JDB4950AWK Jenn-Air Dishwasher - Instructions

First, I removed the foot plate(s) at the bottom of the Dishwasher. (2 screws each side)

Then I removed the two top screws at the front of the dish-washer. The screws were mounted into a board under the counter that had broken loose. (A minor secondary issue specific to my situation.)

I gently inched the dishwasher out from under the cabinets.

SLOWLY, I tipped the dishwasher over on its side, allowing the water still inside to drain into a pan. Minor cleanup required for the cup or two that missed.

I then had access to the part. I disconnected the power from the wall socket, and I closed the valve for the inlet water from under the sink.

I removed the screws holding the Water Valve to the DishWasher case. Then I took a sharpie and marked one side of one of the two power connectors, black-mark to black-mark.

When I went to disconnect the inlet pipe, there was more dripping than I expected, so the valve under the sink was not closing completely. I needed to shut off the water supply to the house for the next stage.

I disconnected the inlet water supply, which continued to drip slightly into a bucket. I then removed the coupler from the old water valve. It was badly clogged and corroded, so I went to a local HW store and found an exact match 3/8" to 3/8" right angle coupler with compression fitting on one end.

BIG TRICK, before installing the new coupler, WRAP the compression fitting threads with teflon tape. You will not be able to wrap it once it is installed. In fact, I needed to uninstall the part once after I discovered this, to wrap the threads smoothly.

Once pre-wrapped, wrap the other threads that screw into the water valve. Tighten until secure, AND aligned with the direction of the flow tubes of the original.

Match the electrical connectors, black-mark to the same position as before. (The new water valve will NOT have the black-mark on it, unless you transfer one!)

Connect the Water valve back to the Dish Washer chassis with the two screws previously removed.

Connect the inlet water back to the compression fitting with the pre-wrapped threads.

Gently return the dishwasher to upright, and then plug it in.

Open the valve under the sink slowly and watch for drips or leaks.

Run the dishwasher at the start of a cycle, long enough to determine that the valve activates, and allows water to flow. Then stop the cycle.

Gently walk the dishwasher back under the counter, observing that you do not kink the copper water inlet pipe, or the drain pipe.

Adjust the feet, if necessary, back to fully support and level the dishwasher.

Install the two screws holding the dishwasher to the cabinet front. Then install the kick plates and tighten those 4 screws.

Clean up any residual water from the process.

I surfed the net using phrases like "dishes not clean" and found a series of possible solutions. When I noticed that the water in the washer was cold, I realized it was a heating element issue. Using a multi-meter set to the lowest resistance I tested both ends of the heating element (OF COURSE I SHUT OFF ELECTRICITY TO THE DISHWASHER FIRST!!!) and found it read a steady 16 ohms. Then I followed the orange leads to the limiter, removed the leads and tested resistance and found it at near zero. Touchdown.

I ordered the new limiter, had it in a couple of days and installed in in 5 minutes. The hardest part was putting the metal cover back on the bottom of the unit.t

The wax motor seemed to work.
At first I thought something was broken and I tried to figure out the "theory of operation" Working the actuator of the wax motor, I COULD NOT GE THE LATCH TO MOVE THE WAY I THOUGHT IT SHOULD. I ASSUMED EITHER IT WAS BROKEN IN SOME WAY I COULD NOT DETECT OR THERE WAS A FLAW IN ITS DESIGN!

It took a long time to figure out the latch would not be worked open unless it was actually holding the lid- this positions the latch at "half mast" and allows the mechanism to "pick it up from there" and open the rest of the way. So once I figured that out, I concluded the failure was really just worn out parts that were out of tolerance for how this "half mast" position and opening was supposed to work. So I ordered all fresh pieces just to be sure, assembled it (very easy) and put it in (easy). It all works fine now.

Everyone said it's too old to fix, I said I have nothing to lose by taking it apart and looking for broken parts.Sure enough I found a broken pump propeller and orded the part and had it in 18 hrs. I,with the help of a you-tube tutorial, fixed it in an hour. My wife thinks I am a hero. I think I am a hero cause I saved $500.

float was missing palnut and letting the float slide up too much causing small leak around the float

We were happy to find the basket we needed listed on your website, even after we could not find it on the Maytag site. It was perfect. I can't believe we lasted almost 2 years with the broken basket we had.

After performing some maintenance to get the water flowing properly through the system (that's another story) the door was leaking very badly during any test run of the dishwasher.

We thought it was the gasket because the old one was calcified and dried out from years of harder water.

We ordered the new one and in minutes after receiving the new gasket we had a firm seal and our dishwasher was back in action.

I googled the simptoms online, and found that the most common cause for a door leak was the door seal. I purchased the seal online from PartSelect.com. Two days later, the part arrived. I pulled out the old seal and pushed in the new one. No tools required. That fixed the problem. While looking at the parts diagram, I noticed that my dishwasher didn't have the water deflectors installed. I don't know if they were ever there. They were cheap, so I ordered them online and slid them into place in less than 10 seconds. Again, no tools required. Dishwasher runs great, no leaks.

Our first effort was to replace the lower washer arm that had splits in the sides of this plastic part. While this increased the water pressure in the wash cycle some it was not enough to adequately wash the dishes. We read that someone else had to clean out the filter which was below the lower washer arm assembly. Thus, we took off the loweer arm assembly by screwing off the hold down assembly in the middle of the arm. We then took off the pump cover by removing the 6 screws that hold it in place with a #3 metric allen wrench. When we took of the cover we could see that the pump filter was so covered with deposits that it was not letting the water through to the pump. Rather than spend hours trying to clean the filter and pump cover we decided it was easier to repalce them. Thus, we ordered the parts and replaced them. The dishwaster is now working fine. We appreciated the information that others had shared that helped us find and fix the problem.

I removed the screws on the inside of the door. Removed the cover and changed door switch and holder and put the new one in. Replaced the cover
all in less than half an hour.

The real cause of the leak had nothing to do with the foam strip. The latch for the front loading door at the top needed to be adjusted to hold the door in tighter to the rubber door seal. This simple adjustment stopped the leak but since the foam seal was all encrusted with dried detergent from probably years of absorbing the leak, I replaced it with your new foam strip. I used a screw driver with torx bit and removed the stainless screws holding the inner door to the outer door. Once these were separated I removed the old foam strip using a putty knife and lacquer thinner. Placing the new strip onto these cleaned surfaces was the easiest part of the whole repair.

Replacing bottom spray arm to fix leaky door:

To fix the leak in the door it is necessary to replace the bottom spray arm. This is because when the lower spary arm fails it gets small splits which, when spraying, send water up into the door vent and inside the door. It then leaks out the bottom of the door to drain.

1. Take out he bottom dish rack.

2. Locate plastic nut (lower spray arm cap) on lower spray arm (see parts diagram).

3. Remove plastic nut (lower spray arm cap) by hand - it twists counter clockwise to loosen.

4. There will be a small piece (jump-up nozzle) under the plastic nut (lower spary arm cap). Note how it was situated. Place it aside with the lower spary arm cap - you'll need them both during reassembly.

5. Pull off lower spary arm and filter guard (they are attached to each other).

6. Note how the lower spray arm was attached to the filter guard. The top and bottom of the lower spray arm are not the same.

7. Unsnap lower spray arm from filter guard by pulling up on one side and then the other to removed it from the plastic clips on the filter guard.

8. Install the new lower spray arm, by snaping it into the plastic retainers on the filter guard, one side at a time. Make sure you installed it with the correct side up.

9. Remove the two metal pieces (Radient Shield)from each end of the old lower spray arm and place the on the new lower spray arm. A small flat head screwdriver is useful to assist in removing them from the old arm.

9. Place the assembly (lower spray arm and filter guard) back onto the dishwasher and place the jump-up nozzle back into position.

8. Attach the palstic nut (lower spray arm cap) and tighten clockwise until secure. Don't over tighten.

9. Slide the bottom dish rack back into position.

This will fix the problem of the leaky door. I went ahead and replaced the upeer spray arm at the same time since it was a connvient time to do so.
If you wish to do so read on.

Replacing upper spray arm.

1. Remove the bottom dish rack.

2. You can remove the top dish rack, but you don't need to.

3. Examine where the upper spray arm is attached to the dishwasher. You will see three parts. The one on the spary arm center - toward the inside of the dishwasher is the SNAP SPRAY RETAINER. Next is the UPPER SPRAY ARM itself. Next, between the UPPERT SPRAY ARM and the body of the dishwasher is the SNAP OUTLET NUT.

4. Remove the SNAP OUTLET NUT by turing it counter clockwise (remember its upside down so you have to be looking up at it to determine which way is counter clockwise). I had to use a screwdriver blade and the palm of my hand to get it to loosen - I set the blade against one of the Knurls on the nut and gave it a tap with the palm of my hand).

5. The whole assembly will drop down. Remove it from the dishwasher. Note the way the UPPER SPRAY ARM is positioned; as the two sides are different.

6. With a pair of needle nose pliers compress the wings of the SNAP SPRAY RETAINER and remove it from the assembly. The assembly is now in three pieces.

7. Replace the old UPPER SPRAY ARM with the new one - again make sure it is in correctrly, as there is a top and bottom to the spary arm.

8. Insert the the SNAP SPRAY RETAINER into the new UPPER SPRAY ARM and into the SNAP OUTLET NUT. Place the assembly back into the dishwasher by tightening down the SNAP OUTLET NUT - turning it clockwise to tighten.

9. Replace the uppper dish rack if you removed it.

10. Repalce the lower dish rack.

The dishwasher is well engineered to perform this work.

Remove the bottom two panels to provide access and visibility to base of pump motor.

Locate plastic pump locking lever and push toward rear of DW to unlock pump from DW.

Inside the DW remove basketsand spray arms. Revove screws holding cover over pump motor and remove cover.

From below raise pump motor and support with block (piece of 2x4 worked well).

insde DW, removre old gasket, clean well around pump and botom of DW, install new gasket.

From below remove block to drop pump motro back into place, and re-tighten locking lever by pull toward you.

re-assemble inside componets, run through a rinse cycle to test for leaks and replace bottom panels.




I

I was able to remove the old handle and place it on the new basket - using only a screw driver.

I removed the plastic retainer that held the lower spray arm in place. After removing the lower spray arm I was able to remove the 6 hex screws that held the cover over the filter screen and the discharge housing assembly. I was then able to remove the bolts that held the upper part of the discharge housing assembly, and replaced it with the new part that I received. The rest of the job was simply putting it back together.

Note: While repairing the broken part, I noticed a small leak under the machine around the float assembly. This was simple to fix. Remove the small lock ring on the bottom of the float. Pull the float out and clean the grease and soap scum out of it. Put it back in and attach the lock ring. No more leak and the water gets turned off when the float activates the switch. Something that everyone should check periodically.