[Closed] Dishwasher water hardness

I think it will release less salt into the cycle.

I'll agree with the above just to get the post count up

Pats pocket

I now consider myself educated on the subject. Many thanks

I don't put salt or rinse aid in mine, just use the 3 in 1 tablets and have never adjusted anything. It still works.

The salt crystals you pour in don't go into the main wash, they go into the labyrinth between the inlet and the chamber.  They counteract the hardness and there's usually a little dial which allows you to adjust the dosage.

Tablets that claim to have salt included "so you don't need to use crystals" do not do the same thing and if you don't add crystals the insides will gum up in a terminal fashion.

How long will that take? I will get some salt in the morning!

Dishwashers need very soft water to operate correctly and give a decent wash result. Therefore all of the water entering the dishwasher passes through a water softener. A water softener is basically a load of resin beads that absorb the calcium and magnesium in the water supply, and the softened  water enters the dishwasher. The resin beads will eventually become full of magnesium and calcium and will no longer absorb any more. The water softener needs to be ‘regenerated’ before this happens. Regeneration is achieved by flushing a saline solution over the beads which forces the beads to release the calcium and magnesium so they are ready to absorb again.

Setting the dishwasher for soft water conditions will mean the softener will regenerate less often, saving you money as you’ll be topping up the salt less often.

I'm sure there’s a better way of explaining it!

So as long as there is a small amount of saline passing out of the salt chamber it will be OK?  Will this reverse any damage from not using it up until tomorrow?

Depends how hard your water is.

I’m sure the manufacturers know people don’t always use salt and try to design a reliable dishwasher. Think of the scale around your taps building up in different areas of the dishwasher internals. I’ve seen some commercial dishwashers that haven’t had salt in for far too long. Eventually the inside of the dishwasher can get covered in scale.

iIf it’s working now I wouldn’t worry about it. Just use salt from now on.

If you’re in a soft water area you shouldn’t need the salt. I live in a soft water area (north of Bradford, West Yorkshire) and in 18 years never put salt in my dishwasher.

Ok i’m on machine #2 now but #1 died of terminal electronics failure, not limescale. Pretty sure it wasn’t the water that did for the electronics, soft or otherwise

Our shiny new dishwasher came with a chemistry set (well, some fancy litmus-like paper) so we could find out how hard our water is.

Despite Mrs W complaining about our "very hard" water, we're at the top end of middling. Machine hasn't asked for any salt as yet.

‘Washing machines live longer with calgon’

but

’buy a new machine for less than you’ll spend in a year or so on calgon’