Only 3 years late, but in the hope that someone else finds this. Have just had a problem with a Hotpoint FDW20P where the right hand side hinge appeared to have broken.
Did a bit of searching (instead of doing the sensible thing of taking the side panel off...) and decided that I needed to buy a right hand side hinge, paid £13 plus another £4 postage - first tip here. When you find out what you need go to a online Spares site and find the part then note down the CXXXXXXXX number and have a look on eBay - could have saved myself the postage). Anyway I digress, disassembled the dishwasher today and found that it was only the hinge pin that had come adrift, this is a pin with a star washer that fits over the end and secures the pin in place (Currently £5 on eBay (May 2012) which is a rip off, but at least there isn't another £3 postage as that would really take the err... biscuit!). The pin was there but no star washer, thankfully my expensive if now redundant piece of kit that I had bought came with two so I fitted it and reassembled the dishwasher.
In order to get to the pin (and the hinge if necessary) unplug the dishwasher from the mains, open the door, you will see on the inside of the door that there are four screws on each side, if you unscrew the bottom 3 on each side you should then be able to slide the metal front of the door down and then off. If it is a little snug turn the washer on its side and remove the front screw from both sides of the underside, this will allow the bottom plastic thingy to come away and then you should be able to remove the front of the door and get to the broken hinge pin. If you do need to change the hinge you will need to pull the washer out from where ever it normally lives and turn it round, take out the two screws that secure the top cover on to the dishwasher, once this is done the top should slide forwards and off, turn it back round again and remove the side panel too which is two more screws at the front (where the door closes) two at the top and two at the back. This should then give you access to the broken hinge. However, I reckon that there is a better chance of the pin going than the hinge......
Hope this helps and saves someone some time and money.....
I.T. Eddie
May 2012
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