Presents…

The Wisdom of Master Samurai and Appliantologist, Miyamoto Mushashi

One thing I’ve learned after years of being an appliance repair Samurai is how to pick your battles. You don’t want to engage in hand-to-appliance combat with an appliance that’s not worth repairing, such as with a front loading washer with a failure in either the inner basket or outer drum.

An inner basket failure is a corroded or broken drum support spider assembly, like this one:

See this page for examples and further explanation.

The most common outer tub failure is a bad drum bearing, but it can take other, more subtle forms.

“But, wise and besotted Samurai,” you ask incredulously, “what is it about these particular failures that makes even you, a seasoned veteran of the Appliance Wars, slink away from these battles like a ninja in the night?”

Ahh, Grasshoppah, in the words of my venerable Master, Miyamoto Mushashi, “You must understand that there is more than one path to the top of the mountain [of Appliantology].”

The parts alone for these repairs can run well over $500 and can take several hours to repair, sometimes requiring a second man. And then there are other things that can fail in the washer at a later time: motors, motor control boards, door boots, etc. So I ask you, Grasshoppah, would you rather spend your precious time, blood, and money resurrecting a machine that has given up the will to live or would you rather spend about the same amount of money and far less time purchasing a new washing machine?

What appears to you as running away from a fight is in reality another path to the top of the mountain of Appliantology. And to get there, you must learn to, “Perceive that which cannot be seen with the eye,” as my Master taught.

To help you “Perceive that which cannot be seen with the eye,” I have assembled three videos from my various encounters with these types of catastrophic failures in front-load washers to help you discern the situation and make a wise decision. Watch and learn, Grasshoppah…

Diagnosing a Broken Drum Support Spider

In this first video, you’ll hear the noise that a broken drum support spider makes at low RPMs. The customer called in with the complaint that the drum would bind while running, stalling the cycle and causing the control to flash an error code. Watch and learn the distinctive noise this particular failure makes:

Diagnosing Bad Drum Bearings

Bad drum bearings in a front loading washer can manifest in a variety of ways. In this case, the customer called with the complaint that her Whirlpool Duet (Kenmore-labelled) washer was stopping during the cycle and, upon further questioning, also showing the F06 error code. The F06 error code is a tachometer error which, as it turns out in this case, was actually being caused by the drum bearings binding and interfering with the drum rotation. I could hear the bad drum bearings when I ran the washer in a spin cycle.

Bad bearings can make a variety of noises depending on exactly how they are failing; you could hear a roaring noise like a jet engine or a clanking noise like in this video. But they all have one thing in common: they originate from the back of the washer and manifest audibly during the spin cycle. Had she reported that the washer was making this noise during spin, I could have saved her a service call fee!

BTW, this particular washer is only 5 years old. Her daughter has the exact same washer, same age, and reports the same problem. An all-too common story with the Whirlpool Duet line of front loading washers.

Diagnosing Outer Tub Failure

This video is a great illustration of why it’s so important to properly identify cause and effect when troubleshooting. In this case, what the customer saw as the problem, a twisted door boot (or gasket), was actually an effect of an underlying, catastrophic cause: outer drum failure. You want to make sure you’re fixing the actual cause and not the effect.

Oh, Canada!

Finally, after years of travail and miles of paper work trails, we are now shipping parts to our cool neighbors in the Great White North! Same great prices, same awesome one-year, hassle-free return policy as we’ve always offered our customers here in the (once upon a time) Land of the Free! Come git you some using the Smart Parts Search Box at The Appliantology Academy:

Wisdom from The Oz Man

Heed the wisdom of The Oz Man and don’t let the beauty of this Autumn pass you by: get up off your duff, get outside and take a hike!

Samurai Appliance Repair Man, www.Appliantology.org