- This topic has 1 reply, 2 voices, and was last updated 21 years, 9 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
You know often in this trade you get a run of bad things, bearings, whatever, routine stuff, it starts to get you down a bit then you get something that taxes your brain a bit, but in a good, positive way and the customer really wants, and is wiling to pay, for you to sort it out and for once you have the time an the inclination to do so. I had such a call today, a Miele dishwasher, forgive me I dont have the model number to hand, but its about 8 years old, with the exposed heater, I guess you know the type I am talking about. The fault was sticking on the final (hot) rinse, I mean just continuing to run until the customer gave up on the patience factor and clicked it on when it would finish its cycle ok.
The thing is she showed me the paperwork left by not one but two differrent Miele engineers who had tried to cure this,the first by fitting a thermostat ( the one in the door) the second by fitting a new timer (god knows the cost of that) but neither had cured the problem. So, you have to admit, the pressure was on given that it defeated the guys who do nothing else but Miele product day in day out. So I ran the rinse cycle and it did exactly as she said. I checked if the timer motor had a feed or not at this point, no. Thankfully, the usual Miele wiring diagram was stuck up behind the facia, a nice touch I think and I always make a point of returning it there for future engineers. I hooked up my clamp meter on the mains plug and realised it was not now heating, although it had been as the water was steaming hot and it seemed the timer was awaitng an impulse from the stats to prompt it to move on. At some point now it started to heat again but soon clicked off on the safety stat underneath. It became apparrant was cycling on this stat, ie overheating and cutting out but the 65 stat in the door was not setting the timer off. But that stat had been changed by the Miele guy and I checked it again, it was ok. Then I thought the safety stat was clikcking off too soon, maybe by poor contacts inside providing the extra heat, no. I checked the temp of the water and it was now over 70 despite being off for 20 minutes or so. Finally it struck me what was wrong… at the top of this model is a small spray arm through which the jet of water for the main upper arm is fed through. This was blocked, the result being no feed to the top arm. The door thermostat is positioned by the dispenser ie half way up the door. With the top arm not turning no water was reaching the stat for it to check the temperature of, hence the overheating and subsequent cycling of the safety stat. That was it, once cleared it worked fine. I then asked the customer how good the wash results were it the top basket. “funny you should say that” she said while I just wondered why she didnt tell me that in the first place, would have saved a lot of time.
Mark.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.