Why does my dishwasher smell like Bigfoot's ****?

Moved to a new house in October and the previous dishwasher didn't work. We replaced it with a Whirlpool which works great but after a couple days of dirty dishes sitting in there it starts to smell like sewage. This is our standard protocol and we've never had an issue with this in our previous houses. Best I can come up with is some sort of air gap/water gap isn't working. As it is now, the drain hose comes up from the dishwasher, up almost to the counter tup and then into the disposal under the sink.

What am I doing wrong?

Stop washing racoons with it.

To me, I think you have backflow as the drain into the system is higher then the outlet. But I'm not a plumber.

Is it the kind with a filter or food chopper? Ours has a filter that needs to be rinsed every couple loads or it starts to smell like swamp bottom.

Ranger50 wrote: To me, I think you have backflow as the drain into the system is higher then the outlet. But I'm not a plumber.

Nope. It's piped correctly. The high hose is supposed to create an airlock, and prevent siphoning the trap.

Suppose to loop up higher than the bottom of the sink so the waste water from the sink doesn't take the easiest path and drain into the dishwasher. It still will if the sink clogs and is full of water. The pump is on the bottom of the DW so there is always a column of water in the drain hose to act as a trap seal. The is unless your one of those numbnuts that drains into a stand pipe in the basement.

First tip, don't leave dirty dishes in there for days. As you said it never caused problems before, but it sitting in there can promote bacterial growth, which means stinky. Some dishwasher tubs are easier for bacteria to grow on than others.

Looking at the drain is important, too. Is the top of the drain hose significantly above the disposal? You are right, crap can drain from the disposal into the drain line, so keep the top of the loop above where the hose goes into the disposal. This will also stop the hose from plugging with crap (which stops dishwasher from draining, which will create a stink of all stinks)

Do you rinse thoroughly before putting dishes in there? Some dishwashers are better than others at getting food through. If the food stays in the bottom, it smells BAD.

Also don't leave the door shut, that creates an environment for crap to grow.

Lastly go buy some 'dishwasher magic' and run it through there. It might help.

if it takes several days to fill the dishwasher, then you have too many dishes.

get rid of some dishes and spend 10 minutes every day washing them by hand..

If I can't wash the racoons in dishwasher where the heck am I supposed to wash them? Our washing machine is a top loader which isn't convenient for loading and every time we hand wash my wife gets rabies.

Maybe they just don't make them like they used to. We normally give it a quick rinse, then load. Once it fills up we run the dish washer and they come out squeaky clean. Should it drain after the disposal? This one drains before the disposal which seems like it could cause some obstruction.

How do you know what Bigfoot's **** smells like?

Wall-e wrote: How do you know what Bigfoot's **** smells like?

Maybe he's a Bigfoot groupie...

I think the real question is why does bigfoot's **** smell like your dishwasher?

.... and how do you know what Bigfoot's butt smells like?

This is currently happening to us at our apartment, in fact I'm burning a candle as we speak, though it just smells like sewage and vanilla now. Last time maintanence came out and cleaned the trap and treated it, I assume that's the case again, or should i request something else?

Wall-e wrote: How do you know what Bigfoot's **** smells like?

Please reference his other thread title, there seems to be a trend...

I wonder if the hairy crack and intimate knowledge of Bigfoot are related?

Have you tried running a rinse cycle after the dishwasher is empty?

It may be that the drain in the disposal doesn't flow fast enough for the dishwasher to clear the line of dirty water.

If running a rinse cycle prevents the problem you can start looking at why things aren't draining properly

secretariata wrote:

Wall-e wrote: How do you know what Bigfoot's **** smells like?

Maybe he's a Bigfoot groupie...

Wouldn't that be a gropie?

Don't mess with Bigfoots ****

Have children. That way you can fill and run the dishwasher daily. Or twice daily on weekends.

VERDICT: Faulty disposal. Unknown to me my disposal wasn't working properly. The little arms on top were rusted/stuck facing inward and not grinding all the food waste correctly. There wasn't really a build up of food but ever since I fixed that the dishwasher stopped smelling.