# Commercial dishwasher in a home kitchen (or a consumer one with removable racks)



## zapotex (Sep 1, 2014)

Hey All,

considering changing my dishwasher and there is one specific features of commercial dishwashers that I'm really interested in: the removable racks.

It would be incredibly convenient to just pick a rack, bring it to the table after a dinner, load it up with dirty plates, put it in the dishwasher, then take the whole rack out and store it in the cupboard with the plates in it.

And while the first rack with the plates is in the dishwasher, you could load up a second one with silverware and glasses, which would go into the dishwasher when the first rack is done.

Few questions:

(1) Can you recommend any consumer dishwashers with removable, standard racks?

(2) If not, is it feasible to use a commercial dishwasher (hi temp or low temp?) in a home kitchen?

Thanks and talk soon!


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## cheflayne (Aug 21, 2004)

Commercial units may be quick, but they are noisy and basically just sanitizers not washers. Dishes, etc have to be pretty damn clean before going into the unit. In addition, you have to figure out where to place the plumbed in 5 gallon buckets of detergent, rinse aid, and sanitizer.


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

Which brings up the question.  Why are home dishwashers so slow?


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## pete (Oct 7, 2001)

Because they don't have the power of the commercial ones.  It's a trade off; if you want something that fits into smaller, home kitchen (usually under the counter), is not too noisy, doesn't use lots and lots of water, and you don't need to also find a place to keep all the chemicals that the machine uses each cycle (commercial machines aren't like consumer machines where you just pour a capful in-they are continuous feed systems) then you need a consumer machine.  If speed is all you require and you have tons of room, don't mind an ugly machine taking up a lot of floor space, you have room for all that, as well as a booster heater then go ahead and get a commercial machine.  The other thing you will need to take into consideration is making sure that your drains are of sufficient capacity as commercial machines dump a lot of water all at once, especially single tank machines, and most standard home drains are probably not large enough to handle that kind of load.


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

Oh, only all that... /img/vbsmilies/smilies/tongue.gif


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## jimyra (Jun 23, 2015)

Commercial dishwashers are set up to run all day and night.  The power cost is very high for these washers.  In home washers over the years I think the best is the kitchen aid.  Get a top end one not a budget one from the big box stores.


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## phatch (Mar 29, 2002)

I want to point out that loading racks at the table is not as desirable as it sounds. 

All the drips from the plates go on your table. 

The loaded rack is going to be heavy and awkward to handle. You'll be bending over with an awkward heavy load which is high back stress. 

Most dishwashers, you can take out the racks just for access, maintenance or to accommodate bulky items. 

I've got a 17 yr old Bosch dishwasher. I've replaced the racks once for rusting through and could do so again at this point. I've replaced the control panel 4 times. But that's pretty minor over 17 years of use. It's very quiet to operate, water and electricity efficient and completes a normal cycle in 73 minutes. Plenty fast for home use. 

I expect to buy a new one in the next three years. One of the best questions to ask in buying a consumer unit is "how quiet is it". These tend to be the best designed and operating machines and they're very pleasant in the home. Cost more, but worth it.


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## zapotex (Sep 1, 2014)

Thanks everyone for your answers!!!

Cheflayne, Kuan, Pete, Jimyra: thanks, giving up on the idea of using a commercial dishwasher.

Phatch: thanks for your comment. I understand the potential back stress, but the time saving  is huge. I can put my unit at a higher level than normal undercounter installation. I'd rather lift a big rack than take out plates one by one or at least I'd like to give it a try, if I'm uncomfortable after a couple of weeks, I can always stop!

I'm wondering if there are semi-pro dishwashers, with low power requirements, but still fit removable racks...

Talk soon!


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## halb (May 25, 2015)

You seem to forget that you still will have to prewash your dishes, glasses and flatware before putting them into the machine, it's not a garbage disposal. So even if you put them into a rack you should take them out, prewash to remove all food in a sink then place them back in the rack to go into the machine. If you only have the typical family dishes I don't see where the savings is. Matter of fact I don't even see the need for a dishwasher. After prewash hit them with a sponge, dish detergent and 140deg water and put them in one of those racks to dry.


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## pete (Oct 7, 2001)

Another point to consider. One reason that consumer grade dish washers have a longer run time is that they usually have a drying cycle. Most commercial machines don't unless you are looking at longer conveyor machines which run 15-20 feet in length and cost well over $60,000.


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## meezenplaz (Jan 31, 2012)

IMO buying a commercial dishwasher to use at home is like buying a Peterbilt Semi truck to

tow your boat down to the lake on holidays. Over-and-ABOVE kill.

I just bought a dishwasher at Home Depot and paid 300 bucks for it. The average price of a

commercial dishwasher is 2,500 to 4,000 dollars. And many are 220volt. 

They're rated NSF, meaning suitable for commercial use. Why? Lets put it this way, 

I will maybe get 4 or 5 years heavy use out of this 300.00 buck Amana, more if Im lucky.

But if I had installed that in a commercial kitchen, I'd be lucky if it lasted 6 months. 

Its all about power and quality of workmanship and materials. The commercial one eventually 

pays for itself in the 15 years you use it almost every day, mainly in time and labor savings.

But if its sitting in your house, it will NEVER justify its cost, energy usage and maintenance costs. 

My advice is to get yourself a high end residential DW, and order some replacement racks you can

hang on hooks in a closet or sommat.  Even if they charge you 150.00 per rack, thats still way

cheaper, and more sensible, than going the commercial route.


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## mikelm (Dec 23, 2000)

We've had great satisfaction from a medium-level Bosch for over 12 years. It was pricey, but it's  virtually silent, which we like. In fact, what clinched our purchase was standing at a  counter in a store with several D/W's under it and looking at a brochure with the salesman. After a few minutes he pointed to the Bosch we were standing in front of and asked..."notice anything about this one?"  We said no and he said..."It's running.  

We bought it and have been very happy with it ever since

Mike


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## zapotex (Sep 1, 2014)

Thanks Halb, Pete, Meezenplaz, MIkeLM!

I'm starting to realize that my idea might make much less sense than it originally did in my head...

HalB: very true, I was thinking I would just put the tray in the sink, spray with high pressure water, then take the tray from the sink to the dishwasher, but I guess if stuff is really dirty with cheese peel, bones, etc... those may remain stuck in the tray.

Pete: true that I love cooking and hate cleaning, but I agree with you that 60 grands sounds a bit too much for meals with family & friends 

Meezenplaz: "My advice is to get yourself a high end residential DW, and order some replacement racks you can
hang on hooks in a closet or sommat.  Even if they charge you 150.00 per rack, thats still way
cheaper, and more sensible, than going the commercial route. "

This makes a ton of sense, I'll probably do just that

MikeLM: will look at Bosch too! My current GE is noisy as hell, I can hear it through 2 closed doors.

Talk soon & thanks again everyone!


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## mike9 (Jul 13, 2012)

My Bosch has removable racks, and full stainless steel interior.  It's very quiet too and it's my second Bosch in twenty years.  I got about 15 yrs. out of the first one and ran it almost every day.  When this one goes I'll probably get another Bosch.


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## meezenplaz (Jan 31, 2012)

> Thanks Halb, Pete, Meezenplaz, MIkeLM!


 NP glad we could help. 


Mike9 said:


> My Bosch has removable racks, and full stainless steel interior. It's very quiet too and it's my second Bosch in twenty years. I got about 15 yrs. out of the first one and ran it almost every day. When this one goes I'll probably get another Bosch.


That's great longevity Mike.....I wouldnt mind a Bosch myself.

But this was a fixer upper situation so the extra $$$ wasnt warranted in this location,


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## stilldishwasher (Jan 9, 2017)

I make dishwashers in New Jersey .Commercial ones. 

there are standard racks that are 20 X 20 in 

but in commercial dishwashers we also make smaller units - 14 X 14 inch (there are also 16X16 and 18X18) . this is very suitable for homes or small places - try to get one of these . 

the difference between the cycle time is not the drying phase - it's the water pump . a commercial dishwasher pump is around 600 watt . The home consumer dishwasher pump is 50 watts .  this is why commercial takes 2 minutes and home takes 30 minutes .

Someone was saying you need a space for the chemicals - that is not accurate - you can use the same tabs for in the commercial dishwasher . no problem . It will work just fine.

Hope the info helped

one more thing - most commercial dishwashers have the drain pump only as optional - they work on gravity . all home dishwashers carry the pump as part of the machine so if you buy commercial one - don't forget to ask for it. 

Best

Robert


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## midlife (Jan 1, 2016)

I had a commercial washer in my wine bar and there's o e where I work now. The one common thing about them was that they don't have a true dry function. They get stemware extremely hot but water stays in the inverted concave bottoms of the glasses. When you remove the stemware you really Have to hand dry it ecause that collected water is still there and even blotting it up before removing doesn't work. I've never quite understood this issue.


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

You have to bear in mind that you will need storage space for at least two racks, one toothed, the other flat. A draining area for the rack is ideal, but not necesary. However, if you leave the door open you will steam up your kitchen, and those machines are very power hungry. You also need to pre rinse the items before loading them in. I don't see the need for commercial at home, they pump out dishes fast, at home you only eat three times a day.


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## Martindale (Aug 9, 2018)

I have used undercounter Hobart and Moyer Diebel dishwashers for 26 years in my busy restaurant. There have been vast, vast improvements in these machines over the years. At home I have bought the very top end home dishwashers available. Just from my experience the home washers take forever and are subject to breakdowns. They just don't hold a candle to a $7000. commercial dishwasher. I constantly have to demonstrate to staff that it is not necessary to pre-wash dishes before putting into the commercial machine except for ones with baked on egg. Since the machine only takes 3 minutes even if a dish doesn't come completely clean just run it through a second time. We do a lot of bacon and egg type breakfasts and put the eggy dishes in without pre-washing and they come out hot and spotless. I just bought a Hobart commercial dishwasher to install at home to replace our Kitchen Aid so I don't know as yet whether it is something that I will regret with the extra noise plus having to bring in an electrician to put in a 220 Volt circuit. The other thing is the capacity. A home dishwasher has 2 racks so holds more dishes. I like the idea of the single rack and doing dishes quickly and efficiently more often. HOWEVER....I promise you I will give you my honest opinion as to whether I am happy about the switch. I just know at this point that a home dishwasher in a restaurant would be a joke.


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## Martindale (Aug 9, 2018)

One other thing that I saw mentioned is all the chemicals etc. In our restaurant we use a commercial grade powder detergent and just put a tablespoon on the door before closing. That is it. You must use a commercial powder, not stuff from the grocery store. Also you have to run cutlery through 2 cycles and use the blue anti-spot agent on the cutlery the second cycle.


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## Martindale (Aug 9, 2018)

Martindale said:


> One other thing that I saw mentioned is all the chemicals etc. In our restaurant we use a commercial grade powder detergent and just put a tablespoon on the door before closing. That is it. You must use a commercial powder, not stuff from the grocery store. Also you have to run cutlery through 2 cycles and use the blue anti-spot agent on the cutlery the second cycle.


One other very important thing that I should mention is that you must use very soft water to have a commercial dishwasher do it's thing. We have a big water softener. If it runs out of salt or breaks down we know right away because the dishwasher suddenly doesn't do a proper job. Buy a water test kit or take a sample of your water to a plumbing store.


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

Odd, very odd. In the 35 years I’ve been in commercial kitchens I have instructed—and fired those who don’t follow instructions to SPECIFICALLY pre rinse every plate and cup before loading. The reasons for this are:

A) The dishwasher is not a garbage disposal unit, nor is it a garbarator. The food debris HAS to go somewhere, and it plugs up the filter basket, plugs up the impeller, and always plugs up the spray arm jets. This is a lot of extra hassle to clean out, and it puts extra strain on the pump.

B) You are washing dishes with dirty water, and food debris that wasn’t originally on the plate is now on the plate courtesy of dirty water.

C) I train staff to SPECIFICALLY wipe off grease on plates and pots/pans with cardboard box tops. Once grease or oil enters the wash tank, the plates will be washed with greasy, dirty water. Once the tank is contaminated with oil or grease, it has to b e drained and refilled, causing delays during peak times.

D) I know of no commercial machine in the last 10 years that is designed to accept powdered detergent. The wash cycle is usually only 90 seconds, which is not sufficient to dissolve the detergent. Every machine that I know of has a minimum of 3 dispensing pumps: detergent, sanitizer ( for low temp machines) and rinse aid.

Odd, very odd....


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## chefross (May 5, 2010)

Someday someone will invent a home dishwasher that runs a 90 second wash and 15 second rinse.
Sigh....I'm amazed that restaurants have this but home machines can take as long as 90 minutes to do the same thing.


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## Martindale (Aug 9, 2018)

Yes odd, very odd, I agree. We of course scrape off food debris before putting dishes in the washer but we don't pre-wash them. We sometimes have to have the machine repaired since it runs pretty much constantly but the tech never says it is full of debris. Today I will show your response to the tech and get his take on it. I just see the dishes and cutlery coming out spotless.


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

I’m confused. From your first post it would be easy to misinterpret that you would just shove “ eggy” dishes in the machine without any prior treatment. Now I understand that you “scrape off” food debris from the plates before putting them in the machine. 

Generally, most people would understand “ pre rinse” as to give the whole rack of dishes a good blast with the spray gun, getting rid of solvable stuff like ketchup, sauces, jam, etc before it goes into the machine where it would contaminate the wash tank. Prior to pre rinsing, the plates would have to cleared of paper napkins, disposables like coffee creamers, jam packets, fruit rinds or pits/seeds, or just half eaten food.


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## Martindale (Aug 9, 2018)

foodpump said:


> I'm confused. From your first post it would be easy to misinterpret that you would just shove " eggy" dishes in the machine without any prior treatment. Now I understand that you "scrape off" food debris from the plates before putting them in the machine.
> 
> Generally, most people would understand " pre rinse" as to give the whole rack of dishes a good blast with the spray gun, getting rid of solvable stuff like ketchup, sauces, jam, etc before it goes into the machine where it would contaminate the wash tank. Prior to pre rinsing, the plates would have to cleared of paper napkins, disposables like coffee creamers, jam packets, fruit rinds or pits/seeds, or just half eaten food.


Howdy Foodpump...I did a whole bunch of research today about this whole discussion we have here and one thing I learned that is no matter how long you are in this business there is always something new to learn. Our techy guy who knows everything about our dishwashers comes in for breakfast every day so this morning I showed him your comments and asked him what he thought. He agrees 100% with everything you said. He said that he has found poppy seeds and such screwing things up. So from now on I will be instructing our staff to rinse off most everything on the really dirty dishes. I also did not know that these dishwashers all have the liquid chemical dispensers so we will from now on be using the liquids rather than the powder commercial stuff. We will now replace our old Moyer Diebel 501 which is about 10 years old with the new Hobart LXEH that I was going to put in at home. After the discussion with the tech I decided to just install a water softener at home and to continue with the high-quality residential washer. The commercial dishwasher would have to be turned off and would take at least 20 minutes to reheat.....so Foodpump I appreciate your input...you know what you are talking about. I hope that our tete a tete will help people who are considering a commercial washer at home. I see you are in Vancouver....I go there quite often and would like to drop into your restaurant and say hello. I am in Quesnel.


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

Great to have you on board! There’s a lot of things I learned on this site too. Give me a shout whenever you’re in town.

Regards
Edward


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## wordlywise (Aug 26, 2018)

Martindale said:


> I have used undercounter Hobart and Moyer Diebel dishwashers for 26 years in my busy restaurant. There have been vast, vast improvements in these machines over the years. At home I have bought the very top end home dishwashers available. Just from my experience the home washers take forever and are subject to breakdowns. They just don't hold a candle to a $7000. commercial dishwasher. I constantly have to demonstrate to staff that it is not necessary to pre-wash dishes before putting into the commercial machine except for ones with baked on egg. Since the machine only takes 3 minutes even if a dish doesn't come completely clean just run it through a second time. We do a lot of bacon and egg type breakfasts and put the eggy dishes in without pre-washing and they come out hot and spotless. I just bought a Hobart commercial dishwasher to install at home to replace our Kitchen Aid so I don't know as yet whether it is something that I will regret with the extra noise plus having to bring in an electrician to put in a 220 Volt circuit. The other thing is the capacity. A home dishwasher has 2 racks so holds more dishes. I like the idea of the single rack and doing dishes quickly and efficiently more often. HOWEVER....I promise you I will give you my honest opinion as to whether I am happy about the switch. I just know at this point that a home dishwasher in a restaurant would be a joke.


Hi, Martindale, I am curious about how you can have a commercial dishwasher installed in home setting? Who did you hire to install the dishwasher for you?


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## wordlywise (Aug 26, 2018)

Hi, everyone, I am curious about how you can have a commercial dishwasher installed in home setting? Who did you hire to install the dishwasher for you?


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## drirene (Dec 30, 2015)

chefross said:


> Someday someone will invent a home dishwasher that runs a 90 second wash and 15 second rinse.
> Sigh....I'm amazed that restaurants have this but home machines can take as long as 90 minutes to do the same thing.


Ninety minutes? Lol! Our Bosh's "Normal" cycle is 2 hours 15 minutes! There is a 60 minute cycle, but we don't use it much. Nevertheless, we love that machine.

Particularly in light of this discussion, it is odd that two sales people told us just to scrape most of the solid food off and not to rinse the dishes. Somehow, it works better when dishes are a little dirty! Lol! Maybe that was a sales pitch.


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## Martindale (Aug 9, 2018)

wordlywise said:


> Hi, Martindale, I am curious about how you can have a commercial dishwasher installed in home setting? Who did you hire to install the dishwasher for you?


Since it is a 220 unit that is the same size as a residential dishwasher as far as I know you just have to hire an electrician to make sure you have a 220 outlet where the washer will be installed....pretty much like getting a commercial dishwasher installed in a restaurant.


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