I purchased my home 2 years ago and the dishwasher came with the home, so I’m guessing at the 5 years for the age of it. Recently, I noticed the dishes not being cleaned properly. The dishwasher runs through it’s full cycle…the dishwasher fills with water, heats the water, runs through the cycle, then drains. The problem is that no water is coming up through the spray arms. I have disconnected the spray arms and feed tubes to check for debris/blockages and found none. I disassembled the lower screen down to the chopper assembly and removed any foreign material found, but this has not helped. It seems that when the dishwasher cycle reaches the wash, there is a slight humming noise coming from the dishwasher. Is this the Pump Motor Assembly not functioning properly? Could this be caused by debris in the impellors and subsequently fixed? Or, will this require complete replacement of the motor assembly? How difficult is this to do? Is there also a seal kit that needs to be replaced while replacing the pump?
Remove the cover to the chopper, sponge out the water, turn the water supply off, and run the dishwasher. Open door while the pump is running and observe the chopper to see if it is turning. If so, you probably have a polled reversed sidewinder motor. If not, you have a busted impeller on the motor.
What is a polled reversed sidewinder motor?
A lot of the sidewinder motors have stator windings that present a symetrical magnetic field. To get the motor to reliably start in one direction, they use a polling wire that polls the field in one direction. A power surge may have burnt open this wire. A sidewinder motor is one that mounts sideways.