Dishwasher consumption

mdharris68 · #1 01/24/08, 07:15 AM

Let me start by letting you know, I did a quick search of the forum and did'nt quite find what I am looking for.

Any idea what kind of energy a dishwasher consumes? I have an electric hot water heater that feeds the beast water, and it has it's own electric heat element for drying, (which doesn't get used if I am around).

If I bought one of those watt metering devices, will it give me a total after one load of dishes, or does it just measure what is being consumed right now?

Also how can I check a 220 volt water heater with this type of device?

Thanks for your help, Mark

wy_white_wolf · #2 01/24/08, 08:35 AM

A kill-a-watt meter could be used on the dishwasher as long as it isn't hardwired. For it to work your dishwasher needs to be plugged into a receptical. It'll measure all the electricity used by the dishwasher, but not the water heater. It does have a running total since it was plugged in.

I'm not sure on the 220 as you would need a watt meter setup for 220 and a way to plug it in.

SolarGary · #3 01/24/08, 10:40 AM

Hi,
Most of the energy to run a dish washer is in the hot water it uses. That is, the energy is going into your hot water tank, but is used by the dishwasher.

Most of the dishwashers have an additional heating element that heats the water right in the dishwasher if its not hot enough.

If you use the KilAWatt, you will get the energy the dishwasher itself uses, but not the energy that was used to heat the hot water it uses.

I'm looking at the EnergyGuide tag on my 3 or 4 year old dishwasher, and it says 700 KWH per year if used 7 times a week. I believe that this includes both the water heating energy and the energy used by the dishwasher itself. Its not an energy star (shame on me).
It looks like some of the Energystar ones are as low as 270 KWH/year.

Gary

tamsam · #4 01/24/08, 04:23 PM

When I lived in NC with my ex we had an old dish washer that made so much noise you couldn't watch tv with it on. We bough a new Mat Tag and used it for one month and it alone. We didn't rinse any dishes, just scraped them off and put in dishwasher. We would run it when it was full usually once a day. Well what a surprise we got. water bill came down, elect came down and I didn't have to fuss about dirty dishes in the sink, and no more dish pan hands. If we had room here for one it would be installed tomorrow. The one we had would take the teflon off a cheap pan. Sam
PS we never used the dry cycle just crack the door when it finished.

artificer · #5 01/24/08, 05:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mdharris68

Any idea what kind of energy a dishwasher consumes? I have an electric hot water heater that feeds the beast water, and it has it's own electric heat element for drying, (which doesn't get used if I am around).

If I bought one of those watt metering devices, will it give me a total after one load of dishes, or does it just measure what is being consumed right now?

Also how can I check a 220 volt water heater with this type of device?

Thanks for your help, Mark

The Kill-a-watt can give you the total power used during the dish washing cycle in KWH, but only if it plugs in to an outlet as others have said.

The 220v water should be hard wired, so you can't easily measure the power it uses. IF you knew what you were doing, you could use a kaw on one leg of the 220, but its an advanced method that you shouldn't use.

another option is to shut off all other loads in the house. Unplug the fridge/freezer, and check the power meter. If its stopped, plug the dishwasher into the KAW, then do a load of dishes. Compare the start/stop power meter readings. Subtract the KAW reading, and you should have the power it uses.

Another method, if you have city water and a water meter, uses the amount of water used, and a rough calculation of how much energy it takes to heat the water used.

Hmmm... this makes me think that for the power meter reading you should wait until the water heater has stopped heating after the dishes are done. This time delay will more accurately represent the power used.

Michael

mdharris68 · #6 01/25/08, 06:17 AM

Ok, so I am going to order a kill-a-watt device so I have the electricity for the dishwasher covered. What I have gathered from work is s current sensor and a defrost timer. I will use the current sensor to bring on the timer when the water heater is pulling a load, and from here it should be simple math, right?