What is the cause of dishwasher vent leak?

Question

My dishwasher has a vent in the top of the door which I suppose is opened during the dry cycle to allow steam/moisture to escape. Recently, after running a load of dishes, when I open the door, about 2-3 oz of water leak from the vent and form a puddle on the floor.

What could be causing the leak, and can it be repaired?

This dishwasher has a "quiet" feature which involves a solenoid-operated value (that's too generous a description -- it's more of a flap) which blocks closes off the vent drain to reduce noise during the wash cycle. I removed the door control panel to inspect the valve/vent system. There is no crud clogging the drain, and the solenoid seems to be normally open (to the drain).

(See the part labeled "5" here)

Answer 1

Does the water appear clear/clean, or does it have food bits and/or detergent in it?

My guess is one of two things:

• The seal on the flap has degraded and the high-pressure jets are now able to force water in under the flap.
• There is some "ledge" in this assembly in which water can collect and puddle, and doesn't dry during the dry cycle (possibly because of the extremely humid air passing by it; there's no capacity in the air to hold any more water).

Answer 2

Just had this happen to me on a Kenmore Elite dishwasher built by Whirlpool. The vent assembly is very similar to this one, except that part #5 looks different but still serves the same purpose. The seal (part #6) seats onto the outside of the door panel, white part #7 is on the inside of the dishwasher and screws into part #5, holding the assembly snug and water tight. Mine was loose and not seating well with the door panel. This let water make its way past the seal and drain down between the door panels to the floor. The solenoid operated flap inside part #5 was working fine, tightening up part #7 fixed the issue.

Answer 3

My whirlpool dishwasher was dribbling on the floor when I opened the door during use. I popped the vent cover off from the inside and found a ton of nasty thick crud in there. Lime had built up not allowing water to drain from the vent to the interior of the door. This caused the area to overflow and leak dirty water between the layers of the door onto the floor. Cleaned it up good as new and soaked the vent cover inside the door in a bowl of vinegar. Problem solved, no more leaks or spills after digging the crud out. Since I had the whole door apart I put the whole inner panel in the bathtub and scrubbed it within an inch of it's life. Some covers require disassembling the door to get them apart. Wish I had not torn the whole door apart before I realized mine pops off easily. But, now I can say I tore it apart and put it back together and it's clean.

Answer 4

I found the air vent was clogged with some weird gunk on mine. I cleaned it out and it hasn't leaked since.