Same Chinese crap used in my Kitchenaid. The diverter on mine corroded the small printed circuit board with the micro switch. Whoever designed this should have been shot. To think that small micro switch from essentially a remote control TV would hold up in a damp area. Were dealing with idiots at the helm here.

Looks like the seal is stuck in the housing as well and will attempt to resurrect it along with a new diverter valve. I plan to use silicon grease on the seal and hope it will work again.

UPATE - The new diverter came in and I also had to solder directly the wires for the sensor side. I treated the switch/board to CorrosionX first before doing this. I have had good luck with that protecting switches and such in damp areas in the past. The leaking is still occuring but not as bad. I will try removing the seal one more time and replacing the inner metal tension band with an o-ring as indicated earlier. The seal appears to be a 10-18/4mm metric version.
Think the decode is 18mm external, 10mm shaft inner diameter and 4mm thick.

Yeah I got it fixed. The trick it to remove the seal, I cleaned mine with CLR to remove the gunk inside of it. I flipped it over so the sealing spring/ring is pointing down. I used silicone grease on the shaft. Slide the seal over the shaft all the way down. Then install the diverter. As I stated earlier the connecter for the small switch was essentially gone. I just soldered to the small board directly the wires. The seal goes into the housing but not as deep as if you install it first. That is the trick. The seal being lower on the shaft seals tighter and no more leaks. I have checked on it half a dozen times to make sure it's still holding up and not a drop. The diverter motor on mine clacks a bit and I may look to see if the internals of the diverter valve are OK. I can hear the water being shuttled between the upper and middle sections now (the job of the diverter) so I think it's working OK.

The pump on mine slightly shifted over time and it's slightly hanging down from the housing. I tried to get it back into the original location a couple of times but the design sucks. I used a small piece of foam rubber under the pump motor to push it back up into position and that reduced a lot of the clack noise. Sad that this dishwasher is only three years old but it's only designed to last at best about four to five years based on the crappy parts being used.

The wood floor in the kitchen around the area where the dishwasher is has been slowly warping in a manner consistent with water damage, and we have been tearing our hair out trying to figure out if it's an issue with the floor, with the actual foundation of the house getting wet and leaching upwards into the subfloor, or something else. Of course in the end it was the most obvious thing it could be, since the warping was all around the dish washer, and of course, I am out of my warranty period.

On at least one occasion, it seems like the basin itself has been overflowing, as water was leaking from below the door from side to side. All other occasions, it's been from the center of the unit, which I now know is the diverter motor. After four or five years of use while leaking, it is, of course horribly corroded, and the contacts on the circuit board are covered in blue corrosion which I assume means the motor itself is not working.

(Side question -- what would be the symptom of the motor itself not working? Would that itself cause a leak? Could it have caused the basin overflowing?)

I took the diverter motor off and like many others in this thread, the o-ring was installed upside down. I cleaned + reversed it, but it still leaks. Should I be able to spin the shaft with my hand? I was not able to, and wasn't sure if this is because it's so corroded (perhaps from having not moved in a while?) or if it's just not something you can move manually while holding the part.

Has anyone tried to contact KitchenAid with any success about this? Seems like if this has happened to many people, they should at the very least be offering to replace the parts for free, if not send out a repairman at no cost to install the replacement parts. I intend to call them tomorrow.

I've come really close to just buying a new dishwasher, but this one was pretty expensive when I bought it, so it seems like a waste to not try to replace whichever parts are malfunctioning -- but the fact that this has clearly been an issue since I bought it makes me so angry!

I've attached some images of the parts mentioned, hope they help someone out. It would be great if someone who fixed the problem (I am intrigued by the auto silicone solution) would show a photo of what they did to remedy the issue.

Gallery http://imgur.com/gallery/sVikX/new

Thumbnails

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Thanks for the good explanation. I feel your pain. My situation is precisely the same with an expensive piece of junk machinery known as KUDE70CVSS2.

I do have a few questions:

1. Are you now leak-free?

2. Did you apply any sort of sealant to the top of the washer where it meets the bottom of the sump? It would seem that this might be the most leak-prone location.

3. Did your attachment of the terminals from the wiring harness that you purchased work OK? Approximately what was the cost of the wiring harness?

4. Any other hard-learned advice for another poor Kitchenaid customer (sucker)?

Thanks.

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Thanks for the good information and photos. The photos look very familiar -- so much so that I think that you must have visited my house, tipped the DW on its side, and then taken the photos. :)

Some questions:

1. If I understood correctly, after you reversed the washer, you were still getting a leak. But then when you installed a new motor, with the reversed washer, you got no leak. That seems odd because I think that all of the leakage originates at the washer seal. The motor assembly has no water in it, so water is simply flowing over it. So, it's curious that, in your case, installing the new motor apparently stopped the leak?

2. Re your call to Kitchenaid -- the response was typical. Of course, Kitchenaid is simply a label of Whirlpool, the huge company that produces junk and has no shame. Consumers without lawyers have no chance of getting Whirlpool to do the right thing -- even concerning its "premier" brand, Kitchenaid.