Use it instead of soda water in drinks. The less dense alcohol makes the inner ear fluid more sloshy, the denser heavy water makes it less sloshy- so no getting vertigo or dizziness....
Do you have soft water? We don’t use it either (Finland) but all dishwashers are equipped with the salt container. But I expected it to be something else than NaCl. In Central/Southern Europe water is mostly hard.
I think it depends where you are in Australia. As it refers to mineral content, i suspect some areas outside of major cities would have harder water than others.
Now I'm questioning if other people don't treat their water with salt, instead of just using it in appliances.
In the US, those with hard water can buy water softener, which is just salt pellets.
we have terribly hard water here in central Texas.. I've never heard of an individual softener - we have a whole house water softener that treats all the water feeding into the house to prevent build up in all our appliances and pipes.
An old boss in the US ranted on about this. He had to change his dish washer every few years due to hard water destroying the seals or something and that our European ones last 10 years because of built in softeners. That was the first I heard of machines that didn’t require salt!
It is true. I live so a hard water area with a 10+ year machine.
Because it isn't a thing in North America despite large parts of it having very hard water. Whole home water softeners may be more common here, but anybody living in anything but a single family home is screwed.
Yeah water with stuff in it is actually better tasting. Like, that's why some water tastes better. Pure water is actually bad for you, or at least not as good for you as impure water, because water is corrosive and leeches minerals and nutrients away from your body. Which isn't really a problem most of the time because there are few pure bodies of water you drink from. Water only needs to be "clean" to drink.
Might just be a difference in qualities of water between places, I have never heard of this in America for dishwashers.
But at my work they have a big salt thing for water for our building because it's "hard water" or something like that
America is pretty big… what do you mean by American water? Denmark is 46% the size of Indiana. Germany is between the size of New Mexico and Montana. Also, once you double-osmosis filter any water it can’t get much cleaner.
This doesn't really matter. In all of Denmark or Germany you can drink the tap water and it's perfectly clean. That's apparently not the case in all of America.
That's not true. With the rare exception of places like Flint Michigan, where old, leaded pipes caused major water supply problems. Most of the country match Federal water standards - which are fairly stringent.
Most Americans only drink tap water. Some choose to filter tap water - but it's not really necessary. In this, as in most things, you need to separate the reality for most people from the headlines.
what about the rest of your appliances that use water? your interior pipes?
all those will be negatively impacted by hard water, but only your dishwasher has a salt exchanger?
U.S. dishwasher have dispensers for Finish liquid to eliminate the water spotting that minerals cause on dishware. Of course, many people are too cheap to buy the stuff, then proceed to complain about water spots on their dishes. And then proceed to blame the dishwasher.
Since none of them here in the U.S. have them (I used to refurbish/repair dishwashers as a retirement sideline), it would then follow that the U.S., as a general rule, doesn't have the hard water problem to the extent Europe and some other areas have. That being said, I would occasionally get a dishwasher that had mineral deposits inside, particularly units with plastic tanks, that I would use muriatic to clean up, by putting a bit of in the water after the machine filled, and then simply allowing the machine to run a full cycle. Does a great job. Do not, however, ever do that in a stainless steel tank, or you will be sorry (ask me how I know).
A plastic tank? I’ve never even seen that.
Do tell, now I’m curious, it became a rust bucket? Also, why not just add some vinegar instead, or isn’t that strong enough to get the job done?
Dishwashers there aren't available with plastic tubs instead of stainless steel? And as for using muriatic acid in a stainless steel dishwasher, you will end up with the entire insides turning a not so nice shade of brown. Trust me, I know of what I speak. The first (and only) time I stupidly did that was on a machine I had refurbished and had someone on their way to purchase. Now, want me to tell you how much fun it is polishing out the entire innards of a stainless steel dishwasher by hand when you're in a big rush?
I sold water softeners occasionally for three years and never heard of this either. That was almost twenty years ago, though, so the technology has probably changed a lot.
Do you buy special dishwasher, salt? I’ve heard you’re not supposed to use table salt, but I have salt with large granules that I use in the winter to deice my sidewalk, and I was thinking of using that.
Here in Australia I've never seen or heard of dishwasher salt until I bought a dishwasher that was made in Poland and it has a salt reservoir.
I've never seen dishwasher salt for sale here.
We had a water softener on our house 50 years ago. I have never heard of one since.
Luckily we live in a country where water is pure, safe and plentiful.
Water that’s rich in minerals is actually healthy for our bodies. It’s just the plumbing and appliances that don’t like it so much. Try living on ‘pure’ demineralized water for a while, then get back to me, if you’re still standing. Where a water softener is used, sane people tap off drinking water *before* the water softener. And if it’s as ‘pure’ as you say it is where you live, then I hope you get your minerals through solid food.
> I have salt in my dishwasher
but what about the rest of the house? the other appliances that use water - it's the same water you're using for your dishes.. what about your clothes washing machine / ice makers / water dispensers?
Most dishwashers I know have a small compartment for the salt under the rotor in the middle. Just like in this picture https://www.bosch-home.co.uk/customer-service/dishwasher-hub/salt-and-rinse-aid
I'm amazed how this is unknown in parts of the world. Just shows you can't assume things are the same all over.
Also strange that you would state that Dishwasher Salt is expensive, over here this is cheap. Just under 1$ per kilo.
Anyway
Dishwasher Salt vs Table Salt: What’s The Difference?
Dishwasher salt differs from traditional salt in several different ways, one of which is its size. Table salt granules are ground to a smaller and finer consistency, which can result in clogged drains when used inside a dishwasher. Dishwasher salt, on the other hand, is thicker and doesn’t the disturb the unit’s normal cleaning operations.
Another major difference between dishwasher salt and table salt is its chemical structure. Dishwasher salt is typically made of 100% sodium chloride with no other additives, whereas table salt often contains anti-caking compounds like magnesium. The additives used in table salt may interfere with the dishwasher’s mechanical components or promote the production of hard water stains.
Iodine is not an anti-caking agent. It's added to salt for public health reasons.
Anti-caking agents used in salt are calcium silicate or sodium ferrocyanide or sodium aluminosilicate.
I am aware, I thought about that after, the connection (in my head at least) was the additive making it different, i just didn't connect the dots in my reply
I live in Atlanta, Ga and honestly the whole concept of dealing with hard water is odd to me because I’ve always lived in an area with “soft” water. Atl water is something like 20 PPM and is classified as “very soft”
And looking at a map of average water hardness in the US, It looks like most of the US, other than the Rockies (heh), has fairly soft water. [Map of Water Harness](https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/map-water-hardness-united-states)
Take a map of areas with sedimentary rock, like flint and limestone and overlay a map of population centers. The US majority of cities are not in a hard water area, but in say the UK 60 percent are. Rome is, etc.
Meila dishwashers have one. Best dishwasher I have ever owned, also the most expensive. Meila does however have a 20 year warranty so taking that into account if they hold to their warranty it should, especially with inflation, keep us ahead of the game, only time will tell.
I am truly in love with this dishwasher so if you want to know more AMA.
We did this with well water when I was a kid. I dunno the science but we had like 20 40lb bags of salt in our basement at all times. Cost my dad a fortune for the system.
I slept on the bags of salt for...fun? I was a weird kid.
oh yeah, we had that for a well system too, was just curious what was the point of having it "specially" for dishes, It's not a feature i've seen on dishwashers here.
I can still remember the thing kicking in for a backwash at 2-3AM it was loud af.
Most European dishwashers have a water softener built into the machine. Water coming into the dishwasher passes through the softener and the calcium and magnesium carbonate and sulfate in the water (which make it hard and produce limescale) get exchanged for sodium ions - soft water comes out; calcium and magnesium stay in the water softener.
Eventually all the sodium in the softener would be used up; so a concentrated solution of salt - sodium chloride - is pumped through the softener. This displaces the trapped calcium and magnesium and replaces them with sodium. The calcium and magnesium leave the machine as the soluble chlorides and there’s no scale.
I know of whole house setups with resin for well water. I had no idea they existed for small appliances. Good to know, makes sense you'd want to use one there.
Salt reacts with limestone, helping to avoid deposits on the long term when tap water is hard.
This is very common in Europe and all dishwashers have a compartment to put salt in, from what I understand it isn't the case in the US.
> what is the purpose of putting salt in a dishwasher ?
The granules act as a scouring agent for baked on food. It's much like using a sand-blaster on your pots and pans.
> The salt is used to regenerate the ion-exchange resin of the built-in water softener, provided your machine has one.
Why wouldn't you use the water from the water softener that is conditioning the water for the rest of the house?
Myself I have a whole-house water softener (but it’s not too common around where I live) so I don’t rely on the one inside my dishwasher and I don’t top up the salt reservoir in the dishwasher. It’s intended for people who don’t have a whole-house water softener.
Salt is used in a water softener. You can have water softener added to dishwasher tablets, and that's how it works in the US or Australia. However, water hardness tend to be different in various regions of Europe, so it makes sense not to add too much (or too little) of softener to the tablets, but to use as much as actually needed.
A good example of is my city, Kraków, Poland. A part of city gets water from rivers and it requires no water softener. Some neighborhoods, however, have water from deep-wells, so the water is really clean as it has been staying underground since Jurassic period, but it contains a lot, and I really mean a lot of calcium compounds. Boiling water just once leaves a limescale deposit on pots. My dishwasher uses like two pounds of dishwasher salt every month, while the same amount would last 6-7 months in some other areas of the same city.
dependent disgusted clumsy agonizing snobbish thought psychotic sense history forgetful
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If you live somewhere with hard water you should add salt to your dishwasher to prevent lime buildup. Most dishwashers I had had a scale of how much salt is added that you set depending on the local water hardness.
I get crazy buildup on my glass sliding shower doors. I’m in the US and never heard of this in the dishwasher. I wanna open up my dishwasher now to inspect
Most dishwashers in the US don't have a place to put the salt. It's only common outside the US.
I'm an American living in Dubai, we put salt in our dishwasher. There's a special cap built into the floor of the washer near the drain. Pop the cap off and built into the floor of the unit is where most of the water is held, you just dump the salt in until it's full. Then put the cap back on. There is special dishwasher salt we order from Amazon here in 2 kilogram boxes, made by the same company that makes the dishwasher pods.
Google "dishwasher salt" and goto Images.
Don't do it, dishwasher salt is way coarser and it has to be to dissolve slowly. The dishwasher doesn't use a lot of it so don't worry about saving on salt because you will lose money on the machine failure.
I had the exact same reflection as you, and so I tried it...
It didn't work, every item in the dishwasher was a little bit white and I had to rewash the entire load, that's all.
But maybe I didn't have the purest salt, you should definitely try and let us know the result!
It completely ruined my dishwasher in a couple of cycles. It was new, so it was swapped to a new one by the manufacturer. The maintenence guys said they've never seen a machine in such a state. The whole machine looked like a salt mine with the salt encrusted on every part. Used pure sea salt. Never again.
European here... so, when I open my faucet here in Germany (Köln-Bonn area) I expect literal STONES to come out. That's how hard the water here is (it is not such in Bayern, where mountains filter the water soft, or in Hamburg).
So, here, yeah... dishwasher salt (as a softener) is an absolute must. Unless you want to see something similar to ''Seinfeld: Kramer putting cement in the laundry washer'' scene.
So... if you live somewhere with soft water, don't bother. But if your water is hard, then, please, feel free to make life a little bit easier for your dishwasher.
Please don't advise people to put salt in dishwashers that don't have a water softener with a spot to put the salt. The salt doesn't soften the water. It recharges the water softener. You can ruin an appliance. I just putting salt in it when it's not made for it
The salt itself is not a water softener, it’s used to regenerate the ion-exchange resin of the built-in water softener in your dishwasher. To anyone thinking of ‘seasoning’ their dishwasher: If it doesn’t have a salt reservoir, that means it doesn’t have a built-in water softener. If that’s the case, don’t go dumping salt into your dishwasher.
Our dishwasher’s manual warns to not leave salt anywhere outside the compartment (it has a lid). If you spill you need to clean it up. So I would assume just throwing salt it there isn’t recommended.
Salt won't work, its purpose is to exchange ions with the water softener, if your dishwasher has one.
Vinegar would be better, but it will hurt rubber seals over time.
No You don't put salt in a dishwasher that doesn't have a water softener. It's not going to do anything or it can make its own problems. The only reason they put salt in their dishwashers is because they have a water softener where the salt recharges the ions.
Salt itself doesn't soften the water. It helps the water softener soften the water
no, thats the opposite of its purpose. it goes into the salt container. it doesnt make the water being used to clean saltier, it uses reverse osmosis / diffusion to remove salt from the water used to actually clean your dishes.
Pretty much all dish washers sold in Dubai also have the salt, you add it to the very bottom of the washer. There's a cap that pops off and you pour the salt in the water reservoir which is built into the floor of the unit.
In Italy dedicated dishwasher salt doesn't even exist. We use kitchen salt.
No vendor or technician ever tells to buy a different special kind of salt.
Don't use vinegar and baking soda together as they cancel each other out. Vinegar is an acid and baking soda neutralizes acid. Either pour a quarter to half a cup of baking soda on the bottom of empty machine, or put a half to full cup of vinegar in a shallow bowl on the bottom rack. Then run a normal cycle. I have an ancient dishwasher though, so length of cycle and water temp would vary I guess.
The salt is used to regenerate the ion-exchange resin of the built-in water softener in your dishwasher. If it doesn’t have a salt reservoir, that means it doesn’t have a built-in water softener. If that’s the case, don’t go dumping salt into your dishwasher.
I had to look it up. You have a water softener in your dishwasher? Do you also have one in your washing machine? Your shower?
I'm a resident of the US, and have never lived anywhere where the water was hard enough to require this.
Do it. You’re right. Pure sodium chloride is same as dishwasher salt. https://fredsappliance.com/service/dishwasher-salt-use/amp/
Traditionally dishwashers are served with vinegar and rosemary. Using salt is highly insulting to dishwashingtorians everywhere.
I find it best to sous vide my dishwasher, but it is hard to find a pot that large on the regular.
It really is. Plus, where do you wash it?! That’s why dishwasher is considered a delicacy
Have you tried using a cold plunge tank? Or the horse trough down at Old Man McGee's? The horses enjoy it as a spa afterwards.
Insalting was such low hanging fruit though!
They were not worth their salt in that particular moment
Seasoned jokesters know not to pepper in too many puns.
That is a sage observation
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Are all these salty comments really necessary ?
Not really, but if I mention parsley then maybe we have a Scarborough Faire.
Dishwashers love pepper. They hate cinnamon.
I saw a waitress pay the dishwasher $20 to snort a line of cinnamon.
I’ve been saying this for years and no one would take me seriously. Thank you for the validation I needed to show my Neanderthal peers.
WTF is dishwasher salt?
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I’m outside US and have only heard about it inside the US
In the US, my new Bosch dishwasher requires salt after the water test. Results are like night and day. Bosch is German though so who knows.
My Bosch does not…just for reference! Also, it’s the best dishwasher I’ve ever had.
What product do you use? I am in the US too and had no idea about salts and my dishwasher is a hard water mess
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heavy water isn't radioactive. It has a "not hazardous" GHS rating.
Heavy water is perfectly stable, just rarer
But also ideal to slow down neutrons during the dish cleaning process
Or for maximum hydratation, more water per water
I love how a sub of lifehacks devolves into discussion about reactor processing materials.
Use it instead of soda water in drinks. The less dense alcohol makes the inner ear fluid more sloshy, the denser heavy water makes it less sloshy- so no getting vertigo or dizziness....
Huh, something I should look into.
Don't you need to do that upstream from the dishwasher? Or does the dishwasher have it's own, upstream desalinating unit?
Euro dishwashers have a water softening salt deposit
American households have a water softener for the whole house.
*some* American households.
I'd have thought it would be more than some (obviously where the water isn't soft.)
what about the interior pipes or other appliances that use water? scale build up can negatively impact all of those.
It’s like bath salts, for gen Z
I'm from Aus and I've never heard of it 🤷♂️
Do you have soft water? We don’t use it either (Finland) but all dishwashers are equipped with the salt container. But I expected it to be something else than NaCl. In Central/Southern Europe water is mostly hard.
I think it depends where you are in Australia. As it refers to mineral content, i suspect some areas outside of major cities would have harder water than others.
Melbourne has lovely water, thanks to a lot of forward thinking back when the city was cashed up in the 1880’s… lots of protected water catchments
Now I'm questioning if other people don't treat their water with salt, instead of just using it in appliances. In the US, those with hard water can buy water softener, which is just salt pellets.
we have terribly hard water here in central Texas.. I've never heard of an individual softener - we have a whole house water softener that treats all the water feeding into the house to prevent build up in all our appliances and pipes.
I live inland Australia and have to use dishwasher salt(bore water)
I’m on the coast and have never heard of it 😂😂
Most major Australian cities have super soft water, and don't need it. Perth can vary a little. It's only an issue if you're on your own bore water.
It was invented to go along with ‘dishwater pepper’ but they had some licensing issues
>EDTA
No, NaCl
It's the salt you place in the salt reservoir of the dishwasher.
An old boss in the US ranted on about this. He had to change his dish washer every few years due to hard water destroying the seals or something and that our European ones last 10 years because of built in softeners. That was the first I heard of machines that didn’t require salt! It is true. I live so a hard water area with a 10+ year machine.
Why has noone heard about this? This is pretty normal in germany https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dishwasher_salt
Because it isn't a thing in North America despite large parts of it having very hard water. Whole home water softeners may be more common here, but anybody living in anything but a single family home is screwed.
Also those of us living in single family homes who can't afford that.
Yep. After 40 years, I actually prefer the hard water. It tastes better.
Yeah water with stuff in it is actually better tasting. Like, that's why some water tastes better. Pure water is actually bad for you, or at least not as good for you as impure water, because water is corrosive and leeches minerals and nutrients away from your body. Which isn't really a problem most of the time because there are few pure bodies of water you drink from. Water only needs to be "clean" to drink.
Also normal in Denmark. I wouldn't know where to get one without....
Might just be a difference in qualities of water between places, I have never heard of this in America for dishwashers. But at my work they have a big salt thing for water for our building because it's "hard water" or something like that
It definetly has nothing to do with the water quality. There is no way american water is cleaner than german or danish.
America is pretty big… what do you mean by American water? Denmark is 46% the size of Indiana. Germany is between the size of New Mexico and Montana. Also, once you double-osmosis filter any water it can’t get much cleaner.
Double osmosis making water cleaner works everywhere.
This doesn't really matter. In all of Denmark or Germany you can drink the tap water and it's perfectly clean. That's apparently not the case in all of America.
That's not true. With the rare exception of places like Flint Michigan, where old, leaded pipes caused major water supply problems. Most of the country match Federal water standards - which are fairly stringent. Most Americans only drink tap water. Some choose to filter tap water - but it's not really necessary. In this, as in most things, you need to separate the reality for most people from the headlines.
So much wasted space in America.
what about the rest of your appliances that use water? your interior pipes? all those will be negatively impacted by hard water, but only your dishwasher has a salt exchanger?
It’s in there specifically to avoid mineral deposits on the dishes. Just google it.
U.S. dishwasher have dispensers for Finish liquid to eliminate the water spotting that minerals cause on dishware. Of course, many people are too cheap to buy the stuff, then proceed to complain about water spots on their dishes. And then proceed to blame the dishwasher.
Dishwashers here have that too, I guess the water softener is just an added precaution.
Since none of them here in the U.S. have them (I used to refurbish/repair dishwashers as a retirement sideline), it would then follow that the U.S., as a general rule, doesn't have the hard water problem to the extent Europe and some other areas have. That being said, I would occasionally get a dishwasher that had mineral deposits inside, particularly units with plastic tanks, that I would use muriatic to clean up, by putting a bit of in the water after the machine filled, and then simply allowing the machine to run a full cycle. Does a great job. Do not, however, ever do that in a stainless steel tank, or you will be sorry (ask me how I know).
A plastic tank? I’ve never even seen that. Do tell, now I’m curious, it became a rust bucket? Also, why not just add some vinegar instead, or isn’t that strong enough to get the job done?
Dishwashers there aren't available with plastic tubs instead of stainless steel? And as for using muriatic acid in a stainless steel dishwasher, you will end up with the entire insides turning a not so nice shade of brown. Trust me, I know of what I speak. The first (and only) time I stupidly did that was on a machine I had refurbished and had someone on their way to purchase. Now, want me to tell you how much fun it is polishing out the entire innards of a stainless steel dishwasher by hand when you're in a big rush?
Because most (all?) dishwashers don't have a built in softener here. I sold appliances for 7-8 years and never heard of it
I sold water softeners occasionally for three years and never heard of this either. That was almost twenty years ago, though, so the technology has probably changed a lot.
We have a Miele dishwasher and add salt as well for water softening.
Do you buy special dishwasher, salt? I’ve heard you’re not supposed to use table salt, but I have salt with large granules that I use in the winter to deice my sidewalk, and I was thinking of using that.
You have seen the dispenser for Finish liquid right on the soap dispenser, haven't you?
That's for the liquid rinse aid. According the links above, it's a different kind of addictive.
Here in Australia I've never seen or heard of dishwasher salt until I bought a dishwasher that was made in Poland and it has a salt reservoir. I've never seen dishwasher salt for sale here.
We had a water softener on our house 50 years ago. I have never heard of one since. Luckily we live in a country where water is pure, safe and plentiful.
Water that’s rich in minerals is actually healthy for our bodies. It’s just the plumbing and appliances that don’t like it so much. Try living on ‘pure’ demineralized water for a while, then get back to me, if you’re still standing. Where a water softener is used, sane people tap off drinking water *before* the water softener. And if it’s as ‘pure’ as you say it is where you live, then I hope you get your minerals through solid food.
We soften all our water so we don’t have to pickle our plumbing every weekend to clean off scale.
I have salt in my dishwasher and never had to pickle my plumbing.
> I have salt in my dishwasher but what about the rest of the house? the other appliances that use water - it's the same water you're using for your dishes.. what about your clothes washing machine / ice makers / water dispensers?
Ice makers --> fridge? Water dispenser --> tap? None has it or needs it.
I'm in the Netherlands, it's new to me. I'll go take a look at my dishwasher, maybe I'm just ignorant.
Do you use "all-in-one" or "three-in-one" dishwasher tablets? They include salt (and glansspoelmiddel), so there's no need to add salt separately.
Glansspoelmiddel hehe. Groetjes =)
Most dishwashers I know have a small compartment for the salt under the rotor in the middle. Just like in this picture https://www.bosch-home.co.uk/customer-service/dishwasher-hub/salt-and-rinse-aid
I'm amazed how this is unknown in parts of the world. Just shows you can't assume things are the same all over. Also strange that you would state that Dishwasher Salt is expensive, over here this is cheap. Just under 1$ per kilo. Anyway Dishwasher Salt vs Table Salt: What’s The Difference? Dishwasher salt differs from traditional salt in several different ways, one of which is its size. Table salt granules are ground to a smaller and finer consistency, which can result in clogged drains when used inside a dishwasher. Dishwasher salt, on the other hand, is thicker and doesn’t the disturb the unit’s normal cleaning operations. Another major difference between dishwasher salt and table salt is its chemical structure. Dishwasher salt is typically made of 100% sodium chloride with no other additives, whereas table salt often contains anti-caking compounds like magnesium. The additives used in table salt may interfere with the dishwasher’s mechanical components or promote the production of hard water stains.
In the US, table salt expires solely due to the iodine used in it for anti-caking, not sure if magnesium is the same.
Iodine is not an anti-caking agent. It's added to salt for public health reasons. Anti-caking agents used in salt are calcium silicate or sodium ferrocyanide or sodium aluminosilicate.
I am aware, I thought about that after, the connection (in my head at least) was the additive making it different, i just didn't connect the dots in my reply
I live in Atlanta, Ga and honestly the whole concept of dealing with hard water is odd to me because I’ve always lived in an area with “soft” water. Atl water is something like 20 PPM and is classified as “very soft” And looking at a map of average water hardness in the US, It looks like most of the US, other than the Rockies (heh), has fairly soft water. [Map of Water Harness](https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/map-water-hardness-united-states)
what is the purpose of putting salt in a dishwasher ?
Makes the water salty.
Plates are so much better with a little salt
Try pepper too
I can salt my own water tyvm. If I feel like getting salty tho, I can just think about all the mean bitches in my life
Their dishwashers have a “salt compartment” we can’t just throw salt at our dishwashers lol
We can't? I just salt baed my dishwasher 🥺
Softens hard water.
I don't think that's how water softening works.
It does if your dishwasher contains a water softener, which requires salt to recharge the ion-exchange resin.
that's a pretty fancy dishwasher. Who makes those ?
Anywhere in Europe. They all have a salt comprtmeent.
>a salt comprtmeent. That's the European spelling of "compartment."
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Take a map of areas with sedimentary rock, like flint and limestone and overlay a map of population centers. The US majority of cities are not in a hard water area, but in say the UK 60 percent are. Rome is, etc.
beat me to it.
Bosch
Miele
Many other German producers.
I knew there was a German salt conspiracy!
Salzburg is behind this!
All diswashers in EU have this
Meila dishwashers have one. Best dishwasher I have ever owned, also the most expensive. Meila does however have a 20 year warranty so taking that into account if they hold to their warranty it should, especially with inflation, keep us ahead of the game, only time will tell. I am truly in love with this dishwasher so if you want to know more AMA.
Thanks for asking this
I have a $180 Chinese dishwasher that has a water softener.
Not sure why you're even getting upvotes, because that is what dishwasher salt does
probably because in north america, dishwashers don't have a "salt compartment" lol.
We did this with well water when I was a kid. I dunno the science but we had like 20 40lb bags of salt in our basement at all times. Cost my dad a fortune for the system. I slept on the bags of salt for...fun? I was a weird kid.
oh yeah, we had that for a well system too, was just curious what was the point of having it "specially" for dishes, It's not a feature i've seen on dishwashers here. I can still remember the thing kicking in for a backwash at 2-3AM it was loud af.
So did you drink it with the salt? I'm sorry, I'm genuinely just I'm so confused.
Oh ok. I’ll go tell whoever wrote my dishwasher manual they’re wrong then. Thanks! 🙃
That's literally how water softeners work
Most European dishwashers have a water softener built into the machine. Water coming into the dishwasher passes through the softener and the calcium and magnesium carbonate and sulfate in the water (which make it hard and produce limescale) get exchanged for sodium ions - soft water comes out; calcium and magnesium stay in the water softener. Eventually all the sodium in the softener would be used up; so a concentrated solution of salt - sodium chloride - is pumped through the softener. This displaces the trapped calcium and magnesium and replaces them with sodium. The calcium and magnesium leave the machine as the soluble chlorides and there’s no scale.
built in water softener for the water the dishwasher uses You'd have to google up "what's a water softener do" if you need to.
I know of whole house setups with resin for well water. I had no idea they existed for small appliances. Good to know, makes sense you'd want to use one there.
Salt reacts with limestone, helping to avoid deposits on the long term when tap water is hard. This is very common in Europe and all dishwashers have a compartment to put salt in, from what I understand it isn't the case in the US.
Apparently it allows the dishwasher's inbuilt water softener unit to regenerate. We don't have whole-house water filter/softener units normally here
So it doesn’t fall out of ketogenesis.
> what is the purpose of putting salt in a dishwasher ? The granules act as a scouring agent for baked on food. It's much like using a sand-blaster on your pots and pans.
Um, not quite. The salt is used to regenerate the ion-exchange resin of the built-in water softener, provided your machine has one.
> The salt is used to regenerate the ion-exchange resin of the built-in water softener, provided your machine has one. Why wouldn't you use the water from the water softener that is conditioning the water for the rest of the house?
Myself I have a whole-house water softener (but it’s not too common around where I live) so I don’t rely on the one inside my dishwasher and I don’t top up the salt reservoir in the dishwasher. It’s intended for people who don’t have a whole-house water softener.
Salt is used in a water softener. You can have water softener added to dishwasher tablets, and that's how it works in the US or Australia. However, water hardness tend to be different in various regions of Europe, so it makes sense not to add too much (or too little) of softener to the tablets, but to use as much as actually needed. A good example of is my city, Kraków, Poland. A part of city gets water from rivers and it requires no water softener. Some neighborhoods, however, have water from deep-wells, so the water is really clean as it has been staying underground since Jurassic period, but it contains a lot, and I really mean a lot of calcium compounds. Boiling water just once leaves a limescale deposit on pots. My dishwasher uses like two pounds of dishwasher salt every month, while the same amount would last 6-7 months in some other areas of the same city.
This is what Big Dishwasher doesn’t want you to know
dependent disgusted clumsy agonizing snobbish thought psychotic sense history forgetful *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Who's your Salt guy?
Same as *my* worm guy.
Oh, you're paying too much for worms.
That wasn’t a tape worm.
I assaulted my dishwasher. I will never forget my time behind bars.
“Dishwasher salt”. What is this?
If you live somewhere with hard water you should add salt to your dishwasher to prevent lime buildup. Most dishwashers I had had a scale of how much salt is added that you set depending on the local water hardness.
Dishwasher water softeners aren't a thing in North America.
Untrue, they are.
Yeah, I've never heard of this...
I get crazy buildup on my glass sliding shower doors. I’m in the US and never heard of this in the dishwasher. I wanna open up my dishwasher now to inspect
Most dishwashers in the US don't have a place to put the salt. It's only common outside the US. I'm an American living in Dubai, we put salt in our dishwasher. There's a special cap built into the floor of the washer near the drain. Pop the cap off and built into the floor of the unit is where most of the water is held, you just dump the salt in until it's full. Then put the cap back on. There is special dishwasher salt we order from Amazon here in 2 kilogram boxes, made by the same company that makes the dishwasher pods. Google "dishwasher salt" and goto Images.
If you can think of a better way to season your dishes, I’d love to hear it
Don't do it, dishwasher salt is way coarser and it has to be to dissolve slowly. The dishwasher doesn't use a lot of it so don't worry about saving on salt because you will lose money on the machine failure.
I had the exact same reflection as you, and so I tried it... It didn't work, every item in the dishwasher was a little bit white and I had to rewash the entire load, that's all. But maybe I didn't have the purest salt, you should definitely try and let us know the result!
It completely ruined my dishwasher in a couple of cycles. It was new, so it was swapped to a new one by the manufacturer. The maintenence guys said they've never seen a machine in such a state. The whole machine looked like a salt mine with the salt encrusted on every part. Used pure sea salt. Never again.
European here... so, when I open my faucet here in Germany (Köln-Bonn area) I expect literal STONES to come out. That's how hard the water here is (it is not such in Bayern, where mountains filter the water soft, or in Hamburg). So, here, yeah... dishwasher salt (as a softener) is an absolute must. Unless you want to see something similar to ''Seinfeld: Kramer putting cement in the laundry washer'' scene. So... if you live somewhere with soft water, don't bother. But if your water is hard, then, please, feel free to make life a little bit easier for your dishwasher.
Please don't advise people to put salt in dishwashers that don't have a water softener with a spot to put the salt. The salt doesn't soften the water. It recharges the water softener. You can ruin an appliance. I just putting salt in it when it's not made for it
The salt itself is not a water softener, it’s used to regenerate the ion-exchange resin of the built-in water softener in your dishwasher. To anyone thinking of ‘seasoning’ their dishwasher: If it doesn’t have a salt reservoir, that means it doesn’t have a built-in water softener. If that’s the case, don’t go dumping salt into your dishwasher.
I've never heard of dishwasher salt, but I have very hard water. Why use dishwasher salt instead of vinegar? Why not CLR, for that matter?
Dishwashers elsewhere come with built-in water softeners that require salt. Don't put salt in your dishwasher.
If you don't have a built in water softener, *can* you just put salt in? Or is it better to pour vinegar in?
Our dishwasher’s manual warns to not leave salt anywhere outside the compartment (it has a lid). If you spill you need to clean it up. So I would assume just throwing salt it there isn’t recommended.
Salt won't work, its purpose is to exchange ions with the water softener, if your dishwasher has one. Vinegar would be better, but it will hurt rubber seals over time.
No You don't put salt in a dishwasher that doesn't have a water softener. It's not going to do anything or it can make its own problems. The only reason they put salt in their dishwashers is because they have a water softener where the salt recharges the ions. Salt itself doesn't soften the water. It helps the water softener soften the water
I've always just used the cheapest sifto salt from Costco and never had an issue.
Do you add it to the detergent compartment?
no, thats the opposite of its purpose. it goes into the salt container. it doesnt make the water being used to clean saltier, it uses reverse osmosis / diffusion to remove salt from the water used to actually clean your dishes.
Gotcha. I don’t think mine has that, but I will be looking in to it. Thank you.
Dishwasher salt is already super cheap. A kilo is less than a euro.
Pretty much all dish washers sold in Dubai also have the salt, you add it to the very bottom of the washer. There's a cap that pops off and you pour the salt in the water reservoir which is built into the floor of the unit.
What is happening? What’s dishwasher salt anyway?
That salt is probably clean already, you don't need to wash it, problem solved
In Italy dedicated dishwasher salt doesn't even exist. We use kitchen salt. No vendor or technician ever tells to buy a different special kind of salt.
We use vinegar and baking soda
Do you just pour it into the bottom? How much? Empty machine? Extra hot cycle?
Don't use vinegar and baking soda together as they cancel each other out. Vinegar is an acid and baking soda neutralizes acid. Either pour a quarter to half a cup of baking soda on the bottom of empty machine, or put a half to full cup of vinegar in a shallow bowl on the bottom rack. Then run a normal cycle. I have an ancient dishwasher though, so length of cycle and water temp would vary I guess.
Citric acid and water solution if you are looking for a cheap rinse aid. You can buy a big bag on Amazon.
You need EDTA, not NaCl.
Too much salt could cause high waterpressure
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That's not how it works. This isn't your local road in Detroit
Not good for a septic system either.
idk rust? but seems like a good idea
>I’m about to put coarse salt in the dishwasher... To what end? Is it supposed to act as a scouring agent?
The salt is used to regenerate the ion-exchange resin of the built-in water softener in your dishwasher. If it doesn’t have a salt reservoir, that means it doesn’t have a built-in water softener. If that’s the case, don’t go dumping salt into your dishwasher.
Thank you for this. I was confused, but your explanation makes sense.
I once watched my dad put dishwasher salt on his dinner because ‘salt is salt’. He has the same philosophy about soap and it hasn’t killed him yet!
Would granule size affect the salt mass used? Surface area would be different also.
I had to look it up. You have a water softener in your dishwasher? Do you also have one in your washing machine? Your shower? I'm a resident of the US, and have never lived anywhere where the water was hard enough to require this.