Momma needs a new dryer

Let's see.. Take old motor laying around, drive dryer barrel off crankshaft, make fan push through the radiator to generate heat.. Yup, totally doable.

Marjorie Suddard wrote: Yeah, but my clothes are gonna be dried day after tomorrow, with the new one delivered, old one carried away--"Dishes are DONE, man!" And anyway, he's not here. If he wants to build me a washer out of old Spitfires and cast-off cabinets after he gets home, he's welcome to try. Margie

Bonus points for DTMTBD reference.

Tim Baxter wrote: Let's see.. Take [] motor [from icky red BWM], drive dryer barrel off crankshaft, make fan push through the radiator to generate heat [then add boost].. Yup, totally doable.

Fixxorrred

Marjorie Suddard wrote: If he wants to build me a washer out of old Spitfires and cast-off cabinets after he gets home, he's welcome to try. Margie

If that quote doesn't make it into the mag, I'll be very disappointed.

Now I'm not even sure your dryer is broke. I'm betting you just waited till he was out of town and took it upon yourself to get a new one. Sneaky!

JFX001 wrote:

Marjorie Suddard wrote: Yeah, but my clothes are gonna be dried day after tomorrow, with the new one delivered, old one carried away--"Dishes are DONE, man!" And anyway, he's not here. If he wants to build me a washer out of old Spitfires and cast-off cabinets after he gets home, he's welcome to try. Margie

Bonus points for DTMTBD reference.

I didn't even notice that the first time through. I say that all the time, and usually just get blank stares in return.

Found this out the hard way: cheap dryers (~$300) have a plastic wear strip across the top of the door opening which is what the front of the dryer drum rides on. That damn thing will wear out, the front of the drum will drop and you will randomly find these mysterious brown and sometimes black scorch marks on your clothes.

The better dryers will have rollers under the front of the drum instead. I actually went to two or three places until I found someone who would let me remove the top of a display model to check for this. I wound up with an Admiral ADE7005AYW, IIRC it was $390.00 and appears to be the same as some Kenmores costing around $400-$425.

carguy123 wrote: Now I'm not even sure your dryer is broke. I'm betting you just waited till he was out of town and took it upon yourself to get a new one. Sneaky!

Yeah, and I bet Tim once had a really fancy Lamp in the window he won as a prestigious award, and Margie accidentally broke it when she was watering the plants, after conveniently having used up all the glue on purpose so it was all gone when Tim wanted to fix it. I bet Tommy thought he faintly heard Taps playing in the distance when Tim finally gave up on megasquirting the lamp

Samsung front loader. It is the shiznitz.

We had a front loader in Germany (like everyone there) and didn't have the stink problem reported here and elsewhere. There are a lot of benefits to the front loading washer, to include energy and water savings. Besides, they sound like a turbine spinning up- how cool is that?

Serious question- Anyone have an idea why this seems to be a problem here but not there? (hold the smelly European comments- I can see those coming). I see us moving to a front loader at some point but don't want to doom us to a life of stinky towels. I smell bad enough as is!

On our front load washer, we leave the door open between uses to cut down on biological growth.

The differences between Europe and North America could simply be what is or isn't in the water or the soap.

My inlaws have some fisher paykel stuff they picked up from the bargain lane at Lowes..

Sweet stuff when it works. They the dryer out of commission while the "techs" tried to sort out an electrical issue. 3 "main boards" later and my MIL called new zealand and got a free dryer out of it..

Good machines, but like italian cars, are only good when they work.

FWIW, our dryer died recently and is now a Challenge car floor.

According to the complaints on the internet it is a problem in Europe too, but people there supposedly have had time to get used to special in-between-time runnings of special mildew killer soap.

Also could be they don't wash as much or as often as we do, especially the French.

we just researched the washers and also read consumer reports.

they claim that washers have improved, but dryers are the same old thing.

my wife and i usually have good arguements when buying applicances and furniture

This might send you in the right direction

I also have a front loading washer (for about 5-6 years now I believe) and we have had no problems with smell or anything.

Front loader LG here, no problems at all, the dryers are going to be the same basic design, the main thing is where you want the controls.

No stink on the washer and we have been using it for 5+years.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Summer-Energy-Savings-by-Modifying-Your-Electric-C/

seems like something that could be helpfull for folks in warm climates. A little easier to use than a clothes line perhaps.

when my avocado green clothes cleaning system puked all over the garage, one unit at a time , I ended up going with the german sports model replacements. I found a slightly used set of fisher-paykell for under $500, and my electric bill dropped by $15 a month almost instantly... i think the power the old ones used for one wash is what the newer ones use in six months... or something ridiculously cool like that...

ive still got the spare dryer (kenmore, apt size 220v, scratch and dent special but was new), less than one months use, sitting under boxes that i picked up when the avocado dryer imploded...

When I was in Rome a couple years ago, some friends and I rented an apartment for a few days and it had a small front load washer/dryer combo... one machine. It was pretty freakin' cool. Put your clothes in, push a button, and an hour or so later they were clean and dry.

I wonder if the drying bit eliminates the stinky bio-gross from growing...Im sure it would help a lot!

The heat and fan definitely would. When I asked the manufacturer about a combo unit, since I'd heard about the European models I was told that the heating element was an issue and because it had to be divorced from the clothes it made for much longer drying times. Plus I was told people wanted to wash multiple loads of clothes without waiting for the first to be totally complete.

carguy123 wrote: You WILL regret it. I promise. One more issue is that of balancing. Front loader washers spin to higher speeds that do dryers so they encounter issues there as well. Gravity works! That means all your heavy, wet clothes want to fall to the bottom of the tub. When it spins up the washer is off balance which means it has to spin back down and start all over again & again & again. This is why it takes much longer to wash a load of clothes in a front loader. You did know it takes longer to wash a load of clothes in a front loader didn't you? Another problem that takes up a lot of space on the internet is how to get them to stay in one spot. Mine has a dent in the front where it walked all the way across the room and into the cabinets. I used rubber feet and now I only have to push the washer back in place a couple of times a week. You must use special HE soap and you can't begin to use as much as indicated on the directions as that aggravates the mold issue. Do you have a tankless hot water heater? I do. They say that if you have a traditional tanked HWH your problems will be worse than mine because the first run of water in will be cold which won't dissolve the detergent well and this too leads to greater mold and mildew issues. Bottom line is that you buy a washing machine to clean your clothes and the front loaders don't. Just Google Front "loader washer problems" or "front loader mold mildew" "front loader balance issues" - or any combination thereof. It will be an enlightening experience. Just be prepared to read for an hour or more.

Obviously your experiences are your own. However, I've not had any issues with my front loader moving around. It does vibrate enough to make some decent noise, but it isn't bad enough to cause concern. The feet that came with ours are very nice rubber pieces.

When I'm washing things in warm or hot water, I run the tap in the bathroom where the washer is located to rinse out the soap from the cup and help bring hot water up to the washer. Works fine.

Of course I don't use much soap either since the clothes rarely are that dirty.

Finally, we've had the washer for nearly two years and no mildew problems since we leave the door open between washes (unless we're closing the doors to make the room look prettier for I think you're being a bit lazy and not looking at how to best work with the units you've got.

We don't use liquid fabric softener, use the HE soap and we leave the door ajar between uses - no stink so far. Our washer (whirlpool duet sport) is supposed to be one of the worst.

Conversely, we had a GE top loading 'portable' washer that was a funk factory. We found this place and bought some of their product.

It worked, but we had to treat the washer 2-3 times a year.