DU4500V Magic Chef Dishwasher - Instructions

This ended up to be a (2) phase project. The first repair was to replace the door seal and inner door foam. Thanks to earlier online comments this part was really easy, but we still had a small leak. When I had removed the interior face of the door panel to replace the inner door foam, I had noticed the insulation was wet and deducted that the 'soap cup door latch gasket' was the real culprit so I had to place a second order (Phase 2). The order came quickly and in time for next Saturdays to to list. My advice is to replace all 4 items at the same time and save on mailing cost and repair time; reservoir O-ring, soap cup door latch gasket, inner foam gasket and door gasket. net repair time, about an hour start to finish.
Don and Rosie
Rochester, NY

The initial repair was more involved due to figuring out how to get at the problem. A foam sealer strip located at the bottom of the inner door had lost it's seal. I first sent off for one and it was of relatively thin material. It was carefully installed but still leaked. I ordered another one from Part Select and it had thicker foam. It was installed right over the previously installed strip and made a tight seal. (knock on wood)

Removed old spray arm and spray arm nut with a twist of my fingers. Screwed in new spray nut with my hand, and snapped in the new spray arm. Works PERFECTLY! I did it all by myself! Saved me a costly plumber bill! I am soooo proud of myself!

The wax motor seemed to work.
At first I thought something was broken and I tried to figure out the "theory of operation" Working the actuator of the wax motor, I COULD NOT GE THE LATCH TO MOVE THE WAY I THOUGHT IT SHOULD. I ASSUMED EITHER IT WAS BROKEN IN SOME WAY I COULD NOT DETECT OR THERE WAS A FLAW IN ITS DESIGN!

It took a long time to figure out the latch would not be worked open unless it was actually holding the lid- this positions the latch at "half mast" and allows the mechanism to "pick it up from there" and open the rest of the way. So once I figured that out, I concluded the failure was really just worn out parts that were out of tolerance for how this "half mast" position and opening was supposed to work. So I ordered all fresh pieces just to be sure, assembled it (very easy) and put it in (easy). It all works fine now.

First I called a repairman. He saw it was a certain model Maytag and would not fix it. It washed, but would not drain, so rather than buy another I took about an hour to carefully remove the washer and the motor / bowl unit from the body. Then it was easy to see what was wrong. The problem was a broken lifter arm in the bottom of the bowl. This caused the drain solenoid piston to "travel" too far and actually dislodge from the solenoid during use. You have to remove the lower spray arm, drain grate and then the lifter is a little black plastic "arm" on a metal rod that is actuated by the solenoid under the washer. The lifter fits over the rod and is held with a snap ring. Re-assembly was easy.

Whoever manufactures this part, hope they read this and strenthen this part. The very thin legs break very easily.

I removed the threaded broken-off part from the extension thing. The spay arm came off, since nothing was holding it on any more. I pried the cover off below that - 4 tangs.
Then I used needle nose pliers to unto the strange pointed nut that holds the spray arm support in place. Then removed the borken support, replaced with the new and reassembled in the reverse order of disassembly. Really pretty easy.

float was missing palnut and letting the float slide up too much causing small leak around the float

I simply ordered new rack assembly for the upper and lower rack units. Removed the old racks and slid in the new ones. I gotta say, Part Select saved me $50 for these racks compared to everywhere else I looked and called.

Thank you Part Select !!!

After performing some maintenance to get the water flowing properly through the system (that's another story) the door was leaking very badly during any test run of the dishwasher.

We thought it was the gasket because the old one was calcified and dried out from years of harder water.

We ordered the new one and in minutes after receiving the new gasket we had a firm seal and our dishwasher was back in action.

I googled the simptoms online, and found that the most common cause for a door leak was the door seal. I purchased the seal online from PartSelect.com. Two days later, the part arrived. I pulled out the old seal and pushed in the new one. No tools required. That fixed the problem. While looking at the parts diagram, I noticed that my dishwasher didn't have the water deflectors installed. I don't know if they were ever there. They were cheap, so I ordered them online and slid them into place in less than 10 seconds. Again, no tools required. Dishwasher runs great, no leaks.

The real cause of the leak had nothing to do with the foam strip. The latch for the front loading door at the top needed to be adjusted to hold the door in tighter to the rubber door seal. This simple adjustment stopped the leak but since the foam seal was all encrusted with dried detergent from probably years of absorbing the leak, I replaced it with your new foam strip. I used a screw driver with torx bit and removed the stainless screws holding the inner door to the outer door. Once these were separated I removed the old foam strip using a putty knife and lacquer thinner. Placing the new strip onto these cleaned surfaces was the easiest part of the whole repair.

The dishwasher is well engineered to perform this work.

Remove the bottom two panels to provide access and visibility to base of pump motor.

Locate plastic pump locking lever and push toward rear of DW to unlock pump from DW.

Inside the DW remove basketsand spray arms. Revove screws holding cover over pump motor and remove cover.

From below raise pump motor and support with block (piece of 2x4 worked well).

insde DW, removre old gasket, clean well around pump and botom of DW, install new gasket.

From below remove block to drop pump motro back into place, and re-tighten locking lever by pull toward you.

re-assemble inside componets, run through a rinse cycle to test for leaks and replace bottom panels.




I

I took the bottom cover off and pulled off 2 wires and removed 2 plastic nuts. I removed the old part and removed the O rings from the old part and installed the new heating element. Replaced the plastic nuts and the two wires. It was very simple. The hardest part was lying on my back to get to the wires and nuts.

had to remove the spray nozle and cover from the bottom of the washer to expose the stem where the lifter mounts. I had to turn the stem slightly to install it, this had to be done from the bottom of the washer and it took an extra set of hands. Once the stem was in the right position the lifter slid right on, I attached the retainer ring and put the othe parts back on. It works as good as new now.

I just replaced them with new ones. Unfortunately the new dishwasher rack was not as sturdy as the original. Hence, when it is loaded the wheel assembly sags and the center portion goes lower. Therefore, while rolling it in and out it hits the center jets and requires that we pick it up as it rolls: acceptable inconvenience but not pleasing.

I fear that with many people using it, eventually the plastic top or plastic extension of the center jet will break off.