# KitchenAid DishWasher Burning Smell KDTM404ESS1



## zootjeff (Jul 11, 2007)

I have a KitchenAid dishwasher from 2016 that started making a burning smell.
Opened it up and one of the spade lug interfaces on one of the high current connections appears to have overheated and burned the insulation off the black wire and caused heat damage to both the connector on the control board and the connector on the wiring harness. Also looks like some of the wires melt themselves into the vibration material on the door. 

Looks like a new controller board W10854228 and a new wiring harness W10763096 

Is there any option to figure out what the connectors are and replace the damaged connectors? 

Is it possible to get the wiring diagram to figure out what this is? is this the main power input into the relay bank?

Anyone else have this problem?


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## DanS26 (Oct 25, 2012)

Before you repair and reconnect that circuit you need to diagnose why that connection overheated.

Was the connection loose from vibration? Did the connection get wet?

Or did the circuit pull more amps than designed? Heat/dry cycle operating properly?

What type of circuit feeds that appliance?


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## zootjeff (Jul 11, 2007)

The control board was not in its normal location, rather it was installed with the bottom half against insulation. The snaps had failed probably during assembly, it is suppose to be suspended in air. This probably caused the hot wire on the input to run hotter and experience fretting corrosion either in the crimp or between the spade lug and the harness connector. Disahwasher never actually stopped working, just continued to emminate a burning smell. Due to the ohmic connection on the hot wire entering the control board. I don’t know if it is pulling more current than designed. I will try to measure that. It is on a 15a dedicated circuit. 

Connection was not loose, it was fully constrained by the plastic housing..


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## DanS26 (Oct 25, 2012)

Your diagnosis may or may not be correct. A loose crimp or connection is most likely.

Since the DW is on a separate circuit I would replace the regular breaker with a combo AFCI/GFCI breaker. There may be something else going on in that appliance that is causing the overheating.


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## MilesL16 (Oct 11, 2021)

I just had this same problem (high current connectors fried and those harness wires partially melted), on the same model (KDTM404ESS1). Did replacing the controller board and wiring harness do the trick, or was it a deeper issue?

.


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## quatsch (Feb 4, 2021)

IMO, it was just bad pin-to-socket connections that could be bridged with jumper wires. You'd need a 25w soldering iron & some solid thin wire.

It's not so much the high current as the high resistance in the connection.


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## jimn (Nov 13, 2010)

This happened to my Kitchen Aid as well. It has been a problem for years and if you do a little research some unfortunate souls had major fires loosing good parts of their houses. . Mine caused a call to the fire department. The call to the FD was for the unmistakable odor of an electrical fire which quickly permeated the entire hose making it difficult to tell the source. . While the FD was here investigating is when the dishwasher let out the whiff of smoke. Sorry not taking on any chance of fixing this as it would likely happen again. My DIY fix was to pull it out of the cabinet as quick as I could and throw it in the front yard away from the house. The next day I took the door apart and found the control board was severely burnt as well as many components on it .. not just the high voltage connectors. It seems to be a relatively common issue with Kitchen Aid dishwashers built over the years from 2002 to 2014 (when I did my research). I don't understand why this was never a recall.. It got replaced by a Bosch which cleans dishes much better and is much quieter and after 6 years has had no fires.


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## MilesL16 (Oct 11, 2021)

Thanks Jimn. Have disconnected the power source. But, after living with the lingering electrical burn odor for a week now, and weighing the potential fix vs. future fire hazard, the only acceptable solution for my wife is to hammer throw this unit off the front porch and shop for something new. Hate it when some DIY projects get overruled by by the boss...and common sense!


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## huesmann (Aug 18, 2011)

Coincidentally, saw this on FB marketplace this morning: 










> This is a smoking hot new model from General Electric don't miss out on this great deal.


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