Machine does not fill with water

I had a Zanussi d/w up until about 5 years ago and there were two perennial problems that required attention. First of all, there was a double solenoid inlet valve for the water supply at the back, one part was the main fill, the other was a supply to the water softener - big plastic lump in the bottom under the salt filler. The main fill solenoid would fail about every 2 years and I would buy a replacement directly from Zanussi for about £10. I believe the failure may have been due to the fact that the machine was filled from the hot supply. This was allowed in the specification but the higher temperature may have led to failure. (Side note) In any case, it is better to fill dishwashers with cold water anyway because during the initial part of the wash cycle proteins are rinsed off rather than being stuck on the items, and secondly, heating from cold increases the contact time of the wash detergent solution and also improves
results. If the solenoid controlling the supply to the water softener has failed, it may well lead to the phenomenon you are seeing because the regeneration cycle happens after the wash in most machines.

If you feel comfortable about using a mains tester(a neon screwdriver one would do) and can *safely* reach the solenoid with power on and the machine the right way up, then you could see
whether power is reaching the regeneration side of the valve or not. If it is, and water is not entering then you have the culprit.


Another area that affects filling is the level switch. Generally these are pneumatically operated device looking like a flat drum, about 8cm across and 1cm or so thick. They are generally mounted up high in the machine or door and have two or three wires
on terminals and a small flexible plastic tube leading somewhere into the wet area of the machine. As the water level rises, water goes part way up the tube and air above it operates the switch to turn off the water.
Sometimes there are two levels used and hence two switches inside this assembly working at different pressures. One could have gone. Another problem is that gunk can get in the lower part of the tube and reduce or block it from detecting. and generally this results in no filling at all.

Hope this helps!