Dear OzBargainers,
I have been using a top loading washing machine for many years. It is now out of warranty and broken.
Strictly speaking, it still washing clothes but doesn't perform the 'rinse' step at the end. ie the water remains in the washing machine after the way. I've been manually siphoning it out for the past week :(
Can anyone please recommend me how, or who can fix it ? It would also help greatly if you can recommend me a solid washing machine that you have experience with.
Cheers.
Definitely, unless you want to have a crack at repairing yourself it just isn't worth it.
I ended up getting a near new front loader off Gumtree which cost the call out fee of a repairman. Still going strong 2 years later.
Did you google your model and see if there any manuals online ?
Have you checked any filters? They should be cleared occasionally.
The owners book should show them?
Some machines (fisher and pakel for eg) perform better if you run an empty cycle about every 5th wash.
what brand and model number is your machine? instead of using the wash cycle, you can try to use the drain/rinse cycle only (?problem with the knob/ program keyboard). re new machine, will get a front loader - save water, energy and laundry liquid. my preference is electrolux - only one cold water inlet for warm washing.
It sounds like the little drain pump has expired.
Many years ago, our Simpson top loader had this problem. Fortunately, there was a council collection in our area and I found a similar Simpson model a few doors up from us.
At the bottom rear-left corner is where that pump was located (not sure if it's still the same, this was late 90s). Anyway I salvaged the part (it was identical) so I fitted it to ours.
Problem solved. I ended up selling that to a friend who used it for ten years before he sold it.
More recently, the Samsung 8750LSW 7.5kg front-loader has been good to us. Two years, at least 200 cycles later it's going well. A quick search here will reveal some good deals on this machine — easily under $400.
As a temporary measure you could reset the machine back to the wash pump out section followed by the final spin.
I have found a company called Statewide useful for spare parts of various electrical appliances too; can be expensive, but if you carry out the repair yourself you are stll ahead. Temporarily I switched the "hot" inlet hose to the "cold" and made the machine setting show "hot." Ilpd a faulty inlet valve repaired by a technician 5 years ago; still going strong. It helped that I recognized the faulty part and coukd get a quote from the techniciab.
I had a similar problem with my Samsung toploader a few years back… At first I thought it was the filters (chock-a-block with snot), that didn't work, then I pulled the back off and had a look at the pump, and a piece of plastic of some sort had made its way in there and was jamming it, pulled that out and it's performed good as gold since :) might be worth poking around a bit yourself?? (PLEASE unplug it from the power point first:)
Honestly, given the cost of labour & difficulty finding reliable repair folk nowadays, IMHO just cut your losses & shell out for a new one…I've seen them around for ~$300 for small top loaders (my preference) or ~$400 for front loaders.