When Ryan and I bought our house we knew the dishwasher didn't work. This wasn't a big deal for either of us, as Ryan had functioned as our household dishwasher for the past year :)
Needless to say, buying a new one wasn't a high priority for either of us. Well, it took only a few nights of hosting dinners and showing off the new home for me to really start thinking how nice this little luxury could be. Costing only around $150, a dishwasher was sounding like a better idea every day.
Well, we did it. We took the plunge and bought one. We assumed removal of the old and installation of the new would be a breeze, so didn't bother paying the folks at HomeDepot what we saw as overpriced fees for either service... I'm still wondering, could be have been more wrong?
For those of you who are unaware (as we certainly were), most dishwashers are actually hardwired... meaning you have to wire it directly to the circuit breaker instead of simply plugging it in to an outlet. Hmmm... neither of us are electricians. Not even close. Second, as it turns out a lot of old dishwashers have copper piping running from the sink to the machine, as opposed to those really nice bendy plastic hoses.... ok, two things we weren't really expecting. Undaunted we pressed on.
We discovered the metal piping as we were trying to simply pull out the old unit. I had visions of it sliding out like butter, us popping off a few hoses, switching a few wires, sliding in the new. Ha! I came home to Ryan pulling on the old one which appeared 'stuck' for some unknown reason. We soon realized (by looking under the sink) that Ryan was trying to muscle a 2ft copper pipe diagonally thru a 2in hole... not going to work.
*Its at this point we take a break, deciding to wait for the guys to deliver the new one and see if they have any genius advice for us. It is also at this point that Ryan, for some reason, decided to turn the water back on. Several minutes later, as I walk into the basement, I'm confronted by a puddle and severely leaking ceiling... hmm, I thought the water was off? Turns out that in the yanking and pulling of the metal pipe we loosened a few things, and turning the water back on was not a good idea. Go figure.
This leads us to Lesson #1 Regardless of progress, keep the water turned off from start to finish.
Which then leads nicely into Lesson #2 Once water is turned back on, monitor any areas that you have been working on diligently to make sure no leaks occur. Lessons learned.
Upon arrival of the deliver guys, we learned a few things about our situation... #1 that our dishwasher was indeed hardwired and we would need things called couplings for the wires, and #2 we should not just keep yanking to get it out. Well, the later we figured, the first we were clueless about. We made a trip to HomeDepot the search out these mysterious couplings... We found a guy working in the electrical department and told him our situation... hardwiring a dishwasher and we needed 'couplings'. He had no idea. Wait... don't you work in electrical? His suggestion "try to buy a dishwasher that plugs in". Genius. Thankfully, a fellow shopper overheard us, and clearly knowing his way around (an actually electrician!) he pulled what we needed off the shelf. Thanks random HD customer!
What you will need when hardwiring a dishwasher:
What are couplings? A metal loop used to hold several wires together so they fit nicely into a single space (in this case the circuit box of the dishwasher. What else will you need? Little plastic nubbins that you twist over two wires to connect them. Finally, some plumbers tapre. Easy, go figure.
Armed with our materials, we went back home to tackle the project again. It took about 1hr of awkward cranking to get the copper pipe unhinged from under the sink and fanagle it thru the small hole... to this day I cannot fathom how they installed this pipe... unless the cabinets were literally built around it.
Regardless, the pipe was out and now we were faced with another problem. The wires (running from the circuit breaker directly thru the wall) were not long enough for us to pull the dishwasher out and then undo them. This discovery was followed by several hours of awkward unscrewing and freeing of wires, and demolition of the machine. After which we could actually pull out that horrid old dishwasher! Hooray! We were half way there... sad.
The good news... hardwiring the new one was not nearly as scary or difficult as I had thought it would be! The directions were very straight forward and easy. The most difficult part was that the dishwasher needed to be nearly in place before the wires would fit, making the space you had to work in very small and tight... much like a dentist.
Once we got the new dishwasher in place and adjusted the height a million and a half times, we were ready to turn the power and the water back on... hoping that 1) we don't cause a massive flood, 2) don't cause a massive power outage and/or 3) don't end up electrocuting ourselves thru water. Exciting stuff for a Saturday afternoon.
Luckily there was nothing wrong with the power... unfortunately we had quite a few leaks in the pipes.
When connecting the pipes you use this stuff called plumbers tape... its a very fine material that allows an airtight seal between the connections. Problem is if you tighten it too tightly you still get leaks and not tight enough, well obviously leaks as well. This took me another hour or so of lying on the kitchen floor pointing a headlamp underneath the dishwasher waiting for drops.
This leads into Lesson #3 Leaks can be slow. Just because there is a leak doesn't mean you'll see water spraying out forcefully. It can be as small as a single drop per 10min... they still need to be watched. Eventually, I would simply dry the floor and come back in 10 min to see if water has accumulated and/or the ground was wet.
So, the quick little project turned into a full day of frustration. However, our dishwasher is fantastic and now we both feel like we know a little more about repairing things than we did before.
The question still remains... should we have paid the $100 to have someone install it for us?
Not much home restoration took place this last week, as we had a few friends visiting from Berkeley, CA. Charlie and Becca where up checking out some nursing programs at the colleges.
