Hello, and thanks in advance for any help you can
offer.

Our dishwasher suddenly started leaking quite
spectacularly from the bottom of the door. The
water mostly comes out of the middle of the bottom,
where you can see the bunched wires come out. It
comes out in surges, with the spinnning of the
spray arm. A little also comes out of the corner.

Although there is a gasket going around the sides and
top, there doesn't seem to be anything like that on
the bottom. The water seems to be going into the vent
at the bottom of the front door and then into the inside
of the door and out the bottom where the wiring comes
out. (We tried covering that vent with tape and sure
enough most of the leak stopped.)

We wondered whether the spray arm was somehow doing
something it wasn't supposed to, and shooting the
water up into that vent. It's metal, and doesn't seem
to have anything like the splits I keep reading about,
but maybe it's different with the metal? The bottom
ring that the spray arm sits on (which is split, and
has a lip) was very worn, and the arm was going around
unevenly. But when we switched it out with the identical
ring from the top spray arm, nothing improved.

The dishwasher was quite out of level, but nothing
changed when we levelled it.

We wondered whether it was overfilling, but you can
hear the float switch going off and on when you lift it
up and down, and when we put the 2.2 gallons of water
the manual says it's supposed to use (water fill charge)
in manually, it looked about the same as when it fills
itself and switches off.

What else did we try that didn't work? We cleaned a
lot of revoltingly gunky parts, the most spectacular
of which was the vent at the top of the door. But we
can't think of anything else to try. Help!

Oh, and one more specific thing: When I gently but
firmly tried to pull the float switch up, a little
flimsy brass nuttish thing dropped off onto the
floor from under the machine. Presumably it was
attached to the bottom of the float switch. Does
it matter? It'll be tricky to get it back on...

Thanks so much again. This has been very frustrating!
Sorry this was so long...

Tahani S.

Hi, Please post the brand and model# , that will help us.

But it sounds like the vent has junk in it, i have seen this happen before on older whirlpools.If youcover the vent, that will make the water flood onto the floor from the bottom.

Jake

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Sorry -- I put it in the subject line.

It's a Kenmore 665.15732000, which apparently is
made by Whirlpool. It's only about 3 years old.

The top air vent was very gunky, but I cleaned it.
The bottom vent is clean as a whistle. The water
is definitely getting out of the main part of
the dishwasher through that bottom vent, because as
I said we tried covering it with tape and the leak
stopped. (Then we took the tape off.)

--Tahani

With all that junk in the top vent, it may be nessary to take the inner door liner apart to clean the upper vent throughly. I know i had to do that on one before.

Because if that upper vent is still abit blocked, it will cause water to come out the bottom, also check the door gasket for rips or bad spots.

Jake

__________________
Appliance Repair School 1987-1988
Star Appliance Tech. 2 yrs. 1988-1990
Wards Appliance Tech. 11 yrs. 1990-2001
Sears Appliance Tech. 4 yrs. 2001-Oct. 2005
Jake's Appliance Repair Nov. 2005-present

If you need more repair advice help on your appliance, click Here

Look-Up & Order Parts

Shop Home Appliances

Check that the screws holding down the top half of the pump assembly haven't come loose allowing water to quirt out from between directly at the door.

JFYI

Dan O.
www.Appliance411.com
The Appliance Information Site
=D~~~~~~

Dan O. wrote:
I think that's IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
A couple of the screws were a bit loose, and a bit of the pump outlet seal was sticking out (don't ask why we didn't investigate this before). So the seal has been stretched and we need to get a new one.

BUT! This raises a new question, because now I'm looking at the parts schematic, there is supposed to be something called a pump gasket, which in the drawing is right above the pump outlet (the thing with all the screws). We don't seem to have this object, and not only that, we can't figure out how something this shape would fit on to anything in there. We wondered whether this model didn't have that, but got no help from Sears (the parts person was just looking at the same schematic). I've attached the drawing just in case that's useful. #13 is the thing that got stretched. #16 is the mystery object.

And then there was that little flimsy brass thing that dropped off the bottom of the float switch. Should we worry about that?

Thanks SO MUCH for solving (I hope) our problem!

--Tahani

Attached Images

pump.jpg (252.5 KB, 345 views)

tahani wrote:
The position of the part in the illustration is deceiving, you can see a picture of the part at the following link. It goes between the pump housing (#25) and the dishwasher's tub and should probably be shown below the motor or with the tub.

LINK > 717000 (661633) Pump/Tub Gasket


I'm not sure if that is used to calibrate the float position against the float switch or just used as a keeper to hold the float in place.

Dan O.
Appliance411.com
The Appliance Information Site
=D~~~~~~

It appears I have a leaking pump gasket. Perhaps you could verify this? Water is leaking on the floor; it seems to be accumulating on the slinger (just above the motor; as seen from the below the dishwasher) so that if it has been sitting even a short while and the dishwasher is turned on, water is slung around (including in my face). Also when the dishwasher tub is pretty full and the pump is turning there's quite a bit of water dripping around underneath. Is it this pump gasket?? (BTW-- Is the purpose of the slinger to keep the motor dry (or drier)? )

Assuming that I need to replace the pump gasket -- how do I do it? Does the whole pump mechanism come off as one unit from the shaft? If not, do I need to take the pump apart? There is an aligning tool (#31) that is referred to to put the pump back together again. Do I need that? Any help would be appreciated. Thank you !!

Model No. Whirlpool DU5003XL-0

Schematic is located at (it said the picture was too big to load as an attachment) (there's also another schematic there of the pump, etc.):

http://www.partselect.com/ModelFrame...hwasher&Mark=3

Hi,

Its better to replace the whole pump/motor assembly as one, saves alot of time and yaking your hair out, besides other parts in the pump have pretty much worn to some extent.

Pump and motor assembly complete, with relay and spray nozzle

Attached Thumbnails

 

__________________
Appliance Repair School 1987-1988
Star Appliance Tech. 2 yrs. 1988-1990
Wards Appliance Tech. 11 yrs. 1990-2001
Sears Appliance Tech. 4 yrs. 2001-Oct. 2005
Jake's Appliance Repair Nov. 2005-present

If you need more repair advice help on your appliance, click Here

Look-Up & Order Parts

Shop Home Appliances

OK ... so if I replace the entire apparatus, does it just lift out from inside the dishwasher after removing the cap and spray arm (and perhaps turning the little rubber bumper looking things just above the motor - shown as #26 in the drawings)? Is there anything special to know about sealing the new gasket? Sorry about asking these questions ... it just isn't really obvious to me and I haven't bought the repair book and can't find anything on replacing this on the various websites.

I know you have a lot of experience ... but it does seem to me that this dishwasher including motor/pump is still working well. It was used for its first 19 years by a woman in her 70's and 80's who hardly cooked or did anything. It means we've had a number of external gasket problems, perhaps from non-use more than anything, but otherwise it works very well. So I would prefer to spend $15 on parts rather than $130 ... If I don't need to take the pump apart to replace (just slide on a new gasket), this doesn't seem to hard ... if I need to take the whole thing apart then I can understand that it'd be much easier to just replace assuming that the new gasket is already in place.

Thank you for your assistance....