Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: the Dishwasher envelope please!

[Rob Sandelin (floriferous]

If you are serving more than 40 plates at meals, in my opinion, you will
want a commercial dishwasher. The load cycle of a commercial dishwasher is
about 3-4 minutes, residential is usually 30 minutes. If you are less than
40 plates a couple of residential will work fine. The money is trivial, it
amortized over 15 years so think ahead. In my humble opinion, one of the
biggest mistakes we made  in our scullery at Sharingwood is to setup for a
under the counter dishwasher. This SUCKS! Dripping wet trays, all over the
floor, heavy back breaking loads to be lifted up and down at awkward angles.
More than a few people have had back issues because of this design.  If you
go commercial, I highly recommend over the counter, so you can just slide
the trays right in, no lifting. The noise factor is not really an issue, an
under the counter model is  only minorly less noisy than an above counter
one, and you will save your backs.

Rob Sandelin
Sky Valley Environments  <http://www.nonprofitpages.com/nica/SVE.htm>
Field skills training for student naturalists
Floriferous [at] msn.com


-----Original Message-----
From: cohousing-l-admin [at] cohousing.org
[mailto:cohousing-l-admin [at] cohousing.org]On Behalf Of HeidiNYS [at] aol.com
Sent: Monday, March 03, 2003 6:48 PM
To: cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org
Subject: [C-L]_the Dishwasher envelope please!



Dear Folks,

We really need a Commonhouse dishwasher.

We have gone through Archives, and asked this List for help.   It was
thought
that we had decided, perhaps not heartily however, on a $4,400 Hobart
dishwasher, if we could afford one.   The choice was between a Hobart and
two
heavy duty home style dishwashers [around $2,000].

Questions have been raised at yesterdays meeting, causing us to re-open
question.

Our one neighbor, after listening said:  "So, what I hear is we can spend
$2,000 for two dishwashers that don't need us to rinse dishes or $4,400 for
one that does?"

Can you give us your input, esp re: these specific questions which were
raised.


The concerns with a Hobart that came up:

1.   Do dishes need to be rinsed off before going in?? Since this is not the
case with a homestyle dishwasher,  it's a concern: uses more water, takes
effort/time.



2.  Our other neighbor raised the point of CAPACITY of homestyle
dishwashers.
 Please let us know your experience.  We're growing to 17 households.....
Currently, a large dinner is about 27 adults & kids;  this increase to
perhaps 30-35 people.  Folks with homestyle dishwashers in CommonHouse, we'd
appreciate knowing capacity.


3.  Water??  Responses to concern about commercial Hobart type needing
dishes
rinsed before going thru [ok, plus expense.]  According to Consumer
Report[May2002], pre-rinsing for a homestyle dishwasher wastes abt 20
gallons; many of the homestyle dishwashers take five gallons to do a whole
load, some, up to double that.  This makes me wonder abt environmental cost
of a dishwasher that equire pre-rinsing.  Experience? Thoughts?


Also, open to any other input on this expenditure!!

And for any others in this search, I can offer to email  compilation of past
& recent research on this topic!

thanks,

Ruth Hirsch, Cantines Island CoHo, Saugerties, NY

email: HeidiNYS [at] aol.com



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