!44: Domestic and Commercial Dishwashers - What's the Difference?

!±8± Domestic and Commercial Dishwashers - What's the Difference?

Just about every family home will have a dishwasher nestled in some corner, and they are now so popular that they are a staple of modern life. New models of dishwasher are being rolled out almost daily by the big companies like Bosch and Miele, each bigger and better than the last, but how are these different from the commercial dishwasher?

The short answer is that commercial dishwashers are simply better than their domestic counterparts. Ultimately the design of the domestic dishwasher means that it is not designed to even compete with the commercial models. Look at the specifications of the machines. A domestic dishwasher is designed to wash one load of dishes a day for around five years, and while the commercial dishwasher is also designed for five years, it will be able to go through up to thirty washes a day. So how is this achieved? Well, ultimately the domestic machine will have a wash cycle of up to ninety minutes, so it will give very thorough clean. However, the commercial dishwasher will blast dishes for only four minutes. Even so, after thirty washes, the machine will only have been running for half an hour longer than the domestic model.

As it runs for a much greater length of time, the commercial dishwasher has to be incredibly efficient. Therefore each wash will use up around two and a half litres of water, using only eight pence worth of detergent. Compare this to the domestic dishwasher, which tends to use up to thirty-five litres. While the sheer number of washes will make the cost of the detergent mount up, the machine is also very effective at using electricity effectively, costing only eight pence for each wash.

The efficiency of the commercial dishwasher is unquestionable when one considers how many dishes it can clean per hour. With thirty washes an hour, the dishwasher, if loaded fully, will clean up to five hundred and forty plates. The commercial model can only manage thirty six.

However, the commercial dishwasher does have certain specifications and features that must be looked after. It can only run on soft water, so you may well need to invest in an expensive water filter, or risk damaging your machine. Naturally some models are available with a built-in filter, and attachments are readily available. However, they are certainly not cheap. Furthermore, with thirty washes a day, you will be using a large amount of detergent, which will, unfortunately, cost a fair bit.

On the other hand, however, the commercial machine is a boon for ensuring that plates are perfectly clean and sanitary - vital for any catering business. Look at the facts; domestic machines only rinse plates at temperatures of seventy degrees. Commercial machines rinse at an average temperature of eighty-two degrees, eradicating any trace of bacteria. At home it is easy enough to give plates that aren't totally clean a second wash, but in a restaurant, plates need to come out perfectly clean after just one wash.

So it becomes abundantly clear that the commercial dishwasher is a safer, more energy-efficient and cost-effective version of the domestic counterparts. They may be a part of every home, but they are not as well-designed as the commercial model.