SUN CITY WEST, Ariz. — Laundromats are packed with many machines, each of which has many parts that will eventually fail. All told, there are probably thousands of parts in a typical self-service laundry.
Let’s take a look at the most common failures, the reasons behind them, and what can be done to not only diagnose and fix them, but to slow down their frequency.
COMMON DRYER FAILURES
Since most common washer failures are water-related, it makes sense that the most common dryer failures are heat-related: no heat, not enough heat, a motor overheating … and for fun, I’ll throw in the infamous “dryer is making a slow, scraping noise.”
“My Dryer’s Not Hot” — I wish I had a dollar for every time I saw a customer with their hand on the dryer door as they yelled that across my store.
You come over and put your hand on the door glass to confirm. Yep! No heat. You open the door to feel the basket fins, because sometimes customers don’t give the dryer enough time to heat the door glass before panicking.
You inspect the firebox, or stove, as it’s sometimes called, and see no flames. There are three common causes for this: 1) there’s no power to the heat circuit, 2) spark plug is grounding out, or 3) you have a bad ignitor box.
If there’s no power to the heat circuit, only the drum will turn. There will be no flames, no spark.
Check the airflow switch. It may be out of adjustment or, more likely, your dryer needs to be thoroughly cleaned of lint from the screen all the way out the exhaust pipe. The airflow switch is an important safety to shut off the flames when there’s not enough airflow, so never disable or bypass it. It’s basically warning you to clean out all the lint.
Some dryer models will have an additional safety in the heat circuit: the motor’s internal centrifugal switch. The motor must be spinning to allow its switch to close and complete the heat circuit. This can also fail due to lint getting inside the motor, building up to the point that it can block the switch from closing.
Since the switch is usually located right inside the motor’s air vents, you may be able to blast the lint out of the motor with a blow gun attached to a good air compressor. Doing this on a routine basis will also help prevent your motors from overheating.
If you see a spark going from the spark plug to the sheet metal of its mount, then the plug is either bad or it’s mounted too far from the gas burner. On some models, you can bend the plug a little closer to the gas jets, but sometimes the plug itself will go bad, such as a crack in its insulating porcelain.
If you see a spark that’s arcing properly between its two points with no grounding but the flames aren’t coming on, then the problem is most likely the ignitor box. Swap it out with a known good one to confirm. It’s also not a bad idea to swap out the spark wire as well.
Lastly, the coils on a gas valve can go bad over time and will not be strong enough to lift the spring-loaded plungers inside to allow the gas to flow. As a safety, the valves have two plungers, both of which must be lifted. It’s best to change both coils. Aside from the plungers, a faulty gas valve is very rare.
If you hear a slow, scraping sound, a nail or a screw has probably poked its way through a hole in the basket and is scraping the outer drum. Address this as soon as possible. I’ve seen those things scrape a hole in the drum!
These things get bent over in the basket holes and become stuck. Turn the drum so the nail is facing the lint screen under the basket. Then you just open the lint compartment and wiggle the nail to loosen it. It should come right out.
So in conclusion, many, but not all, equipment failures are related to a lack of required maintenance, especially when lint is involved. When in doubt as to what to do in response and when, refer to your equipment’s maintenance manuals.
Also, keep in mind that when you suspect a part is bad, you have the advantage of identical machines to compare with. Many times, simply swapping out the bad part with a known good one from another machine will lead you to success.
Have a question or comment? E-mail our editor Bruce Beggs at [email protected].
