DC4500B Magic Chef Dishwasher - Instructions

removed the door gasket by just pulling it out and pushing the new one in its place. very easy, took five minutes at most. Then removed the 7 screws holding the inside of the door in place, removed the dispenser assembly, held by two drive screws and replaced the dispenser door latch grommet. Finally, removed the insulation foam gasket. Had to scrape the old adhesive from the door as the old a\gasket had disintegrated. This took the most time. Then just pressed the new foam gasket in place. Reading the comments from others was a big help. Don't think I would have replaced the dispenser grommet had I not been warned about it. I'm sure it was part of the problem. All is well now, no leaks.

Took off old part. Modified new roller w'knife. Found a nut and bolt in scrap pile. Attached.

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!

I ordered the part and it fit perfectly!! About five minutes to screw it onto my faucet and problem solved!!!

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.

I first disconnected power from the dishwaher at the breaker panel. Then, removed 4 screws on the front of the dishwasher and removed the lower panel. I removed the two wires (compression fittings, by hand). Then I used an adjustable wrench to remove the two nuts which retained the element. I opened the diswasher door and extracted the old element. I reused the rubber O-rings from the old element and placed the new element into the dishwasher. I replaced the nuts and wires. I reenergized the circuit and ran the diswasher through a normal cycle. Note: I had plenty of towels on hand just in case the old O-rings did not perform. No problems encountered. I replaced the front cover and loaded have checked under for leaks during the last two wash cycles. Note: be sure not to over tighten the element nuts as they are plastic and will strip out. I used the model number to obtain the new part and all went flawlwssly. Thans!

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

Use towels to catch water that spills from unit. Lay unit on side to expose bottom. Remove plastic retainers, rear wheels, and bottom cover. Disconnect inlet and discharge hoses. Tie pull cord onto each hose separately. Temporarily re-install rear wheels. Set uinit upright. Remove two star screws from underside of wooden top. Slide top forward to release and remove top. Remove tie strap holding hoses to inner bracket. Lay unit on side again and pull hoses out. Remove discharge hose first to allow removal of inlet hose from plastic housing on back of unit. Tie pull cords to new hoses. Pull new hoses into unit. Reconnect hoses. Turn unit upright. Replace tie strap on bracket with new hoses. Hoses are marked as to where they should be secured to the bracket. Replace top. Remove old door gasket by pulling from one end of gasket. Clean gasket groove. Push new gasket into place. Close door to seat gasket. Remove and replace faucet adapter kit. Run unit and check for leaks. Lay unit on side, remove rear wheels, replace bottom cover and plastic retainers, reinstall rear wheels.

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 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 !!!

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.