The dishwasher filter nobody told you about.
Grit on the clean dishes, or a smell that survives every cycle, doesn't mean the machine is broken. It has a filter, and the filter is full. Odds are nobody ever mentioned it exists: dishwashers from roughly the last fifteen years traded the old self-cleaning grinder for a quiet filter that's meant to be rinsed, and that memo mostly didn't arrive.
Does every dishwasher have a filter?
One made in the last fifteen years or so almost certainly does. An older machine that grinds audibly may be self-cleaning. Either way, the manual's entry for the filter settles it.
How often should a dishwasher filter be cleaned?
Every month or two keeps it ahead of the problem. Food scraps and grease collect in the mesh cup at the bottom of the tub, and after a few months what's trapped there rots. That's where the smell comes from, along with the gritty film on the glasses.
How to tell the filter is full.
Pull the bottom rack with the machine empty and look at the tub floor under the spray arm. Standing, cloudy water after a cycle means the drain is blocked. A sour smell that outlasts a cycle, or plates that come out gritty, means the filter is full.
How to clean a dishwasher filter.
Turn the filter a quarter-turn counterclockwise and lift it out. Separate the mesh sleeve from the inner cup and rinse both under warm water with a soft nylon brush. Wipe out the sump hole in the tub floor, then twist the filter back in until it locks.
What if the smell or the grit comes back?
If the smell survives a clean filter, run an empty hot cycle with a bowl of white vinegar on the top rack. If grit keeps showing up, toothpick the spray arm holes clear and make sure the filter locked back in. A torn or punctured mesh lets debris into the pump, so stop using the machine and order the maker's replacement part.
Or hand it off. The dishwasher filter is on the full price list at $— one-time, cleaned with the spray arms checked. The four visits of a plan look after the rest of the house. Plans
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