Rotor gear teeth wore down and the thing stopped spinning. It was an adventure just to figure out what exactly was wrong with it. Ended up being a total tear-down, too. Would have been much simpler if I hadn’t broken off the bolt that secures the rotor to the spider. Tried to get it out with those reversed drill bit thingies, but no luck. I said hell if I’m gonna pay a guy $95 just to tell me it will cost me $600 to fix.*
Total cost of parts: $150. Labor? Well… took me a day and a half, because, not being much of a handy person, I decided I would take it veeeerrrry sloooowwwwly.
Bought the parts on Amazon. Took a lot of pictures with my phone, downloaded the dismantling instructions, dialed up some You-Tube vids (very helpful, even though the models were slightly different), put all the screws in little compartments in a plastic organizer box and stuck little post-it notes in each one with a description. Struggled with difficult fasteners and wire harnesses and bladibladibla. But I effin’ did it! Big yawn to some of you I’m sure, but I just had to brag a little bit.
*I reckon that whatever they charge to do what I just did is probably a fair price, even though they could do it a lot quicker. Whether or not it should have broken in the first place is a different story.
Now I’m just waiting for the next thing to break. I am not afraid.
Thanks, flatlined! For me it really brings home the power of the Interwebs. I don’t know if I would have ever tried it if it weren’t for all of the resources out there that gave me some idea of what I was in for before I ever picked up a screwdriver.
Congratulations! Those tools on your bench? You just Paid for a good chunk of them!
Now, bonus points if you not only put all your tools back, but strip all the usable scrap (nuts, bolts, screws, strips of metal that can be drilled & used in other projects) and store that for your next (or 10th to next) project.
I am familiar with the sense of amazement that comes with tearing into something, guided only by an instruction manual and YouTube. A couple of months ago, I diagnosed and replaced the heating element in my dryer. Not nearly as impressive as rotor gear teeth, but still pretty darn amazing (to me, any way).
Ha! I considered basking in the glory and NOT putting my tools back right away, but I went ahead and did it anyway. The only thing left over was the old rotor, the spider (the thing that’s screwed to the drum and has the shaft to make it turn), and the broken bolt. Maybe some cool metal sculpture could come out of that.
Nice work! I’ve fixed my dryer before, but it was really simple. Seems every time a washer dies on me the water won’t spin out and I’ve got a full washer sitting there. Maybe it’s a similar issue? I always figured it was an entire motor replacement and it would be more than it was worth. If nothing else, I wussed out on digging that deep into the washer and needed one soon anyway so I went with convenience over repair.
That’s exactly how men become hoarders! My first husband was “handy” I don’t think we called a repairman for any thing for our entire marriage. (10 years)
He never threw anything away after a project.
When we split, I lived in the house until it was ready to sell.
The basement was so packed with “usable things” I had to hire someone with a BIG truck to haul it away. (I suspect it all ended up in his basement, he was “handy” too)
I don’t consider myself a hoarder (who actually admits to it?). But I do hang on to some stuff. There were actually some items that I had saved and never thought I would use that came in handy on this project, namely: zip ties.
There were only two things that I outright bought (besides parts) in order to complete–Loctite® thread locking fluid and those screw remover bits which kind of worked, but couldn’t finish the job–the main reason I had to take the whole thing apart rather than do an easy replacement. To be fair, the bolt was pretty big, and I think those bits are generally meant for fasteners that have a phillips or flat head.
Not a bad track record, considering that any given project, be it in the garden or painting or whatever, it usually requires several trips to the hardware store because some thing or other was forgotten.
And I don’t have too much difficulty throwing things away. The two big metal parts I could put out on the tree lawn and they would be gone in a day. A lot of scrap metal scavengers around here.
