Dryer Motor On The Way Out?

[Greg]

All,

Just tried to dry a load of laundry in my '97 Whirpool dryer only to discover that my dryer drum was not rotating. I heard a hum and shut things down.

Upon investigation I found the following things:

1. Belt was not broken.
2. All wheels turned freely
3. Motor turned freely*

After vacuuming all of the lint/dust... I reconnected the door switch to check if the motor would turn without a load (i.e. the belt attached). Nogo... at first.

• I "helped" the motor turn and cleaned up a bit more lint. The motor now seems to turn more freely. It is always rotating now (w/o a load) when I start things up.

Question:

Can I get away with lubing things up and hope for the best or am I looking at a motor and/or start capacitor replacement?

Many thanks!

Greg [e-mail]

[Appliance Repair Aid]

Hi,

Normally no capacitors in a dryer motor circuit. Certainly -sounds- like a motor going sour! :(

jeff. Appliance Repair Aid

[~^Johnny^~]

[meirman]

In alt.home.repair on Tue, 26 Jul 2005 13:34:09 -0500 Greg posted:

[Greg]

-snip-

Thanks for the follow-ups. I believe the problem may have fixed itself after using compressed air and vacuuming out everything. With and without the drum (even with a load in the dryer) attached... I can't get the motor to bind up again. Hopefully I bought myself a little more time with this dryer. :-)

Best.

Greg

[anoldfart2]