Dishwasher Cutlery Baskets

Plastic Dishwasher Cutlery Baskets

Probably the most commonly replaced spare part on any dishwasher is the cutlery basket. There are two basic reasons for that, one is that the cutlery basket is easily removable by the owner and the second is that people break them all the time.

Occasionally we get people asking why it is that the cutlery basket has failed, often accompanied by sentence like, "it's only four years old" etc but the truth of it is, like a great many things with appliances, it depends on what the quality was like to begin with and also how the component is treated. 

The most common mistake that people make and kids are really bad for it, is to drop cutlery into teh basket rathe than to place it in. This stresses the plastic mesh on the bottom of the basket over time and it breaks up after cycles of being stressed and having to be subjected to high heat, detergent and the mechanical actions.

We also get asked, on occasion, if you can get a cutlery basket made from something other than plastic and the short answer is no, even cutlery baskets used on commercial dishwashers are made from some form of plastic. The reason, so far as we can tell, is that if you made it from say metal, the slight movements that your cutlery has while the dishwasher is loaded (pulling in and out the main basket) and during the wash process would create small scratches or marking on your cutlery. Obviously this would be very detrimental and therefore the cutlery basket has to be made from a material that is softer than the cutlery you put in the basket.

It is far preferable to have a cheap plastic component fail than to have a more expensive one break or cause damage to the very items that you are trying to care for.

All of that said, there are varying levels of quality when it comes to dishwasher baskets and normally people just look at the price and assume that they are all the same. It's all too natural to do this and loads of people do it. Then buy the cheapest cutlery basket that they can find.

We use the better quality cutlery baskets as compatible replacements or we use the genuine baskets. we really try hard to avoid the cheap ones as they can just fall apart after a few months or so and we therefore regard them as being bad value and, they're not that much cheaper anyway. You can find a selection in the online store from the links to the left and above in the navigation bar.

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