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On the topic of dishwashers, can anyone tell me why no dishwasher let's me fill it with, say, 20 loads worth of detergent and then it just dispenses it as neede

On the topic of dishwashers, can anyone tell me why no dishwasher let's me fill it with, say, 20 loads worth of detergent and then it just dispenses it as needed? My dishwasher can do that with "rinse aid"(which I don't use), but I've never seen one that can do it with regular detergent. Another "hack" is that the tray you're supposed to fill with detergent is almost always way too big. People think "more soap -> more clean", but that is only true to an extent. You will be just fine filling it only halfway up, even if you have a full load in there. The same goes with laundry detergent.

jandrese 6y ago
My dishwasher can't do that, but my clothes washer can. The limitation is space inside of the device for the reservoir. In a clothes washer there's plenty of space between the cylindrical wash basin and the square housing, but in a dishwasher there is much less available space between the square dish cavity and the housing, and that space is generally filled with sound deadening and thermal insulation.
- preinheimer 6y ago
  Great observation on space utilization!
amluto 6y ago
GE makes dishwashers that do exactly this. You look up your water hardness in a table, push some magic buttons as described in the manual to tell the dishwasher how hard your water is, and you pour detergent into the reservoir. Interestingly, you are strongly advised not to mix chlorine-based detergent with enzyme-based detergent at risk of turning the mixture into hard-to-remove goo.
- drivingmenuts 6y ago
  Seems like determining water hardness would be something the dishwasher could do.
  - citiguy 6y ago
    Have you ever taken a dishwasher apart? I have and it's an unbelievably simple machine that they charge you big bucks for. There's a lot it could do but manufacturers are in the business of making money, not selling complex, hard to maintain machines.
    - Loughla 6y ago
      They are very simply constructed - and I think that's for two reasons: 1, it's cheaper, and 2 - My experience with dishwashers is that they are sort of intended to be disposable. They're relatively cheap, and replacement parts for the things that can fail regularly are very nearly as expensive as the actual machine. The control board is the thing most likely to go (electronics and water); everything else is floats and switches. It's also 7/8ths the price of an entirely new machine. This is one conspiracy theory I whole-heartedly subscribe to.
      - asdff 6y ago
        This is like Apple charging half the phone to fix a cracked screen.
        Benjammer 6y ago
        Half a phone? The screen repairs are like $100-200 depending on your model, while the new phone is over $1000. It's also not just the glass, when you get your iPhone screen replaced, they replace the entire front half of your phone, basically everything involved with the display, and put a new front on. So I think you are pretty wrong here, I think they charge less than half the phone, and you actually get half of a new phone.
        asdff 6y ago
        They can be well over $200 for some phones: https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/screen-replacement https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/screen-repla... I get that it's a lot of parts, but this is the most fragile piece of the phone and Apple would be wise to take a note here from their competitors and explore other options. There is no reason why it needs to be a lot of parts replace to fix your cracked screen, or even have a screen that cracks at all, other than a lack of imagination in the engineering department.
- TwoBit 6y ago
  Are you sure you're not thinking of dishwasher salt? https://fredsappliance.com/service/dishwasher-salt-use/ https://fredsappliance.com/service/dishwasher-salt-use/
  - amluto 6y ago
    Yes. https://products.geappliances.com/appliance/gea-support-search-content?contentId=106 https://products.geappliances.com/appliance/gea-support-sear... Sadly this seems to have been discontinued.
analog31 6y ago
One design issue would be keeping the reservoir and chute dry enough that the detergent supply doesn't cake up. Another is that dishwashers are designed to fit into a very specific space in a typical kitchen, and any extra gadget takes away from the capacity of the tub.
twic 6y ago
You're not buying expensive enough dishwashers - Miele have recently launched machines which do just that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQPmumBcAF4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQPmumBcAF4 They use a proprietary disposable reservoir, so there's an opportunity to get hacker points by working out how to refill it yourself!
adrianmonk 6y ago
Some users might get annoyed if it isn't compatible with whatever type of dishwasher detergent they want to use. And there are at least 4 types: liquid, powder, gelpacs/pods, and tablets. It's easy to solve that with a compartment and a door that flips open. I don't know of an easy way to solve it for 20 loads.
refurb 6y ago
Or even easier, just create a hockey puck of detergent that dissolves a certain amount each time you run it. Kind of like those toilet pucks. Once it disappears, drop a new one in.

jandrese 6y ago

My dishwasher can't do that, but my clothes washer can. The limitation is space inside of the device for the reservoir. In a clothes washer there's plenty of space between the cylindrical wash basin and the square housing, but in a dishwasher there is much less available space between the square dish cavity and the housing, and that space is generally filled with sound deadening and thermal insulation.

preinheimer 6y ago
Great observation on space utilization!

amluto 6y ago

GE makes dishwashers that do exactly this. You look up your water hardness in a table, push some magic buttons as described in the manual to tell the dishwasher how hard your water is, and you pour detergent into the reservoir. Interestingly, you are strongly advised not to mix chlorine-based detergent with enzyme-based detergent at risk of turning the mixture into hard-to-remove goo.

drivingmenuts 6y ago
Seems like determining water hardness would be something the dishwasher could do.
- citiguy 6y ago
  Have you ever taken a dishwasher apart? I have and it's an unbelievably simple machine that they charge you big bucks for. There's a lot it could do but manufacturers are in the business of making money, not selling complex, hard to maintain machines.
  - Loughla 6y ago
    They are very simply constructed - and I think that's for two reasons: 1, it's cheaper, and 2 - My experience with dishwashers is that they are sort of intended to be disposable. They're relatively cheap, and replacement parts for the things that can fail regularly are very nearly as expensive as the actual machine. The control board is the thing most likely to go (electronics and water); everything else is floats and switches. It's also 7/8ths the price of an entirely new machine. This is one conspiracy theory I whole-heartedly subscribe to.
    - asdff 6y ago
      This is like Apple charging half the phone to fix a cracked screen.
      - Benjammer 6y ago
        Half a phone? The screen repairs are like $100-200 depending on your model, while the new phone is over $1000. It's also not just the glass, when you get your iPhone screen replaced, they replace the entire front half of your phone, basically everything involved with the display, and put a new front on. So I think you are pretty wrong here, I think they charge less than half the phone, and you actually get half of a new phone.
        asdff 6y ago
        They can be well over $200 for some phones: https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/screen-replacement https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/screen-repla... I get that it's a lot of parts, but this is the most fragile piece of the phone and Apple would be wise to take a note here from their competitors and explore other options. There is no reason why it needs to be a lot of parts replace to fix your cracked screen, or even have a screen that cracks at all, other than a lack of imagination in the engineering department.
TwoBit 6y ago
Are you sure you're not thinking of dishwasher salt? https://fredsappliance.com/service/dishwasher-salt-use/ https://fredsappliance.com/service/dishwasher-salt-use/
- amluto 6y ago
  Yes. https://products.geappliances.com/appliance/gea-support-search-content?contentId=106 https://products.geappliances.com/appliance/gea-support-sear... Sadly this seems to have been discontinued.

analog31 6y ago

One design issue would be keeping the reservoir and chute dry enough that the detergent supply doesn't cake up. Another is that dishwashers are designed to fit into a very specific space in a typical kitchen, and any extra gadget takes away from the capacity of the tub.

twic 6y ago

You're not buying expensive enough dishwashers - Miele have recently launched machines which do just that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQPmumBcAF4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQPmumBcAF4 They use a proprietary disposable reservoir, so there's an opportunity to get hacker points by working out how to refill it yourself!

adrianmonk 6y ago

Some users might get annoyed if it isn't compatible with whatever type of dishwasher detergent they want to use. And there are at least 4 types: liquid, powder, gelpacs/pods, and tablets. It's easy to solve that with a compartment and a door that flips open. I don't know of an easy way to solve it for 20 loads.

refurb 6y ago

Or even easier, just create a hockey puck of detergent that dissolves a certain amount each time you run it. Kind of like those toilet pucks. Once it disappears, drop a new one in.