Dishwasher spares and tabs ...

Have you tried espares?

That was where I got the original figure :) The question is whether a £20 Indesit part is the same.

(Having grown up in the motor trade, I'm well used to identical parts having different prices depending on what make/model they are meant for ...)

Well, unless someone has experience of both makes it is a bit difficult to know. I would assume that the people at espares / ransomspares would be better informed.

I learned that 50 years ago whe I discovered that the generator for my Ford Anglia cost less than the one my friend had bought for his Mini, They had the same Lucas part number

We recently got a new dishwasher. With out old one it didn't matter if you used the dispenser on the inside of the door or just chucked the tablet in anywhere, but with this new machine you have to use the dispenser or else it doesn't clean properly. A little investigation / experimentation quickly reveled why.

The new machine on the programme I usually use, first does a prewash (cold I think) then drains and refills and only then releases the tablet and does the hot wash.

I must say that the dispenser lid (more of a spring-loaded slider than a flap) looks as if it's the thing that will fail eventually. Perhaps I should price a couple of spares now.

That's what our Bosch does (although I use bulk powder, not tablets).

The dispenser lid seems to last about 4 years, on this and our previous Bosch. Cheap and easy to replace, though.

(there is a plastic lug, the catch, that wears over time)

Looks like the bulk powder you use is about the same price as the Finish, although obviously getting a 5kg tub is more convenient than the 1kg Finish ones. Does it show any tendency to cake?

SWMBO priced up tabs, concluded they work out at twice the price of powder.

Ours is a Bosch, too, same mechanism - I'll bear that in mind. It's a model supplied by Wren with our kitchen, although I found it slightly amusing that our nice Wren kitchen design lady was unaware that our model has a cutlery tray right at the top of the machine rather than a basket (we, OTOH, were, which is why we chose that one).

Can't tell you for that particular part, but there are some major branding groups:

Whirlpool: Hotpoint Ariston Indesit (and previously Hoover Candy)

BSH: Bosch Siemens Neff

Vestel: Electra Sharp Servis (and lots of supermarket TV brands)

and other conglomerates like Arcelik (Beko).

I suspect the supply chains for the groups above are similarly organised.

Theo

No...there is very occasionally a small residue in the dispenser, but it goes away at the next wash.

I haven't seen Finish tubs. Where do you get them?

Indeed. And where we are, we still need the salt. Salt and rinse aid from Aldi, cheap.

The Bosch spare parts site is pretty good. I just got the door last time, although (previous machine) there was a little kit with spare spring, etc. which I also went for.

The cutlery tray is good (less chance of stabbing yourself with a knife or fork, too). However, it the top drawer is packed full, not enough water always gets to the cutlery.

Clearly a design parameter .... ours lasted about 4 years too :)

Ah, when you bury into the actual spare, it gives you a choice to see which Hotpoint or Indesit model you have ...

OK

Well, not tubs unfortunately. We used to get it in large 3kg bottles but then tabs arrived and since then it's only been possible, AFAIK, to get it in 1kg bottles. We were getting them from Tesco at £3 each (so, £15 for 5kg), but they've not had them the last couple of months so it's £3.50 from Sainsbury's now.

We have a softener and the d/w seems happy with no salt.

We've had four dishwashers in 25 years (the third gave up last week). None of them have had the soap dispenser fail.

SteveW

On the Bosch, it's a minor issue. The dispenser mechanics have never failed completely - it's just that the worn protrusion on the lid means that the lid doesn't stay closed. A new one is very cheap, and fitted in a few seconds.

Four?

The one I recently dumped was a Tricity Bendix DH 100 and was purchased in about 1994.

The only repair I did was to replace some of the basket rollers, The door counterbalance spring failed at some point but we just lived with that. It was working fine when I got rid of it, largely for aesthetic reasons, rust and dents.

To be fair. Three of the four were bought second-hand and the one that was bought new was never the same after my wife fell over and sat down hard on the opened door!

We had a Tricity Bendix combination microwave. It went on for years, was then moved to France, as we wanted a matched pair of combis at home to allow cooking two things at once, and was finally disposed of when the French house was sold - when the TB was about 25 years old.

The first was bought second-hand, about a month before completing on purchasing the house - I was single then and have always absolutely loathed washing up! The electronics went and as the machine only cost

The second was new and lasted many years. It had the jet arms, the waste pump and the heater replaced over the years.

When it failed, a couple of years ago my wife was unable to work through illness and my income had fallen significantly, so another, cheap, battered, second-hand one was bought. That had a couple of basket rollers replaced.

That one went the weekend before last. I could have fixed it, but it wasn't worth it and would have taken days to get parts. I could have bought a new one, but didn't want to spend the amount it would cost for what I wanted. Instead I got a 10 month old, £450 machine for £100 the next day - the owners were having a new kitchen, with integrated machines, fitted and wanted it out of the way.

SteveW

I just chuck one in the bottom of the machine, shut the door & let it get on with it. Is this not universal for tablets?

(Snip)

Chortle!