Where do I put salt in a Siemens dishwasher?

Every year, household appliances become more sophisticated and "smarter," which is truly exciting. Today, housewives don't even have to worry about when to add salt to their dishwasher—the smart machine will automatically notify them via a special indicator on the control panel. After this signal, the "home assistant" can run a few more cycles without salt, but afterward, the container will still need to be filled with salt granules. While finding dishwasher salt is now very easy, as it's sold in virtually every store, finding the salt container in a Siemens dishwasher is a bit more challenging. We'll discuss the salt container and salt consumption today.

Where is the salt container located?

Conveniently, modern Siemens dishwashers come with a small funnel designed to make pouring salt into the hopper easier. It allows you to quickly add granules to the salt reservoir, which is located directly in the wash chamber. To add salt:

• open a pack of salt and make sure that it can be used in a dishwasher;

In Siemens dishwashers, you can occasionally even use regular table salt, but it is important that it is crystal white, without any black or clumped granules.

• open the dishwasher and remove the lower dish rack;
• find the plastic cover of the salt reservoir, which is located on the bottom of the machine next to the left wall of the washing chamber;
• unscrew the cap counterclockwise;
• inspect the salt container for water;
• If there is no liquid inside the container, then use a funnel to add water right up to the neck of the container;
• Pour salt into the hopper, adding salt to the brim even if the granules begin to push liquid out of the salt tank.

At this point, adding salt is complete. All that's left to do is screw the lid back on, wipe away any water from the bottom of the wash chamber, and reload the lower basket. Now you can continue using your Siemens dishwasher without worrying about damaging your appliance.

Optimize your salt consumption

Dishwasher owners often report that their dishwasher salt runs out too quickly, literally within a month or even less, which is a serious expense, given the current cost of specialized salt for Siemens dishwashers. To avoid this, you can optimize salt consumption, which requires knowledge of the hardness of your tap water. You can find this information either on the official website of your city's water utility or using special water quality test strips. These strips determine the water hardness level.

• If the strip shows from 0 to 6 dH, then you have very soft water in the city.
• From 7 to 16 dH – medium hardness.
• 17-21 dH indicates hard tap water.
• Finally, dH readings between 22 and 35 indicate that your water is too hard.

When the city has high-quality soft water, you don't need any dishwasher salt at all. However, if the machine uses hard water, you will have to add salt and program the hardness level in the device settings. The Siemens dishwasher has four levels of salt to combat hard tap water, which are activated as follows:

• turn on the device;
• Press and hold the “Setup” button for approximately three seconds until the double curved arrow symbol flashes on the unit’s display;
• Using the "Start" button, select the desired level from 0 to 3, where the minimum level is needed for soft water and the maximum for extremely hard water.

You can determine the selected water hardness level on a Siemens dishwasher without a display by the LEDs. When three lights up, level three is selected; two lights up, level two; one lights up, level one; and zero lights up, the water hardness mode is set to high-quality water.

Therefore, it's not so much how much salt you add to your dishwasher as it is choosing the right water hardness setting. Be sure to monitor the water hardness setting, especially if your tap water quality fluctuates significantly throughout the year. This simple procedure can not only save you money on dishwasher salt but also extend the life of your Siemens dishwasher.

   

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