Hey all. Our Drier, which is a Kenmore series 80, just died. Based on the melted plastic smell coming from the back, and from the fact that it died after a couple of failed attempts to rev it with the starter button, I’m guessing it’s the motor that’s died on us. I’m also thinking it might be worth trying to replace that, since the cost of a new motor is a lot lower than the cost of a new drier.
Does anyone have experience trying to replace a drier motor? Is this an achievable goal, and if so, any tips on how I should go about it?
There’s a ton of YouTube’s with things to check. Thermal fuse being one of the most common. Is the lint trap and vent pipe clear of lint ? Get that long attachment on your vacuum and see if you can suck anything out of either. If you find a good bit of lint that leads to the thermal fuse being more likely. (It’s a bit of wire encased in some plastic, so burning plastic smell wouldn’t be surprising.
Thank you all for the advice and the help. I’m not sure at this point what exactly was wrong with the drier, but I took the back off, found and tested the fuse (which still worked), dusted the lint out of the back and closed it up, and now it works. Why does it work? I do not know, but the important thing is that I don’t have to set up a drying line in my house.
The random build of of Lint can catch on fire. Build up in the air flow pathway causes the air flow to slow down. This air flow is important to move the heat from the heating element to the drum chamber. Thus the buildup is lowering its ability to cool the heating elements down. Any build up can ignite when it gets too hot. The bigger the build up, the slower the air and the more it is over-heating. So there are sensors to detect these conditions. This is typical and is likely to occur just out of warranty. But is often considered general maintenance.
Thermal fuse is what killed my Kenmore dryer a few years ago. There’s a place in Lansing called Electric Appliance parts (on Cedar St.) that had one in stock. It was pretty inexpensive too.