Hi fellow Hiveians and DIY enthusiasts,
Back today with the second edition of my previous post, found here, to complete the washing machine disassemble and reassemble. Overall this was a very fun project that taught me some more things to keep in my back pocket for when I need to fix another appliance in the future. These appliances nowadays are definitely not built to last any longer! They wear out. Whenever we look online forums or tell people we know our washing machine has lasted 8 years they are astounded. Unfortunate that I broke it lol
Not everyone may read the whole post but if you have a DIY story of your own, please share it with me! I'd love to hear about it!
To continue where I left off in the last edition, I had just taken off the rear weight and disassembled the top panel and front rubber boot that kept water inside the tub. Now that the boot was off, it was time to remove the actual front plate of the washing machine. When all of the screws are taken off the front and put into that red bucket with the rest of the screws so I don't lose them, I pulled back the front. I thought it was broken or something because it would absolutely not come off! Thankfully it was just some rust on the joint. What I did to break the rust free is to take my screwdriver and the rubber mallet and give each connector (total of 3) metal clip a few taps with the combo right at the seam between the washer and the front plate. This broke through the rust and it eventually, with a lot of creaking and noise, came free and I took the plate off.
Below you can see the two other clips that were keeping the front plate attached. There was one on the left, one in the middle and one on the right to evenly distribute the plate to the frame.
I put it aside. You can see all of the different holes that were there for the screws for it. The front plate was considerably heavy because of the glass door so be careful of that if you take it off. It wanted to just fly free especially since it was not connected to the spring loaded lock.
Pretty cool view of the front of the washer without any plate on it! You can see the inner tub and the rubber boot as well as the weights on both sides.
Now that the front plate was off, it was time to start to disassemble the weights. It's important to remove all of the weights because these are the balancers that keep the tub from knocking loose. You also would have one hell of a time lifting the tub up and out of the frame of the washer if the weights were still there. This weight below is on the front left side of the machine. I removed both bolts. The same process was performed on the other side, the right side.
Below is a picture of the look and placement of the door hinge and spring lock mechanism. It's pretty cool to see all the different components of it! Somewhere in there is a sensor that makes sure the door is actually shut before the wash will start. It also contains a lock mechanism besides the normal one to keep the door closed. When the wash is actually turned on, it completely locks down the door. This is good but can be problematic if the mechanism fails, which I've heard it does. Also fun story, in Italy years ago, the washing machine was turned on for an hour cycle and would not shut off until the cycle was complete, and it kept the door locked even if we tried to turn it off! That was a really frustrating thing to learn lol
Below two images are the left and right stabilizing shocks that keep the drum centered and in place while on spin cycle. Until I opened the washer for the first time, I never knew these things were in there!
Now comes the time when I actually took the weights off. I used my 13mm socket to ratchet them off. It was glorious to actually have room to do this, unlike the back inside bolt.
Now that the weights were taken off, I took off some of the other components. I believe this was either a vacuum hose or a sensor. Not completely sure what it served but it was connected so I removed it.
This is where it was connected, which leads me to believe it was some kind of sensor. The connection didn't have anywhere to drain, so sensor it was in my book.
This was another sensor here, not sure what one specifically. Some of the units have heater cores but it looks like this one didn't, at least nothing jumped out to me that it was a heater.
I disconnected the electrical clip and put it aside, in a location that I could take a quick photo so I would know what it served later on if I forgot what to plug it into.
Here is an image of the various weights and balancers that came off the unit. Three heavy iron weights and one counterbalance for the soap dispenser. Pretty cool for me to look at them all to understand the engineering behind keeping it level!
Now I moved to the back of the unit and started to dismantle the motor assembly. I removed the serpentine belt from the motor, it attached at those grooves you can see on the black spindle sticking out.
The main wiring harness to the motor was attached with these little screws, so I had to remove them since they attached to the outer tub housing.
Now came time to remove the actual motor itself. The 13mm socket you can see was almost the universal socket for the whole job, which was very nice and kind of the manufacturer lol to keep it consistent.
It was insanely difficult to remove the electrical connector from the back of the motor! I unfortunately had to crack the clip a little bit in order to get it out. Good thing we are buying a new one once things settle down.
This is a picture of the back of the motor. It attached to the bottom in two places. There were 2 bolts in the front but also these round holes that connected to plastic hangers so it was secured in both directions.
Now that the motor was free, there is a big hole. You can see the two bolt holes on the edge of the outer drum where they attached.
Now that the motor was out it was time to remove the balancer shock pistons. These flex up and down just like they do in a vehicle, which was cool to learn. There are 4 of them, one on each corner. These are vital to keeping the tub stable while spinning.
The good old 13mm socket is the same one here as well. This was the front right shock.
A look at the strange view of a completely bare underneath section of the washer. The motor is gone, the drain hose is disconnected and the electrical connections are also gone.
Everything up top is almost disconnected. The last piece I needed to do was to remove those two connections with the big black springs on each side of the drum.
The drum is removed, and free from the shell! It was quite a challenge to get it out since it was heavier than it looks. Thankfully no back injuries occurred in the making of this post! It would have been nice to have a garage to do this in but the bathroom wasn't incredibly small so I had sufficient space to get that done.
The drum outside, laying on the front! That is the back spindle that the serpentine belt runs on.
Now for the challenge, removing the bolt that keeps the drums connected. I needed a 19mm deep socket for this one and a 24 inch length, 1/2 inch size steel breaker bar for this. The breaker bar is critical for this, it gives you the leverage you need to break the seal of the bolts without hurting yourself or the bolt you are loosening. I had to jam my thick screwdriver between the lateral bars on the spindle and brace it on the very inner part of it where it is metal. This gives you the stopping strength to keep the spindle from spinning while you are trying to crank the bar to loosen the nut.
Once I broke the seal on the bolt, it thankfully released without much effort. I removed the spindle and the inner drum fell out with a little tap of the top of the nut here, which is good. You want a good seal between them.
The challenge I was now presented with is getting the screws out from the sides of the outer drum. There was about 12 screws in total. This first one I tried with my regular screw driver and did not work at all. I'm incredibly lucky it didn't strip more otherwise all of that work would have been for nothing. Luckily, I had my fantastic impact-driver screw gun. This thing has saved me on countless occasions! It's a very versatile drill that breaks through screw issues like this if you apply a lot of downward pressure. I had to use a double extension on the drill bit but thankfully it worked out.
That is an inside view of the outer tub with the inner tub removed. The black hole is the ball bearing outer casing. The washer is old so unfortunately I didn't have the opportunity to buy a new set of bearings for it.
Now for the real gross part! The first look at that makes you think it's a decomposing body or something but it's just calcium and lime buildup that happens when you use the laundry detergent. We haven't run a calcium and lime clean wash since I moved in 6 years ago, so needless to say it's a lot of buildup lol. Once you get past the horrifying scene there and focus on the middle of the picture, you can see the problem. This is the inner spindle of the washing machine. The outer metal part of it is cracked, throwing the balance off in combination with the bent bearing. The part nearest the middle is partially cracked but as it goes outward you can see it is cracked the full length unfortunately.
Different view of the crack, you can see the other two sections of the spindle.
I spent about 15 minutes using my screw driver like a poker and cleaned out most of the buildup thankfully. It came free in most scenarios without too much effort. Just a little vacuuming and you're good to go.
In that process, I noticed that there were a couple more cracks. They also don't sell this spindle any longer so we are basically out of luck.
What I ended up doing is knocking the cracks back into place as best I could, cleaning up the spindle as best I could and putting it back together. Once I hung the outer drum on the springs and shocks, I used my rubber mallet and rotated the drum and smacked it with my hammer to try and adjust the way it sat in the bearing. This corrected the issue somewhat but certainly not permanently. It allows us to do very small loads of laundry at a time but it's better than what I was preparing for: handwashing everything! I don't want to complain too much because I know people around the world, even in the United States, do this every day. We are definitely lucky to have an electric washing machine that does most of the work for you.
Check out my other DIY posts if you'd like!
DIY Washing Machine Repair pt 1 ;
Focaccia Bread ; Sink Pop-Up Assembly Repair ;
Bathroom floor washer dryer ;
DIY bathroom floor near a toilet ;
DIY 2011 Nissan Sentra spark plugs ; DIY Tomago Cages ; Securely Hanging a Cabinet ;
Joint Compound on Ceiling ; Washing Machine Drain Pump ; Bubble wrap insulation on a wall ; Finish work in the bathroom ; Bubble wrap on windows ; Laminate floors in a bathroom ; Ball joints on a car
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