Dishwasher won’t pump out.

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cmac2012

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Very strange. I and a friend installed a GE dishwasher in his house a few days ago, All seemed normal enough.

On it’s first load of normal operation, it started normally, ran for about 45 minutes,and then stopped. Has much standing water in it. Will not pump water.

Troubleshooting guides are of no help. They talk about it being plugged or the knockout plug still in place in the disposal.

There doesn’t seem to be any trouble code action. There is a number display panel, it is displaying 888, which is basically every diode it has lit up.

Installing a dishwasher is not that tough, dealing with the internal brain of it is a different matter.
 
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Disconnect the drain from the plumbing and direct into a bucket.

Figure out how to cancel and drain the cycle.

Check for proper operation.

If that fails then make sure you haven’t kinked the drain hose during install.

If no problems found then you need to call for service or get another dishwasher.
 
Thanks for the quick reply. I’m still at the house, I tried your first suggestion already. The drain hose was in two sections, one comes from the back of the machine the other hooks to the airgap - you connect in the middle. I unhooked the middle connection, blew on the airgap side and got a whistling sound - no resistance.

I got a small bucket for the machine side of the hose and plugged it back in (my client had unplugged it after the first episode to get rid of the blinking light). I couldn’t get it to do anything.

I noticed though that I had crimped the hose slightly at the middle joint. I didn’t think I had tightened it that hard but I must have. Hard to imagine that it would stop the flow that much, but maybe any impediment signals to the brain to stop.

I opened that up best I could, I hooked it all back up, we’re running a test batch now.

Oops, this just in. We had it on ‘light cycle.’ it indicated 48 minutes - at 22 minutes it did the same thing: all activity stopped and in the number display on the left started flashing 888 in slo mo with A smaller light next to it flashing quickly. Not sure why I trouble code is not possible, I don’t think dishwashers do trouble codes.
 
I am almost tempted to replace it on general principle. It has to be pretty old. The previous dishwasher developed a leak from the lower body. A square LED panel on the bathroom ceiling below was ruined from it. It was old, beat up, and ugly and it didn’t look like a repairable leak. I know in water heaters and disposals a leak looking like that means it’s time to buy a new one.

My thought is that it’s a heck of a coincidence that’s the air gap suddenly stopped working when we put in the new unit. Not sure the blowing on the drain hose segment connected to the airgap side is a conclusive test. I hate to admit it, but air gaps are sort of a mystery to me. I don’t understand why water doesn’t shoot out of the top. As I am able to blow air through it with minimal resistance I can’t understand why the dishwasher pump wouldn’t shoot water through the same gap all day long.
 
I would, but he doesn’t want me to come back. Not that he’s mad at me, he doesn’t want to feel on the hook for more time from me. He called the help line and they’re sending a guy on Monday. Also, he undid the drain pipe at the union (first time I’ve seen a union in the stock drain pipe like that) and wired the part from the dishwasher so that it would point down into a 5 gallon bucket, and ran it to see what would happen. Did not begin to pump water. Just like with the prior test, it cut out and gave the de facto 888 error message at 22 minutes in. Which I’m pretty sure is long before it would start to pump out, though I am mostly ignorant on what dishwashers do in their own universe.
 

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