Well, I finally bought a dish washer. I have always washed the dishes by hand but recently with the addition of our second baby, washing the many bottles and dishes was becoming a chore. So the wife and I decided to go shop for a dish washer last weekend. We went to 3 different stores before purchasing from the third store. The model we purchased is a Frigidaire GLD2445RFC – 24″ Gallery GraniteGreyâ„¢ Interior Dishwasher. My new kitchen already has the pluming roughed in, with the exception of the drain which required an adapter. I just went to home depot and bought the adapter, connector and ABS glue. The installation was very easy and straight forward, simply apply glue and attach the connector and adapter.
The kitchen did not have the power roughed in, I do not understand why not? There must be a good reason that I am not aware of. The new dishwasher does not have a power cable and connector. The power supply cable must be routed directly from the circuit breaker into the dish washer. Again I do not understand why this is the case, it is one of those unexplained mystery to me. To make life easy for future maintenance, I decided to put a power cable with a three prong connector to the dish washer. Since I have a box full of old computer power cable I simply took one that looked the thickest and cut off the female end. I then stripped the wires exposing the copper connecting the green to the ground screw of the dish washer. The remaining two wires were blue and brown in colour confusing me for a bit. The wires in the dish washer were the standard white and black, white being neutral and black for live. I know from past experiences finishing my basement that the prong on the power cable that connected to the wider hole on the electrical receptacle was neutral. So I simply used my handy multi tester (ohm setting) to test for continuity to the prong that inserts into neutral. That told me the blue wire was neutral and therefore it was connected to the white wire of the dish washer. The brown wire was then connected to the black cable of the washer. Now I had a power cable with three prong connecter extending from the dish washer.
The next step was to run a new circuit from the main electrical panel in the basement to the inside of the kitchen cabinet under the sink. From past experiences of finishing the basement in my old home I knew enough about electrical wiring. I knew that there were many different manufacturers of circuit breakers and you have to buy the right one that matches the electrical panel in your basement. In the past I had made the mistake of purchasing the wrong ones. What you have to do is to get the brand of electrical panel, this is printed somewhere on the panel. In my case it was Federal Pioneer for my new home. I took that information to home depot and asked the sales person to help me locate the part number for a 15 amp circuit breaker. For some reason the breakers are kept behind locked doors, not sure why, perhaps it is a high theft item. I had to take the part number to a casher and she had to fetch the breaker from a cabinet. I also bough an electrical receptacle and a metal two gang box to hold the receptacle.The hardest part was trying to figure out where to drill the hole in the basement ceiling so I come up under the kitchen sink. After carefully measuring the distance from the hot and cold water supply under the sink to the point where I wanted the hole for the wire I proceeded with drilling the ceiling. I used the measurement I took earlier to guide me. I started with a wide wood drill bit, it cut through the plywood but then got stuck when it hit the ceramic floor tile. I then had to swap the bit to a masonry bit, that did the job. I got lucky, my calculation was very accurate, I had the hole in the kitchen cabinet floor right were I wanted it. After drilling a few more holes in the floor joist, I the proceeded with routing the cable from the electrical panel to the kitchen sink. I terminated the cable in the metal gang box with the receptacle. On the end of the main panel I connected the exposed copper cable to ground, the white to neutral and the black to the circuit breaker. After installing the circuit breaker by simply pushing and inserting into the next available slot, I closed the cover of the main panel. The receptacle was live and working. After that it was simply a matter of connecting the water intake to the hot water supply, the drain to drain intake and the power into the receptacle. I also had to secure the washer to the ground with two 1.5 inch screw after drilling pilot holes through the ceramic tile. My dish washer was fully installed and functional.
