Quick Note About Pulling Out Kitchen Appliances

One of the first things I did, was move the refrigerator and range out of the kitchen. I was able to do this by myself by getting some furniture sliders under the feet/casters and pushing them along. I did not remove the dishwasher, because it would not come easily come out and I figured there was more to it, and i would eventually get to it.

Icemaker tip:

Make sure that you turn off the water supply to your ice maker, and disconnect the supply hose. Have a towel handy right before you pull the line from the fitting, as water can spurt out. Tape the supply line and power cord to the back of the fridge so that you do not roll over them, while moving the fridge.

Dishwasher Mishap

While laying some of the tile around the dishwasher I decided to pull it out. After tripping the breaker, I tried to pull it out but it would not budge. After some meddling around with it, i removed the kick panel at the bottom and saw that I had bent the pipe that connects the water supply to the dishwasher. I'm not sure why, but the piece of copper tubing used was a cut to length pipe, with no room for any kind of movement.  I turned off the (very old/damaged) hot water valve under the sink, removed the coupling from the fitting, removed the electrical connections (usually hidden in a little box behind the kick plate) and pulled out the dishwasher.

Once the dishwasher is out, remove the coupling for the drain hose, and move out of the way using sliders.

I noticed that water kept leaking from the pipe, although the valve was closed, so I placed a 2 liter bottle to catch the drip, while I worked. I noticed that the leak hadn't stopped and maybe I hadn't tightened the valve fully. As I went to re-tighten the valve, I broke through the seal, and water began to shoot everywhere from the pipe! I shut the water main to the house (located in the crawlspace, at my house) and then had to head back to the store to find a replacement hot-water, 2 way valve (one fitting for the sink, the other for the dishwasher). After a quick change out of the old fitting and replacing with the new one, I was back in business.

I removed the fitting from the bottom of the dishwasher, cleaned it up and replaced the Teflon tape before re-installing it on the dishwasher. I purchased a stainless braided dishwasher hose and installed it to the fitting, and thread it at the hole where the previous line was fed through, and connected it to the port at the valve under the sink.

This stainless steel line allows more flexibility, and doesn't run the risk of corroding or fracturing. Highly recommend replacing this if you ever pull your dishwasher out.