**How to Clean Your Dishwasher: A Step-by-Step Guide**
Maintaining your dishwasher is essential for ensuring it runs efficiently and keeps your dishes clean. In this guide, we’ll walk you through how to tackle two common issues that can affect your dishwasher's performance: cleaning the reservoir and addressing mineral deposits on the spinners and a mat.
### 1. Cleaning the Reservoir
Start by removing the strainer from the reservoir. You might find small pieces of debris like plastic or food particles that could be causing clogs or preventing the water from draining properly. Even if your dishwasher seems to drain fine, it's a good idea to clean out the reservoir periodically.
- **Steps:**
- Remove the strainer.
- Check for any debris in the reservoir, such as small pieces of plastic or food particles.
- Clean out the reservoir thoroughly.
### 2. Addressing Debris Under the Mat
The mat at the bottom of your dishwasher can accumulate a lot of residue over time. This buildup, often referred to as scale, is caused by dishwasher detergent and can make dishes dirty again if not cleaned properly.
- **Steps:**
- Inspect the underside of the mat for debris or hard residue.
- Use vinegar or citric acid to help break down the scale and clean the area effectively.
- Soak the area with vinegar or citric acid and let it sit to loosen the buildup.
### 3. Cleaning the Spinners
The spinners in your dishwasher can become clogged with mineral deposits, which can dirty your dishes. Here’s how you can clean them:
- **Using Vinegar:**
- Fill a kitchen sink or a container with white distilled vinegar.
- Submerge the spinners in the vinegar and let them soak for about 10-15 minutes to remove mineral deposits.
- **Alternative Method (Duct Tape):**
- If you don't have enough vinegar, use duct tape to cover the holes in the spinner temporarily.
- Pour distilled vinegar into the spinner until it’s full, allowing the vinegar to stay inside and work on breaking down the buildup.
- Use a cookie sheet or similar item to catch any spills and keep the vinegar contained.
### Conclusion
Regular maintenance of your dishwasher, including cleaning the reservoir, mat, and spinners, can significantly improve its performance and extend its lifespan. By following these steps, you can ensure your dishes come out clean and your dishwasher runs efficiently for years to come.
"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enonce you get this strainer off this is disgusting but what I want you to do is reach down into this reservoir and see if there's anything down in there look there's a little piece of plastic maybe from a popsicle or something of that nature and that could be clogging the water or causing the water not the fully drain I know that the water is draining in our dishwasher but nonetheless you want to clean that out every once in a while make sure that it's okay now the other thing that I wanted to share with you is this little mat down here and look at all the debris underneath of it you just all the old residue from I don't know what here it's just cake under here and it's so hard it's scale you know it's just scale build up from the dishwasher detergent and I have to imagine that the water is going down into this mat being sprayed down knocking off some of that build up back into the dishes so you know maybe pouring some vinegar on this and letting it sit there will help out and that's what I know I'm gonna do we're using some citric acid to break this up and get it nice and clean but look at all that scale under there if they imagine that is making the dishes rather dirty so check under if you have one of these little plastic mats you know check under there and see if it needs to be cleaned out okay what I did with these spinners or these parts from the dishwasher is I put duct tape on them now the duct tape will seal the holes a little bit and just enough that whenever I go to pour this white distilled vinegar in the hole of the spinner it will stay there now I also used a cookie as you can see so that any water that drips in here or any excuse me distilled water will be caught and the Lisa will stay within the pan so I did this I did the same thing for this tiny little spinner that has a it's hard to see now because I didn't clean it out with a knife but there are a lot of just mineral deposits and junk in here that I'm assuming could go down onto the dishes and create a lot of dunk problems so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna pour the distilled vinegar in the hole till it gets fill it up and then I'm gonna fill up this tiny little spinner to okay admittedly the best thing that you can do is probably just put them in a sink like sell a kitchen sink and fill up the top until it's just full of white distilled vinegar but I didn't have enough vinegar to do that so what I'm doing here with this other spinner is pouring in the vinegar until it fills it up and we'll let this soak for like a good you know 10-15 minutes to clear out all the mineral deposits I do think that the best option is to just fill up a tub full of distilled vinegar I don't think that the duct tape is a great option it's good option for you if you don't have a ton of distilled vinegar and you want to do this in one day you know just don't have the time to get to the grocery store so anyhow that's it that's how I'm gonna clean out the mineral deposits within the spinners from my dishwasheronce you get this strainer off this is disgusting but what I want you to do is reach down into this reservoir and see if there's anything down in there look there's a little piece of plastic maybe from a popsicle or something of that nature and that could be clogging the water or causing the water not the fully drain I know that the water is draining in our dishwasher but nonetheless you want to clean that out every once in a while make sure that it's okay now the other thing that I wanted to share with you is this little mat down here and look at all the debris underneath of it you just all the old residue from I don't know what here it's just cake under here and it's so hard it's scale you know it's just scale build up from the dishwasher detergent and I have to imagine that the water is going down into this mat being sprayed down knocking off some of that build up back into the dishes so you know maybe pouring some vinegar on this and letting it sit there will help out and that's what I know I'm gonna do we're using some citric acid to break this up and get it nice and clean but look at all that scale under there if they imagine that is making the dishes rather dirty so check under if you have one of these little plastic mats you know check under there and see if it needs to be cleaned out okay what I did with these spinners or these parts from the dishwasher is I put duct tape on them now the duct tape will seal the holes a little bit and just enough that whenever I go to pour this white distilled vinegar in the hole of the spinner it will stay there now I also used a cookie as you can see so that any water that drips in here or any excuse me distilled water will be caught and the Lisa will stay within the pan so I did this I did the same thing for this tiny little spinner that has a it's hard to see now because I didn't clean it out with a knife but there are a lot of just mineral deposits and junk in here that I'm assuming could go down onto the dishes and create a lot of dunk problems so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna pour the distilled vinegar in the hole till it gets fill it up and then I'm gonna fill up this tiny little spinner to okay admittedly the best thing that you can do is probably just put them in a sink like sell a kitchen sink and fill up the top until it's just full of white distilled vinegar but I didn't have enough vinegar to do that so what I'm doing here with this other spinner is pouring in the vinegar until it fills it up and we'll let this soak for like a good you know 10-15 minutes to clear out all the mineral deposits I do think that the best option is to just fill up a tub full of distilled vinegar I don't think that the duct tape is a great option it's good option for you if you don't have a ton of distilled vinegar and you want to do this in one day you know just don't have the time to get to the grocery store so anyhow that's it that's how I'm gonna clean out the mineral deposits within the spinners from my dishwasher\n"
