Dishwasher racks

In My Humble Opinion
1

Here’s the short version:

Does anyone have any tricks or ideas for making your dishes better fit into your dishwasher racks? Or does anyone know of maybe some sort of customizable, replacement dishwasher rack system?

Here’s the longer, painfully detailed, boring version:

For various reasons, I have had about six different models of dishwashers in my kitchen (one at a time, of course) over the last ten years. In none of them have our dishes “fit” into the racks in a way that they aren’t loose or prone to flopping around and hitting each other with resultant chipping. The only safe solution has been to space plates and bowls with one empty slot between each piece, thereby losing about half of the dishwasher capacity. Since we are a family of six, this is a less than optimal solution.

The worst part is, my wife is very into having things “just so,” and so the last few times we have gotten a new dishwasher model (which is twice in just the last two months), she sits down and tries different combinations of spacing and placement. That would be OK, except that none of the arrangements quite work to her satisfaction, and she sucks me into it, asking me to see if I can find a good method.

I am all for having clean, unbroken plates, but after five or ten minutes of moving plates and bowls around, I have had my fill of that type of fun, and am ready to say “intercourse the dishes, just put them in and turn it on.”

Then, of course, the finer points of whatever method we do finally come up with are lost on the children (who apparently lead more interesting lives than I do and therefore really don’t have time to worry asbout dishes and dishwasher racks), who just put the dishes in the racks in accordance with their whims of the moment.

After the third dishwasher or so, I kind of resigned myself to the fact that we have odd dishes (the cereal bowls have a large rim, which creates a lot of problems). Therefore, I began to look forward to the day when we would get a new set of dishes, and then our dishes would fit into the dishwasher perfectly.

Today, the glorious day came, after years of waiting. We got new dishes, with totally different characteristics.

They don’t fit. At least, not securely. When I started this post, my wife was in the kitchen, trying different arrangements, with no success.

I could go on, but it is time to get the grill going. If anyone has any ideas, advice, suggestions, or even amusing tales of dishwasher-rack related woes, please clue me in.

2

Clearly, the problem is the dishes, not the dishwasher racks.

Oh.

Well the only other constant left is you and your wife. Have you tried having someone over to try loading your dishwasher*, to see if your expectations are off? Or look at how they load their dishes, and see if that would be you would consider that correct?

  • With clean dishes! No one wants to see someone else’s mess.
3

Pictures might help?

4

I’ve only had a dishwasher where I lived once in my life. I actually prefer to do my dishes by hand.

If I had had that many problems just loading a dishwasher, I’d have made that spot into a nice roomy cabinet and bought a dish drainer.

5

Have you read the manual? They usually have some preferred layouts listed.

6

Thanks for the responses so far.

Really, the problem is the dishes. (Although I can see how my OP might lend a lot of support to the idea that I am a drooling idiot, I actually do know how to load a dishwasher. Not that not having experience with a dishwasher would make you a drooling idiot.) The problems began with the previous set of dishes (replaced by the ones we bought today), which we purchased about ten years ago. Prior to that, I have a twenty-year track record of successful and satisfying dishloading experience.

The problem boils down to having dishes that have a large diameter and a comparatively deep bowl. In the previous set, the cereal bowls had a rim about an inch-and-a-half-wide, giving them a diameter almost as big as the dinner plates. In the new set, the dinner plates have a raised rim.

The effect in both cases is that if you lean the dishes back against the rack tines behind them, the depth of the dish keeps them from leaning back very far, so they are prone to tipping forward and hitting the dish in front of them, which leads to chipping.

Conversely, if you lean each dish forward against the rack tines, the large diameter of the dishes combined with what seems to me to be fairly short rack tines means that each dish leans so far forward that it is susceptible to wiggling left and right, pivoting on the tips of the tines, again leading to chipping as they bump the dish in front.

The illustration in the manual depicts some idealized set of dinnerware that is thin and shallow, allowing the dishes to lean back pleasantly in neat rows like little soldiers, and our dishes (the last set and the new set) are full of thick nonconformists and malcontents that refuse to fit nicely with the spacing and height of the tines of the rack.

So really, I was hoping someone might know of some customizable rack or some sort of spacers or somesuch. Googling “customizable dishwasher rack” and “replacement dishwasher rack” didn’t produce any useful leads.

7

I’d try leaving every other rack space empty, so that the dishes will lean forward but not hit each other. I’d also get some melamine plates and dishes for everyday use, ones which will fit the dishwasher better. Yeah, your table might not look as elegant for everyday, but if you DO manage to chip one of those dishes, you just pitch it and buy another one.

I’ve had one dishwasher which had turnscrews which would raise or lower the upper rack, and that’s the only sort of customization for dishwashers that I’ve ever known of.

8

Have you tried turning the dishes around so they are facing the other way? I have to do this in my dish drainer with one set of dishes, because the slight angle to the dividers tilts them too much in one direction…when I turn them around, they fit better. But I’m sure you’ve tried this. Never seen anything that would make the spacing customizable.

9

Pull out your dishwasher rack and take it with you to the store while you shop for a set of ideal dishwasher-optimized dinnerware.

It seems to me that dishwashers are designed for the average set of plates and bowls. Once you start using odd shapes or sizes, things won’t fit as well.

If you really want to challenge the Dope, give us pictures of your dishes and your dishwasher racks, and let us play virtual dishes Tetris in your kitchen to make them fit right.