Product
Kenmore 20232 (Type 587-20)
Category
Kitchen Appliance
Report number
20120122-9DFA0-2147471085
Ownership age
Not stated
Failure type
Fire / ignition
Incident narrative
SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20120122-9DFA0-2147471085. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Matched catalog product: Kenmore 20232 (Type 587-20). Source model text: 587.1640590. Incident: About 11-12 years ago, my dishwasher burst into flames. I was in the room when it happened. The dishwasher was running, and there was a quick flash of light. Flames then started shooting out of the vent in the door right above the selector knob. I quickly unlocked the door, shutting off the dishwasher, and threw a dish towel over the fire putting it out. There did not appear to be any external damage, so I called a repairman. He opened things up and the circuit board was scorched and burnt, but all of the surrounding plastic wasn't even melted. He told me that it was a bad circuit board, this kind of thing was isolated, and if he replaced the circuit board it would not be likely to occur again. I never run the dishwasher when we're not at home, but it hasn't given any problems since. I am only reporting this now after recently seeing a CBS news report of the same problem happening today.
Official report number: 20120122-9DFA0-2147471085. Search that ID on SaferProducts.gov or match it in the CPSC public database export to verify this record.