Now for the table setting cleanup experience. Had a dinner party for 10. Thirty pieces of stemware, ten pieces of other glassware, forty pieces of dishware, fifty pieces of silverware. Also various serving platters and utensils. All washed, sanitized, dried and put away in 20 minutes.

Same drill as described in my previous post. Fill a sink with warm soapy water, bus the dishes into the sink, then when it is time to wash, it takes about a minute to load a rack, 3 minutes to run the dishwasher, then pull the rack out and set it on the counter, by the time the next rack is loaded and being washed, the dishes in the first rack have air dried and are ready to be put away. Glasses don't need to go in the sink of water, they can be bused straight to the rack. You need three racks: a peg rack for dishware, a glasses rack for stemware, and a flat rack for silverware, pots, etc.

Racks cost $25-65 each depending on type. You can store two or three in the dishwasher, the rest need to find a home somewhere.

You don't need to find room for big jugs of detergent. Just put some detergent in a squeeze bottle and squirt an ounce or so into the dishwasher before every load. The commercial detergent comes in two gallon jugs, about $25 each.

It is an active, and rather noisy, wet and steamy, 20 minutes. You need some counter space to set the racks, and the ability to lift a rack of glasses or dishes (10 to 20 pounds maybe). The floor gets wet where the rack drips as you lift it out of the dishwasher.

Two standard dishwashers would (maybe) have fit and washed all of that with about 10 minutes of loading, then start the cycle, handwash the larger platters and whatever wouldn't fit, and go to bed. The next day, spend 10 minutes putting away the dishes.

If you have room for two standard dishwashers, and don't care about the "cleaning while cooking" capability described in my previous post, then that may be the way to go.

You can probably buy two very nice residential dishwashers for one-half the price of one of the less expensive brands of commercial undercounter dishwasher. If you have to pay an electrician to install a 240v circuit in your kitchen, or if you buy a Hobart which seem to be significantly more expensive than other brands, then make that one-third the price.

The commercial dishwasher looks, well, utilitarian. It is stainless steel, but not the shiny stainless of a residential model.

Finally, the commercial dishwasher is really meant for washing a lot of dishes at a time. If we're just cooking for two and have only a few plates and glasses, it isn't worth starting the commercial dishwasher, waiting for it to fill and heat, and running it. We'll just hand wash in that case. With a residential dishwasher, we could simply rinse off the dishes and put them in the dishwasher to be washed the next day.

As for repairability, I think the commercial dishwasher is likely to last for decades and decades in the very light-duty environment of a home (they are heavy-duty, designed to wash dozens of racks a day, seven days a week), and parts will be available for decades too. But I've no idea how much it costs to get a Hobart service rep to come to a house.

So, that's my report. I like this commercial dishwasher, because we have a small kitchen, give large dinner parties, and I don't mind the rather industrial appearance. But I don't think its for everyone. In a perfect world, I'd have this commercial dishwasher for the dinner parties and a single dishdrawer for when we only have a few dishes.

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