We hit the Jackpot on Craigslist again last week. This time in the form of a dishwasher to round out our set of stainless steel kitchen appliances. We picked up a 3 year old top of the line, Bosch 800 series dishwasher for $400.
The Dishwasher, Our Hero.
The woman we purchased it from was remodeling a 3 year old kitchen, and she was getting rid of 2, not one, but 2 identical dishwashers she had installed in her previous kitchen, and we were more than happy to take one of them off her hands.
The installation however, did not go as smoothly as the purchase. I ended up doing just about everything I could possibly do wrong. It took me took me two trips to the local hardware, but I ended up getting it all plumbed up and ready to go one night last week.
However when it came time to wire it all up, I was stumped. It appears as though to save a dime or two the previous owner of this foreclosed hunk of junk decided to wire up my kitchen using an antiquated, out of date, and marginally un-safe electrical wiring method.
Needless to say it confused the crap out of me and my highschool “Residential Wiring 101″ knowledge base. After a good half hour of cussing and swearing off any and all future home improvements, I hopped on google and found my answer. It appears as though this method of wiring a kitchen used to be quite common back in the 50’s and 60’s and goes something like this…
It is called a multiwire branch circuit but for our purposes it would be clearer to call it a two-circuit cable. It involves two hot wires sharing one neutral as their “return” path. The hot wires are 240 volts apart from each other and each is 120 volts from the neutral. This sort of arrangement saves a little wire at installation time by using a cable containing black, red, and white wires between the panel and (usually just) the first outlet or switch box it is run to.
The purpose, other than saving a few bucks is this…
The kitchen/dining area of U.S. homes wired in the 1960s often had two distinct 20-amp “appliance” circuits reaching each normal (duplex) receptacle by way of two-circuit cable. The idea was to distribute heavy loads more easily between the two required circuits.
So after reading about this, and making a series of desperate phone calls, to my trusted advisors, I decided I couldn’t possibly stand to wash one more dish by hand, and that I had to get this dishwasher working at all costs. So I hooked it up, crossed my fingers and Viola! It worked without a hitch, and Thank God, I was just about to throw my Mother Earth Loving priorities out the window and stock pile paper products, just to save me from the 2 hour dishwashing marathons every Sunday morning.
The dishwasher all cozied up to the stove.
Dishes being cleaned without physical labor.
Tagged: criagslist, dishwasher, electrical wiring, kitchen, plumbing, Real Estate, the condo