Choosing normal wash cycle over sensor wash cycle on a dishwasher?

[Shermann]

OK I admit this is a First World problem. I recently bought a new KitchenAid dishwasher, and it is far more sophisticated than the 20-year-old GE that it replaced (that one had a good run!). As I understand it, the normal wash cycle will run for 2.25 hours, and the sensor wash cycle is variable based on sensor readings (KitchenAid calls this the ProWash cycle).

That's as far down the rabbit hole as I could get with Google. Google won't tell me WHY you would choose the normal wash cycle when ProWash sounds like a slam dunk in all cases. Any insight into this deep, perplexing mystery?

[sinkingfeeling]

1. ProWash takes around 3 hours to complete, with heat drying. I've seen no difference

in the outcome from both.

[Shermann]

2. FALSE

ProWash takes what it takes based on sensor readings, 2 - 3 hours.

I just did a ProWash run and it was just under 2 hours. I prewashed the dishes this time.

The mystery endures.

[sinkingfeeling]

3. Well, I always pre wash my dishes and mine takes almost 3 hours on the nose when set to

ProWash.

[Shermann]

4. Those clean sensors can fail

In that case, the ProWash cycle might always run the full duration. So that would be a reason to use the normal cycle.

I sort of had that issue with the old dishwasher. The GE would do one or two extra prerinse cycles based on the clean sensor, and those would sometimes run despite small loads of prerinsed dishes. Sometimes, not always.

You also might not care about getting the maximum cleaning and want to limit the cycle to the two hours for whatever reason.

So maybe we've answered it.