Been looking for a cheap washer to get me started when I move in now I can get broadband.. ;-)
Seen one on Ebay that is local to me for £20.00 - says it needs a new spider? Assume that's the metal bit on the back of the drum.
Can I fix it myself if I get the part, they've quoted in the advert £97.00 to get it fixed.
I know it's not new but I don't want to shell out hundreds on a new machine for a couple of washes a week etc. when I could be buying diy materials. :-)
Mark S.
if you replace the spider, you should also replace the inner and outer bearings, and the seals - £97 dont sound bad if it includes labour, so I would consider the following:
A)Do you know what you are doing and might you find you have to replace other parts too, and B)Is it worth spending that kind of money on a machine whose history you do not know.
But then, what do I know, I only worked on washing machine development at Hoover for eight years!
I would say a non-working machine is worth nothing. You are saving the owner from having to cart it to the nearest tip/ditch/pond/layby. You certainly shouldn't be paying for the privilege. Might just be worth it if it's free or they are prepared to pay you to take it away.
97+20 = 117 plus agrravation
nuj
Bearings, seals and spider for my Hotpoint were about 20 quid from CPC.
Took a couple of hours and a bit of swearing...but still going fine several years later...
Not worth it in any way. It'll be old and knackered, you'll spend well over £100 on it and still have an old, knackered machine that works for a while then breaks.
Now if your post had read something like "my parents have an old machine which hasn't been abused too much but needs a new spider, should I take it for free", it might be a different story.
Really? Interesting.
So tell me, why is it Hoover make such crappy machines these days? ;-)
In message , Paper2002AD writes
Aha!!
Just as a matter of interest, I let a few flats and the Hotpoint machines vibrate like hell on any spin, whereas the Hoover are almost as smooth as silk.
Any ideas?
My current thoughts are that Hotpoint are crap, and I will never buy anything else from them. It might also be because you spent 8 years developing the Hoovers
You neveer seen a Hoover clasica then !!
Peter
I would also guess that if the spider has broken the bearings need replacing.
I've just replaced these parts on my washing machine (parts less than £20 from CPC). I took a few hours longer and there was probably a lot more swearing.
I got some clues about how to do it from instructions found reading the newsgroup archives at and from a Haynes Washing Machine manual[1] which was somewhat out of date (the copy I have is 12 years old). Instructions such as tap lightly to release shaft from bearing actually mean hit hard with a lump hammer.
{1] Don't bother buying the book unless it's 20p at a local boot sale. The book is well described at
Funny, my experience was different when I switched from a Hoover to a Hotpoint. The Hoover used a drum speed when draining out which was just fast enough to keep the cloths stuck to it at the top of the drum, so as the water level dropped, the cloths were evenly distributed around the drum, mostly. However, it had no check for this, and on occasions where it went wrong (like if everything else in the wash somehow got itself inside the pillowcase you put in), the Hoover would still go on to spin at top speed and dance across the kitchen floor.
The Hotpoint doesn't use this critical drum speed whilst draining, but instead, once drained out, slowly increases the drum speed with the intention of again getting the cloths evenly distributed by the stage it has got fast enough that the cloths are sticking to the drum without tumbling, and then switches to the spin speed. In my mind, this doesn't work quite as well as the Hoover method of doing this whilst draining the water, but the Hotpoint does use a means to measure the unbalance of the load in the drum. If it's too bad, the Hotpoint gives up, stops the drum and rotates it backwards a bit to break up the ball of cloths, and then tries again. It has up to 3 goes at getting the cloths evenly distributed, before going on to spin. If all 3 attempts fail, then it still goes on to spin, but will not take the spin up to the top spin speed (1400 RPM in mine -- I think it was slightly faster in later models).
Another machine I have experiance with is a Zanussi. This is much worse than either the Hotpoint or the Hoover. This drains out with the drum stationary, leaving the cloths in a clump at the bottom. Then it just starts spinning, with the load pretty much guaranteed not to be distributed around the drum.
None of these are new machines, and manufacturers may well have changed how their program cycles work. I would suspect some of the techniques may be (or may have been) protected by patents.
That's why I said "bearings, seal and spider"!
The only problem I had was that, as I was told, I wasn't hitting the old bearing hard enough!
Thanks for all the replies. :-)
The bearings have already been replaced it says.
New one it is then. ;-)
I'll get myself off to ebay to list a few notebooks then I can buy a halfway decent one, buy cheap buy twice...
My parents wreck their machines, the one they have now dances about and is very noisy and it's not that old.
Mark S.
It was OK when I left it, many years ago
Mind you, Hoover has for many years now been owned by Candy (all happened after my time)
In message , Mark S. writes
And I chucked one away last week which just needed a new bottom hose
I advertised it here a few months ago, free to a good home - no takers
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