Loud bang from clothes dryer...

[Fiber Optic]

I purchased my Whirpool dryer new from Sears about 5 years ago. It works well, except that while running, it emanates a fairly loud BANG every 20 minutes. It's electric. It did this in my previous home, moved, and does it the same in my new home. So I think I can rule out electrical problems. It has good ventilation, and I also clean out the dust filter.

The sound is muffled inside the metal structure, and is similar to a large piece of metal popping from expansion. I thought this was the reason but it does this about 3 times during a drying session.

Also, I noticed there is an area near the top of the dryer in the back that is turning black as if a lot of heat is back there, which is reasonable since it gets hot while running.

I never run major appliances while not home, except the fridge of course.

Any experience this?

Thanks, Chris

[Nehmo Sergheyev]

- Fiber Optic -

- Nehmo - Run it on "Fluff Dry" (no heat). See if it still bangs. Report back.

[B©©B]

Stop leaving bullets in your pants pockets when you do laundry. The heat in the dryer makes them fire. One of these days someone is gonna get killed from one of them.

You really should shut off the fridge when you go away. You never know when one might explode and splatter milk and eggs all over the kitchen.

B©©B

[jeff]

Hi,

Model#?

That certainly *sounds* ( no pun intended ) like metal expanding and contracting making that bang noise....the hard part is being there or having enough of the dryer apart when the noise happens to see what is doing this....cabinet, back wall bulk head, element casing, back panal, ect.

jeff Appliance Repair Aid

[Terry]

Chris: The suggestion by Nehmo to run on 'Fluff'; that is with the 'heater' not electrically heating IMO is a good one. It might be a heater coil touching something inside. However it may no be conclusive. (The other end of a broken heater may/will also be live?) Recently I helped a neighbour fix their dryer. It has two heating coils that get red hot. One of the coils had broken about two thirds around, so they were only getting half the heat from the other intact coil. It was only a matter of chance that the point at which that heater had broken did not permit the broken end of the coil to hang down and touch the metal frame! We had an electric wall heater that gave off a similar 'bang'. Some years later when it was necessary to move the wall heater we found a live wire inside had touched off the metal enclosure and then burnt off. This might be similar! Terry. PS In light of some recent questions about whether a neutral wire can/should also be used a GROUND this kind of possibility illustrates how important it is to have a distinct and separate ground wire back to the main house panel ground!