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Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

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Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#41

Post by kazinator »

jbotz wrote: post #19

One point for dishwashers I haven't seen mentioned is that they get the dishes a lot cleaner than you ever could by hand, because very hot water . Gets the oils off much better than any amount of soap. For what it's worth. First time I traveled to the US (I was 13) I thought there was something odd about the dishes... they felt strange. I told my host, I said "there seems to be a film of something that feels strange"…

Dishwasher detergent is a different animal from the liquid detergent people use for washing dishes.

It's not the only "game in town".

I once washed a load of dishes in a laundry tub filled with a pretty strong concentration of Mr. Clean floor cleaner in hot water.

They came out squeaky, sparkling clean, like out of a dishwasher, without any scrubbing.

(Why I did that is that the dishes fell victim top a drain backup: vertical stack clogged somewhere below my floor, causing other people's black, stinking drain water to start coming up in the kitchen sink, and it soiled a bunch of dishes that were in the sink. I had to resort to something strong and anti-bacterial to feel good about those dishes. I still put them through the dishwasher, too.)

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#42

Post by kazinator »

cpach wrote: post #23

Modern dishwashers are effective. You don’t need to rinse the plates before starting the dishwasher. (But of course you should remove large food particles first.) However, for a single-person household it might not be worth it. For a household of more than two it’s definitely worth it.

What's the difference between "remove large food particles" and "pre-wash"?

If I can't take the dish off the dinner table and stick it into the machine, it means I'm pre-washing in some sense.

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#43

Post by kazinator »

praash wrote: post #21

What's the issue with everyone saying that pre-cleaning is something effortful? Spending a few seconds to rinse a dish right after use saves you tons of effort later on. If you leave your lunch plates in the machine for a day before turning it on, chances are that even a decent dishwasher can't get all the gunk off. You'll end up scraping the rest with your fingers. I don't get it why all the dishwasher ads tell you…

If you have left dishes in the machine for a day, what you do is run the machine without detergent first. Some may have a dedicated rinse cycle for that. This should be covered in the instruction manual.

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#44

Post by giardini »

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #27
giardini wrote: post #6

I doubt it. I have a dishwasher but don't use it. I wash and dry dishes by hand. It takes no more than 10 minutes to wash and dry two persons' dishes and cookware. I often cook and wash dishes at the same time! But I've been washing and drying dishes since I was a child and my early years of conscripted dish washing were spent learning to optimize washing and drying procedures. So I'm very fast and efficient. For a f…

You can firmly hold sharp objects by the sharp end relatively safely; it's the letting go that can be dangerous. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwuQPfvSSlo (Extreme example: At one point in time, people would sometimes hold sharp swords by blade -in the middle of a swordfight - and win!) To cut something you need sharp object + cutting motion. No cutting motion means no effect. I say relatively safe; because of cour…

That is different: he is pinching the sword with his hands. And FWIW it is far better to have your hand cut by a sword than to suffer a fatal wound.

In my situation I'm grasping a handful of utensils blindly (they're under soapy water), some which are knives. I can pull them up and sort them out w/o damage. Why?

The hand, and the combination of hand + eye, are remarkably facile. But in a suds-filled sink the eye is useless and the hand alone governs.

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#45

Post by addison-lee »

kazinator wrote: post #42
cpach wrote: post #23

Modern dishwashers are effective. You don’t need to rinse the plates before starting the dishwasher. (But of course you should remove large food particles first.) However, for a single-person household it might not be worth it. For a household of more than two it’s definitely worth it.

What's the difference between "remove large food particles" and "pre-wash"? If I can't take the dish off the dinner table and stick it into the machine, it means I'm pre-washing in some sense.

It means take the fork and push stuff into the trash. This isn’t rocket science here.

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#46

Post by Aditya_Garg »

airhead969 wrote: post #36

Moms are often the ones who make you clean dishes before they can be cleaned. The thing is, you do have to clean the drain "lint screen" more if you don't prewash. Dishwashers require a lot of manual labor even without prewashing. Like "flying cars," I dream of robot arms that can clear the table, clean the dishes, dry them, and put them away. How hard can it be? :X I also thing hiring a maid and a cook are a good id…

A dish washing robot is the #1 robot people wish for

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#47

Post by haneefmubarak »

bjourne wrote: post #31
jbotz wrote: post #19

One point for dishwashers I haven't seen mentioned is that they get the dishes a lot cleaner than you ever could by hand, because very hot water . Gets the oils off much better than any amount of soap. For what it's worth. First time I traveled to the US (I was 13) I thought there was something odd about the dishes... they felt strange. I told my host, I said "there seems to be a film of something that feels strange"…

I don't buy that. The scrubbing you do when hand washing must make up for the hotter water.

The specific combination of hotter water, rinse aid, and modern detergent mix (lipases, proteases, amylases, and surfactants) is actually able to remove certain chemicals that you couldn't otherwise remove via normal mechanical abrasion (at some point scrubbing harder with a harder abrasive will damage the dishes).

This is because the intermolecular bonds between certain food molecules (esp lipids like fats and oils) and the dish surfaces themselves can be remarkably strong. Additionally, it is quite possible for you to instantaneously remove molecules that are sticking due to intermolecular adhesive forces only for them to stick back on as you move said abrasive out of the way slightly.

The only real way you can actually remove such substances without mechanically damaging the dishes is to break down and/or dissolve them into the water so they don't restick to the surface.

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#48

Post by culopatin »

I moved from a place with a great dishwasher to one with not only a cheap one but also an OLD one. If I leave something bigger than 1/4in on the plate, it’s getting stuck in its drain until I wipe it out. It sucks hard.

Newer dishwashers can handle dirty plates no problem, cheese or no cheese and are much more efficient.

If this dishwasher had been my first experience I would’ve thought the same as you

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#49

Post by Kim_Bruning »

giardini wrote: post #44
Kim_Bruning wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can firmly hold sharp objects by the sharp end relatively safely; it's the letting go that can be dangerous. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwuQPfvSSlo (Extreme example: At one point in time, people would sometimes hold sharp swords by blade -in the middle of a swordfight - and win!) To cut something you need sharp object + cutting motion. No cutting motion means no effect. I say relatively safe; because of cour…

That is different: he is pinching the sword with his hands. And FWIW it is far better to have your hand cut by a sword than to suffer a fatal wound. In my situation I'm grasping a handful of utensils blindly (they're under soapy water), some which are knives. I can pull them up and sort them out w/o damage. Why? The hand, and the combination of hand + eye, are remarkably facile. But in a suds-filled sink the eye is u…

At 4:15 he also demonstrates full grip, then does a few full power murder strokes (mordhau) while holding the sword that way, and shows his uncut hands after.

Of course, we don't have to live quite that dangerously ;-)

If knives were to instantly cut on touch, blindly groping for them in the suds would be way too dangerous. (And I haven't really ever gotten cut that way either, so go figure)

Re: Ask HN: Are Dishwashing Machines Bullshit?

#50

Post by giardini »

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #49
giardini wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is different: he is pinching the sword with his hands. And FWIW it is far better to have your hand cut by a sword than to suffer a fatal wound. In my situation I'm grasping a handful of utensils blindly (they're under soapy water), some which are knives. I can pull them up and sort them out w/o damage. Why? The hand, and the combination of hand + eye, are remarkably facile. But in a suds-filled sink the eye is u…

At 4:15 he also demonstrates full grip, then does a few full power murder strokes (mordhau) while holding the sword that way, and shows his uncut hands after. Of course, we don't have to live quite that dangerously ;-) If knives were to instantly cut on touch, blindly groping for them in the suds would be way too dangerous. (And I haven't really ever gotten cut that way either, so go figure)

I get it: you like swords. Well I've played with knives. I've grabbed knives and machetes and other sharp-edged tools. I know how to grab a blade and all that good stuff. There's plenty about swords and knives somewhere else on the WWW.

While washing dish utensils through my life I have observed something I thought was truly surprising and unexplained. Can't we focus on that?

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