video or second channel one, in which Alec states with confidence that big brands make powder worse on purpose to push their higher margin pods.
The opinion is based on his experience (horrible residue left by big-name powder in contrast to store-branded great-value powders being problem-free) and lab results.
i used cascade powder to refill miele cartridges. there was 0 difference with regards to residue/etc. also SDS was very similiar.
i just went to check amazon. cascade complete powder has 4.6 with 9k reviews. if it was subpar, pretty sure that rating would have reflected it. for example plant based detergents hover around 4.
It's also highly dependent on how soft your water is. The people complaining about performance probably have hard water. Do you ever have to descale your kettle / coffee maker?
i used to live in area with very hard water. used softening salt in dishwasher. later switched to pods that were advertised to have water softening compounds and used them without softening salt.
when i used pods, i had open box under counter. i could with literally closed eyes to take one and put it in machine without looking. using spoon involves more actions and there are chance that some of the powder will end up on floor/inside cabinet/etc.
I bring a bag to the store. Is it more convenient? no, is it the right thing to do? yes. I'm just making the point that they are more convenient for people in this situation.
Having the cleanest dishes is not always the optimization one is looking for.
I like pods because there is less of a chance my clumsy self, or younger kids can accidentally spill costly soap for my dog to try to lick up or overfill the dispenser. My dishes are almost never caked in fats and oils when I put them in. I do not use a pre-wash. If I do I break a pod in half and toss in the bottom.
This guy makes me roll my eyes. There is nothing more exhausting than a self-assured YouTuber lecturing others as if he has all the right answers. He is not wrong per se but not everyone has their own preferences and needs.
Who the hell has a dishwasher connected to hot water? Shit, my washing machine doesn't even have hot water. Both devices have internal heaters. Both are over 10 years old.
This guy has been incorrect in his yt posts so many times, I simply do not believe him anymore.
He is all about monetization and doesn't care about truth or accuracy.
I wish the description of the video was like an abstract.
YMMV. Based on the earlier videos, I did switch back to powder, and I did follow the steps of putting some powder in the main compartment for the pre-wash. And i did try several powders.
Yet, none of the powders were anywhere near as good as the tablet we use.
It also doesn't contain any nasty chemicals, unlike several of the powders[1].
So we went back to our tablets. It might cost slightly more, but hardly a significant expense by any stretch.
Now, there might be some powders that work better which aren't available here in Norway. But I gotta work with what I got.
[1]: https://www.forbrukerradet.no/siste-nytt/test-av-oppvaskmidd...
The solution might be to put powder in the pre-wash tray and a pod in the dispenser. Or you could cut the pods and split the powder between the prewash and the dispenser.
On the page it shows an extra TLDR button near the like button.
You can change the prompt to modify how the summary looks and has an optional mode with links to specific timestamps.
Also I should add Gemini (the app) is able to access YT transcripts most of the time, so sometimes I'd just paste the link and ask for a tldr. One of the few reasons to go for Gemini app, not google ai studio.
That said, Technology Connections is worth watching just because videos are very pleasant, it's probably my favorite YT subscription right now.
Where I live this feature is called hot fill, I believe, and a lot of dishwashers don’t even support it. For those that do support its still generally not recommended to use it since the dishwasher now can’t do any rinsing with cold water, which is not only wasteful but I’ve heard the hot water can damage the water softener in your dishwasher.
But if you do hook it up to hot water (which is a lot more common in the US, I think) this makes a lot of sense.
In which case my comment still stands for those who also haven’t watched the whole video, which is probably a fair amount of people
His argument is that appliance manufacturers are trying to simplify their lineup by making models that would work in homes without a dedicated circuit (15 or 20 amp). Although I can't think of a better argument that still doesn't quite sound right to me. The NEC has required dedicated circuits for dishwashers for quite a while now and IIRC that requirement has been for a 20 amp circuit for a few decades. Even though you typically only see 15 amp receptacles, kitchens have required 20 amp circuits for somewhere north of forty years.
I think a lot of his video is simply based on testing with crappy Whirlpool and AEG dishwashers. There's a reason why Bosch (and these days LG) dishwashers are pretty much universally recommended.
For example in Australia a standard house circuit is 10 Amps, but because it's at 240V we can get 2400 Watts (realistically more like 2300) out of a _standard_ wall outlet that is in every room of your house.
Your standard home has a supply of 3 phase power @ 35A (southern Germany) or 63A (northern and western Germany), I think only the former GDR is at standard 3x25A, because like in many former Communist countries they had to save on expensive copper and aluminium, and since a lot of the GDR was heated by steam-based central district heating systems, you didn't need that much power anyway.
The electrical code (NEC) has started moving towards requiring 20 amp circuits in other rooms and more 20 amp circuits in kitchens.
As heated air drying (in the US) has fallen out of favor, hot rinse water will help things dry faster. To that end my Bosch dishwasher has an option to increase the temperature of the rinse water.
Therefore I stand by my assertion that if you refuse to learn the details of what your dishwasher actually does then you will probably be using it badly.
I know they exist in the commercial realm, but I'm not 100% certain the wife is ready for a Hobart machine in the kitchen ...
You put two large detergent containers in (one for whites and one for colours) and then forget about them. The machine reminds you when you’re running low and allows you to reorder more thru the app.
I have no idea if it’s cheaper or not, but anecdotally they feel like they last a long time. Ultimately, I don’t care, because of the convenience and the fact I know the machine is working out the correct dose per wash (the machine has a touchscreen interface that allows you to state what’s in the wash: T-shirts, denim, towels, etc. the level of soiling, etc. Then it works out the temperature, duration, drying time, and correct detergent type and dosage)
I looked at Miele, saw the requirement for using their refill containers (TwinDos†). Noticed an option for using not theirs as a fallback but it all seemed a bit convoluted.
Then I took a look at some high-ish end LG and they had sort of the same principle (EZDispense††), except the dispenser sits like a usual tray that you fill in with regular off-the-shelf liquid stuff, and then you're good for a while. The whole wifi/app stuff is entirely optional, the machine is fully functional through the panel without the app. So I got that one, very happy so far.
† https://www.mieleusa.com/c/laundry-tech-washing-machines-aut...
†† https://www.lg.com/in/magazine/easing-laundry-with-ezdispens...
Also, the Miele powdered detergent, in my personal opinion, sucks. And it leaves some residue behind. Yuck.
Very pleased with the experience personally. I am very happy to trade not having to transfer the laundry in the middle with it simply being done when I get back to it a few hours later. YMMV.
Older dryers (that needed a vent) were inefficient, but faster at drying. They constantly pumped damp, heated air out of the vent.
Modern condensing dryers keep the heat in the system for a more energy efficient drying cycle but the condensing process is slower.
That dishwasher was great and lasted over 20 years. The previous owners had definitely abused it and never cleaned it. I repaired it and had about the best dishwasher for a few more years. Eventually the main logic board went out (can't blame it too much, had electrical issues that killed a few things) and a replacement board was going to cost a few hundred dollars in parts even from questionable third party sellers. Seemed to be a good bit to sink on what was a highly abused >20 year old washing machine at the time.
https://www.lg.com/us/washcombo-all-in-one
I think long term, having two "all-in-one" combo washer and driers would make way more sense than separate washing and drying units. But the price for functionality just isn't there yet.
LG washing machines. And I think Miele washing machines as well
I used to just use the Kirkland pods and they worked fine too. The reason I started using powder in prewash is to get any loose fat dissolved so that it doesn’t clog over a period of time, not sure if that’s a valid concern. And yes, I do run hot water before starting the dishwasher.
I (as is common for many middle-class South Africans) have a domestic worker who cleans the house, and in general you just have to accept that domestic workers will tend to use quite a bit more cleaning products than is necessary. At least with tablets, they will always use a set amount.
It's not their money that they're needlessly wasting and the thing not being clean is a more immediately noticeable problem with their work than you finding you're spending a lot more than usual on cleaning products.
It also wouldn't work to try give them a budget on cleaning products as then you're encouraging them to skimp on using enough so they get more money in their pocket.
Although our domestic worker is a lovely person who I help out as much as I can, at the end of the day she has limited skills and education, so can't demand very much of a salary, hence why she and many others in her position is a domestic worker.
When you're the one who does all the cleaning yourself and pay for the products you use, you'll try find the amount to use that definitely gets the job done, but isn't needlessly wasteful.
I also like the convenience of the tablets, you don't have to think about the amount or possibly making a mess or pouring too much powder in, etc.
This video explores dishwasher detergent, focusing on a new powder formulation. The creator details the science behind effective dishwashing, including pre-wash cycles and water temperature. Independent testing results comparing the new powder to leading pods are revealed.
I've noticed that they all seem to not give away too much so you still have to watch the video to get the conclusion. It makes sense why they do this for creators, but I do agree it would be awesome to just read the conclusion on many of these.
Oh summer child, they do that because they'd serve less ads.
Heavy Duty + Hot Wash doesn’t usually work. Doesn’t finish washing.
Heavy Duty + Sani Rinse doesn’t usually work. Weird residue issues for entire top rack.
Heavy Duty + Hot + Sani doesn’t work. Both of the above issues at once!
But, as it turns out —
Normal + Hot + Sani does work, perfectly, repeatedly.
The takeaway from the latest video for me is that the options aren’t Boolean on/off flags for different cycle-specific parameters, the cheap U.S. rental dishwasher comprehensively alters the entire program based on which total set of options are selected in non-intuitive ways.
So I have to use Normal not Heavy, Hot Wash and Sani-Rinse, or my wash cycle doesn’t wash properly. Which is absurd and obnoxious, but TIL, and suddenly I’ve had two consecutive loads of dishes come out clean for the first time in a year of trying.
No, the pods didn’t work either, as it turns out my dishwasher doesn’t reach the “enzymatic cleaning” temperatures off my rental’s barely-120F water using Hot Wash alone. No, the filter isn’t dirty. Yes, it drains fine. Yes, I’ve run cleaning cycles with several cleaning powders. Yes, run the tap to hot. Etc etc.
TLDR for the entire video: If your dishwasher isn’t cleaning fully, even if you use maximum powder or pods or cleaning it, make sure you’ve tried counterintuitive combinations with Light/Normal instead of Heavy, or Sani Rinse to improve the wash cycle, etc. Ruling out unlikely combos because they seem illogical may prevent you from finding a working set. (And if you’re using a powder formulated by anyone who sells colorful dishwasher pods, it’s probably designed to be less effective than the powder in their pods.)
Business opportunity something something AI
What to look for is any powder or powder-filled pod with a) no AEs and b) does contain amylase and protease , two food-eating enzymes that are often omitted for who knows why.
365 Whole Foods brand pods are my go-to
It’s cheap enough to try it and see if it helps but don’t feel obligated to use it if it doesn’t.
[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36464527/
what does that even mean?
Any citations here?
Edit: i see the linked pubmed in a child comment now. But it seems to be not in humans, so saying it "damages your gut" is not an appropriate conclusion.
> next, rinse aids. use them. this isn't a scam.
I'll trust the dishwasher expert until there's some proper citations.
You have to realize that every time you sip a glass or eat off a surface that's provided by a commercial entity, you're getting items that have come in contact with industrial appliances that dispense rinse aid.
I have a difficult time believing that something so ubiquitous is as harmful as you claim, but I'm open to being convinced.
There is some research (see my other comment) hinting that industrial level use can be harmful (households dilution levels are probably fine).
The creator argues that most dishwashers are designed to use a pre-wash dose and a main wash dose of detergent, a fundamental often ignored by single-dose pods, and presents independent ASTM testing confirming the new powder matches or exceeds the performance of a leading premium pod. The video also features a detailed demonstration using temperature logging and peanut butter to stress the importance of purging cold water from the hot water supply line before running a dishwasher, particularly in North America, to ensure the water reaches the optimal enzymatic temperature needed for effective cleaning. This is further reinforced by showing how adding pre-wash detergent dramatically improves the initial cleaning phase, especially with fats and oils.
One thing I can't get a good answer to is whether the "prewash" step is universally the case or not. I have a good Bosch dishwasher and there's no compartment for a bit of pre-wash detergent. I don't even know if my dishwasher cycle has a pre-wash step. I would assume the dishwasher manufacturer knows what's best.
The owner's manual gives advice about not pre-rinsing the dishes because the food bits actually help the wash cycle, so I'm wondering if it works differently from the two-step process in this video.
You can tell if your dishwasher has a pre-wash cycle if it does a short run, then you hear it draining, and then it does a longer full run. I expect it probably does.
Also, you can always add a bit of detergent to the main compartment of the dishwasher for prewash. The normal detergent compartment has a lid so the the detergent stays dry until the main wash cycle, and most prewash compartments are just an open tray.
Come to think of it, if there is a latching door on the detergent tray, your dishwasher definitely has a prewash cycle, or else they’d skip the door entirely
Alec also mentions this briefly in the linked video; if manufacturers could avoid the cost of a latching mechanism, they absolutely would. Its presence means a pre-wash cycle exists.
The manual is likely referring to not hand rinsing dishes before loading them which was very common 30 or 40 years ago. I had to train my Mother to stop doing that.
With better understanding you can achieve far better results. I no longer rinse or even scrape dishes. with the right approach my dishwasher performance has been stellar. The user manual also includes proper tuning to local water hardness levels.
Poor dishwashing also discourages people from cooking at home, which leads to less healthful diets. So it's an important thing to get right.
Dishwashing is fascinating.
For example, he kept on saying that pods are not better in previous videos, but in the study he presented in this video, it showed that pods are performing significantly better than powders in every category. The study (which was not linked and I couldn't find it) was sponsored by a powder maker which the video recommends, but even this study showed just on par results with pods.
He also specifically calls out Great Value brand powder as one he finds to be consistently on par with pod performance
At the end of the day, it'd have been much better for this community if we could have just gained access to a proper study comparing different cleaning options and learn from it instead of watching a 40 minutes video that doesn't say much and doesn't link to the study which is briefly mentioned there.
Note: This dishwasher provides the optimum cleaning performance without the use of a prewash detergent and further enhances our standards of sustainability and efficiency.
This dishwasher also came with a box of Miele pods (and they encourage you to buy more). I think it's designed first and foremost to not use powder.
This is because the profit margin on them is much, much fatter. Miele still makes powder if you want to use theirs.
Like in the video: https://youtu.be/DAX2_mPr9W8?si=Njn749InqNCbjhQd&t=822
The Extra Dry setting seems to help with getting the glass and ceramics dryer. Plastics still come out quite wet since it uses a hotter final rinse rather than a heating element to get dishes “dryer”.
The video explains why there always is a pre-wash step. Regardless of whether it comes with a pre-wash-powder compartment or not. I will try his solution.
All I would add to what you've said is that when my Bosch does include a pre-wash in a cycle, it checks how dirty the water is and only drains the pre-wash water if is dirty. If the dishes haven't caused the water to become dirty, it keeps the same water for the main wash cycle.
Also, I want to expand upon my first paragraph a little: I'm not having a dig at anyone who doesn't understand their dishwasher. I am just venting/observing that the world is filled with all kinds of different people and reminding myself that I shouldn't make assumptions about people as often as I do.
I've had this realisation many times, but it doesn't hurt to have it again. Communicating with people is lot quicker and easier when I remember that.
Alec's dishwasher videos are based on some rather primitive dishwashers. For instance he talks about his test unit not flushing out the spray arms, but Bosch/Siemens filters the water going to the spray arms so it wouldn't recirculate dirty water anyways. Same deal with the prewash. Bosch uses a turbidity sensor to determine how many "prewash" cycles to run and when to reuse the water, something his test unit very clearly does not.
American dishwashers don't have their own heater? All dishwashers I've seen in Australia only have cold water supply.
15, dishwasher manufacturers can't assume the dishwasher is on a 20.
Trying to run a resistive heater on the same circuit as a fridge compressor without tripping leans towards very conservative wattage
Just a waste of copper and a beaker really.
But also helps avoid the case where your coffee maker trips the breaker shared with your refrigerator and you don't notice until the food in the refrigerator is warm. (which was a risk in my previous apartment - the counter circuits were shared with the refrigerator). I think it makes sense to have it as a separate circuit.
Ouch. Code here (Ontario) is that not only does the fridge need a separate circuit, but counter outlets need two separate circuits: each socket on the duplex outlet is required to be on a separate circuit (although multiple outlets can all share the same two circuits, but you're supposed to alternate top and bottom).
Of course, if your home is older than I am or it's a handyman special, all bets are off. If I run the microwave while someone is vacuuming in another part of the house it'll trip the breaker.
Kitchens in general have required 20 amp general purpose circuits since at least the early 80s. However the NEC (but not the Canadian equivalent) allows for 15 amp duplex receptacles on 20 amp circuits so home builders looking to save a few pennies often use those. Besides, there are few if any, residential appliances out there that have NEMA 5-20 plugs. Then again hardwiring dishwashers was pretty common up until recently.
post world war 2 consumer choice culture in the US led to people buying cheaper clothing but varying their outfits every day and cleaning them (with copious availability of water) with less intensity.
once these patterns are established in the market, they become more like customary and it's what consumers expect of their appliances, detergents, etc.
Problem is, that most dishwashers have a prewash and a main wash. By the time the prewash is finished and the main wash starts, the water in the supply line will have cooled off quite a bit.
This almost made a mess when the sink was clogged and the dishwasher tried to pump the water out but had nowhere to go.
The airgap causes the pump to be physically incapable of backfeeding the drinking water supply with dishwasher waste
my wife once decided to dump into garbage disposal a bunch of uncooked broccoli at once. it clogged garbage disposal and drain. when i tried to unclog it with plunger it backed into dishwasher (was hooked directly to garbage disposal bypassing airgap). took me hour to get everything out of dishwasher.
It's for comfort and convenience.
Whenever natural gas supply is turned off in the US, for any reason, only the gas company can turn it back on. And they can't do so if there's a leak at all. You have to call a plumber to come out, detect the leaks, and fix them. After that, you can call the gas company to come back out (but not on a weekend) to turn it back on. And a same-day request for service requires someone to be home ALL DAY after it's called in.
And this is how I ended up showering at work for three days that week after not having had one over the weekend.
Natural gas is mostly methane, which is lighter than air and easily escapes most structures.
I had a seismic shutoff installed at my gas meter and the plumber who installed it had no problem turning off the gas and turning it back on when he was done. (and then turning it off again to demonstrate to me how it worked).
He re-lit the water heater pilot light before he left. The gas company was not involved at all.
I discovered the unexpected value of a YMCA membership when my hot water was offline for a while.
This just happens to be the one that affected me. Like modern gas water heaters that have electric ignition instead of pilot lights, because the one serious reason to have gas water heaters is that they work when there is no electricity. Now it’s just a price distinction.
Doesn't match my experience. My colleagues and I are able to turn on or off the gas supply to our houses at will.
retrofitting old traditional houses (especially stone) with higher capacity plumbing was expensive and infeasible, so putting heaters in appliances was a cope for markets that needed it.
Some do, some don't.
The ones that do vary in ability by overall dishwasher quality.
The ones that don't are hooked up to the kitchen's hot water line.
This is considered more energy efficient because a home's hot water heater (whether electric, gas, or another fuel) is better at heating the water in a bulk capacity than a tiny heater in the dishwasher.
The downside is that the cold water between the big water heater and the dishwasher has to be purged first for it to be really effective. If your hot water heater is in the other side of the wall, no problem. If it's six rooms away, problem.
It’s not like the engineers for heaterless dishwashers are just too stupid to realize there’s an obvious workaround for having to purge the line before filling the basin. Especially when the performance is so much measurably better when you do it.
Like I said though, it’s a guess. It’s also possible efficiency certifications ding you for the excess water use.
Also the size of the heating element is irrelevant. What matters is the power dissipated. Most dishwashers in the US will use only about 900 watts of power even when plugged into a circuit that supports 1500 watts. In the EU they often hit 3000 watts. Even when just heating up a gallon or two of water that makes a huge difference.
Depends on how you have it set. My current and previous hot water heaters had thermostats which permitted adjusting the temperature.
They also had warning labels on them about scalding water. If it's hot enough to scald, it's hot enough.
The dishwasher also doesn't need to heat up a "bulk" amount of water, just the amount of water used for washing the current load of dishes.
If you're washing dishes and someone is, or has recently, taken a shower; or someone is, or has recently, done laundry; or someone is, or has recently shaved or done any of the other dozen things that draw from the hot water heater, then the water is already hot and available and doesn't need to be heated all the way from cold by the dishwasher. A properly insulated hot water heater can retain heat for quite some time.
But the quality of the summary - and maybe the ability to expand it if slightly more details are required - and the low latency with that - are all super important. In that sense, AI can potentially save a lot of time in getting the right information quickly.
I'm also firmly in the camp of having a flat cutlery compartment at the top and not that inefficient, and uncivilized, scarring, basket in bottom section.
Until seeing that video I thought I was crazy. I've found my master.
I.e., he started off with all his things clean and in dishwasher A. As he used things he pulled them from A and put them in B. When B is nearly full and A is nearly empty, run B, move any remaining items from A to B. Then B becomes the storage space and A becomes the place to put the dirty items.
I strongly doubt the stuff is good for your skin, so I've only done this a few times.
And yes, it’s not good for your skin, so avoid immersing your hands in it or wear gloves.
I regularly use things to clean that I am more worried about, such as bleach, acetone, turpentine and the likes…
That said, based on his advice in a previous video, now I run the hot water tap until it's hot. I put a pod in the dispenser, and I sprinkle some powder into the dishwasher. My issues with the dishwasher getting the dishes clean went away.
- One of the key factors in powder over pods in his prior videos was cost. Cheap powder runs about 6.6¢/oz. The brand he’s promoting is $1.11/oz, nearly 17x more expensive than traditional powder. When comparing per-load costs, Cascade pods are about 39.5¢ per load and the promoted powder is 58.5¢ per load, or 48% more costly than pods. The price to performance is terrible and could only be justified if you also consider external factors like their sustainability practices and the donation of all profits to coral reef restoration. Not discussing price seems like a huge gap to me.
- I was disappointed that he only personally compared and tested washing performance against a pod and the promoted powder, rather than also evaluating a traditional powder. Could he have replicated and compared the subpar performance reported by others?
- I would have assumed that, if the pre-rinse is supposed to get hot, the heater would run until it reaches the temperature target. Is it normal for a unit to simply not care? Last I had done reading on this, whether to attach to the hot or cold side is actually a contentious issue, mostly around the gas vs. induction-based heating costs in water heaters, in addition to temperature losses in the pipes. If the pre-wash expects hot water, then that’s an extra point for the hot side backers. I guess one should always check their manual to determine best-practice on the purge and line placement.
It feels like his channel suddenly changed to go into "let's make some money", carefully packaged in a "non-profit / charity" deal.
Maybe I'm just overly pessimistic.
Not sure if water can be introduced to bind the press, or maybe some other material.
[0]: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_rBO8neWw04
But he said that almost as a throwaway, with almost no explanation of his methodology in determining this, nor discussion about how common this problem might be.
https://youtu.be/WnBb3DLlVPwsi=1fW2qg8_Y1SmxkKo
Tl;dr He actually tested each cycle, timed what it did, and measured the energy with a Kill a Watt. He also found the repair manual, which included a diagram of each cycle that matched his tests.
His ultimate finding was that all of the cycles and modifiers did wildly different things, none of which correlated in any way to their name.
Doubly frustrating since mine is a small, single-drawer dishwasher, so pods are even worse since I can't break them down. It leads to me having way too much detergent in the dishwasher and I end up with residue on the dishes.
https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/sainsburys-conce...
And this has worked for me too:
https://www.waitrose.com/ecom/products/essential-dishwasher-...
Pods are a different story.
At some point, I'll maybe post up the pics of repairing the door hinges - previously it was leaking badly because the chunky metal hinges had cracked and bent, pushing the door up enough to not squash the bottom lip seal. Unobtainable parts now, but if you have a welder...
If you don't use a JTAG cable and a MIG welder on the same project in the same day, can you really call yourself "full stack"?
Dishwasher detergent doesn't make suds. Dish soap does. Are you sure you're using the correct stuff? Or prewashing the dishes for some reason and not getting all the soap off?
With dish liquid.
It's almost like the movies where the wash machine fills the house with suds, and the occupants go floating out the front door.
After your weld, I hope you consider replacing all rubber with silicone, and add lubrication to at least an annual list.
The hinges broke because someone leaned on the door with their full weight while it was open. The grease on the hinge pins was perfectly okay too.
Ariston used to be a quality company.
Simply changing back to powder completely stopped the error and the leaking and this was in a 1 year old dishwasher
I hate when people use that term the G in MIG stands for Gas. If you are not running a Gas (argon, CO2...) it isn't Mig. There are flux core wires that are commonly used and called Mig, but they are not Mig (unless there is also a gas flow - this isn't uncommon) and have very different weld properties.
They are more expensive, but I buy them on sale at Costco for about $16/100, so at $0.16 per load I really don't care if powdered detergent is only $0.03 per load or whatever.
There is clearly a revealed preference for pods among consumers for these things, and "proving" that everyone is wrong for liking them is just not a very interesting exercise imo.
Grocery floorspace that was once primarily staples and whole foods is mostly now junkfood.
Proper razors have been replaced with disposables.
Skincare & toothpaste products contain sodium laureth sulfate , which lathers well, but causes mouth sores and skin irritation.
Letting consumers choose usually ends up optimizing superficial and sometimes harmful traits.
i also had in past machines from 5 different manufacturers. none of them had mechanisms that facilitate 2 releases or pre-wash compartments
did you check the manual? I think in a previous video he mentioned that for machines like that it was stated in manual to add powder for prewash directly in the machine.
i also went to american lg website and checked manual of cheapest dishwasher that they have. it doesn't instruct to run water either. it says that if water is not hot enough cycle will run longer.
anticipating comments that LG is not american enough, i went to GE and checked manual of cheapest (349) dishwasher. it doesn't instruct to run tap either. it does say just like LG that if water not hot enough, cycles that use hot water will take more time (because water needs to be heated)
as a concrete example, the video has a section in it where he shows that his doesn't so any sensing - hot or cold water have exactly the same timing on the heater's use (and resulting water temperature graphs).
so like. I agree with you that it should be true, it's simple and cheap to implement and it obviously works better. unfortunately it's not a sane reality for tens (hundreds?) of millions of people.
cheapest GE dishwasher that i found now - $349 heats water. of course, for video he could go and find some ancient dishwasher that doesn't heat water just to make a point (or maybe he has a broken one ? ), but i think it will be outlier today.
check your user manual. huge numbers of them tell you to run your nearby tap until it's hot before starting a cycle because of this exact reason. this is also part of the video, and it has been true for literally every washer I've lived with (I read essentially all manuals), including the "good" ones.
my dishwasher manual doesn't say to run tap. in fact it says "The dishwasher can be connected to a hot water supply for further economies. If the water is heated by for example, solar panels, this would be energy efficient. However, if your water is heated by electricity we would recommend connection to cold water. "
i also went to american lg website and checked manual of cheapest dishwasher that they have. it doesn't instruct to run water either. it says that if water is not hot enough cycle will run longer.
anticipating comments that LG is not american enough, i went to GE and checked manual of cheapest (349) dishwasher. it doesn't instruct to run tap either. it does say just like LG that if water not hot enough, cycles that use hot water will take more time (because water needs to be heated)
This reminds me of how some of my house guests will accidentally splash water all over the bathroom counter and even the mirror when they wash up in the morning. I don’t say anything, to be polite, but they clearly lack technique lol.
This works for me:
0. store the dishwasher powder (box) under sink.
1. Open dishwasher door
2. grab box, place OVER the opened door.
3. dispense powder into cartridge in door (with spoon, tilting box, etc)
4. put spoon back in box OR fully tilt box back upright. “Crumbs” will drop onto the door, that’s OK.
5. move box back under sink.
Even if I was messy, I personally couldn’t make myself spend 5x on pods to avoid cleaning crumbs under the sink once a month. When i think of convenience i think of a dishwasher saving me hours every month. Not saving 10 seconds a month to wipe crumbs under the sink. :-)
We clearly all have different preferences and ideas of “convenience”. I respect that.
With a pod there is no technique to be improved. They just work, every single time.
I find it easier to just use the powder.
The point of this series of videos is that for many people they don't.
Or did they not test the "putting some powder into the prewash" thing and so it was just "powder released all at once" vs "tablet released all at once".
Even there I'd expect some mild improvement from the powder mixing more easily than a plastic wrapped tablet (though maybe if the content inside is liquid this factor is reversed?).
Does this mean the big corps do have some chemical advantage that cancels out the crappy delivery mechanism?
Or does it mean that a mechanical spray prewash step isn't meaningfully improved by chemicals in most circumstances?
I was more alarmed by the wrappers being plastic. I had assumed they were some clever biodegradable thing but they're not.
So, even if they had equal cleaning performance, economically the powder would come ahead.
As it turns out, the 1/6th-as-expensive powder does an even better job than the pods, making the powder an even more obvious choice
(Unless you really value the handling convenience of using a pod and were willing to accept poorer results at a higher expense)
One aspect I like about it is that they have a fragrance-free variant, and even the "fragrance" one is not too bad. A second aspect I like is that it's biodegradable, et cetera. So a bit lighter on the environment, I hope, and the SDS is prominently available on the website.
I think another thing which is under-appreciated is that you need to know how to do the basic cleaning chores for your dishwasher-- for example if it has a filter, learn to clean it! Otherwise its ability to clean will probably be compromised.
But you can buy a large box of generic and very cheap no-bullshit pods at Costco, and simply put two or even three of them in a load.
If you're going the multi-pod route, you can put one in the dispenser and one or more right in with the dishes.
powder deploys during rinse and wash. pods deploy only during wash (or only rinse if people put the pods into the tray, which is common)
And the dishwashers are designed with a hardness index in the hopper . you're supposed to line up the soap with your local hardness level to avoid residue.
I'm not sure if my machine even has a hardness marking, but when I used liquid dishwasher soap, I simply filled up the compartment every time.
As to the cost, yes it's 3X, but if you're reading this and you have a Costco membership, it's still a rounding error.
Pods just make life simpler and cleaner (no messy powders and gunky liquids in the soap cabinet), which is why I even have a dishwasher in the first place.
https://youtu.be/Ll6-eGDpimU?t=718
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rBO8neWw04
Perhaps part of the issue is that the presenter in the video is using a somewhat primitive machine.
A couple of months into the experiment with the powder, the dishwasher started to smell a bit foul, which usually indicates time to clean the filters, which I did. But this happened vastly sooner than I was used to with the pods.
Even if the powder's performance sucks intentionally because Cascade made it worse now, as a sibling comment suggested, ultimately that's the only powder option still available here.
I like chocolate milk, made by mixing chocolate powder (Nesquik) into milk, and somehow everything except pods manages to leave a film of the chocolate powder over everything. I haven't watched this video yet, but my suspicion is he's using bad pods - ones that really are just packaged detergent without the extra chemicals they often include in the pods nowadays.
I wonder if part of it is differences in water hardness and such.
It's also why he's endorsing a new powder product he was involved in developing: it performs as good or better than the pods.
is my experience of dishwashers extraordinary ?
but if we talk about powders, they can be very different with different performance. There are commercial powders (for restaurants and such where dishwashers run on very short cycles) that I afraid to put in my dishwasher and there are eco powders that are made from unicorn tears (tried once, they cleaned dirt but leave stains on clear glass). i went through sds of a bunch of them. most of them have same similar basic ingredients, but in different proportions
The opinion is based on his experience (horrible residue left by big-name powder in contrast to store-branded great-value powders being problem-free) and lab results.
i just went to check amazon. cascade complete powder has 4.6 with 9k reviews. if it was subpar, pretty sure that rating would have reflected it. for example plant based detergents hover around 4.
now i use cartridge like this that is replaced once in 3 weeks https://www.mieleusa.com/c/powerdisk-automatic-dishwasher-de...
it's even more convenient.
I like pods because there is less of a chance my clumsy self, or younger kids can accidentally spill costly soap for my dog to try to lick up or overfill the dispenser. My dishes are almost never caked in fats and oils when I put them in. I do not use a pre-wash. If I do I break a pod in half and toss in the bottom.
This guy makes me roll my eyes. There is nothing more exhausting than a self-assured YouTuber lecturing others as if he has all the right answers. He is not wrong per se but not everyone has their own preferences and needs.
There's always chances with everything in life.
Perhaps teach/practice with your kids to be less clumsy - that will pay a lot more dividends than just using pods.
This guy has been incorrect in his yt posts so many times, I simply do not believe him anymore.
He is all about monetization and doesn't care about truth or accuracy.