At the end of every load there is a burning rubber smell and smoke coming from the tub

Washer Repair
1

Brand: Samsung
Model Number: WW22K6800A
Main Symptom: smoke smell coming from within the tub
What happens & when: After a spin cycle

I’ve only started looking into this issue this evening. My wife and my one daughter said they smelled a burning rubber smell and smoke came from the tub when they opened the door. My daughter also said she heard banging from it when she ran a load earlier in the day.

I just ran a rinse and spin cycle and smelt and saw the smoke from the drum/tub area when I opened the door, but didn’t hear any of the banging my daughter had described during the spin portion of the cycle. While the drum was spinning it did not appear to be spinning in an out of balance way, but there was still the smoke. There was also nothing in the cycle other than the water, so maybe if I added some towels and tested again it would present the banging during the high speed spin.

I initially suspected something had become lodged between the drum and tub, but my daughter’s observation of a lot of banging/noise leads me to believe it may be failed bearings and/or seal on the back drive shaft that’s allowing it to spin off-centre and rub the rubber front gasket or the plastic tub in some area. There only appears to be .125”-.25” free play between the front edge of the drum and the plastic tub. Is that too much or is it within spec and I should assume the bearings are fine?

I feel comfortable disassembling this but would like to know what parts I should be ordering to minimize downtime. We’re a house of myself and 6 other of my people who seem to do 3 loads each everyday with no more than 4 items per load. Needless to say I’m getting some heat here!

SOS!

2

Does the tub spin relatively easily by hand?

3

Yes it spins very easily, smoothly, and makes no unusual scraping or grinding noises.

4

That shouldn’t be the bearings or anything binding then, I’d check the belt and pulleys to see how worn they are.

5

I will be checking those things when I have a chance to take it apart this weekend, but I really doubt it’s them since I smell nothing until the front door is open and the smoke or rubber mist comes billowing out. I would think if it’s the belt melting or deteriorating, some of that smoke should be coming out of other vent holes in the housing, which doesn’t appear to be the case — it’s all coming internally from the sealed drum/tub.

6

Updating for future readers…

So I disassembled everything and it turns out it was the rear drum spider that two of the three arms had cracks in them. Running a test Rinse/Spin cycle didn’t show the issue because there was nothing in the drum to throw it out of balance, but a load of laundry would send it out of balance and cause the drum to hit the inside of the plastic tub. It was this abrasion that caused what I thought was smoke, but I think it was just very fine plastic dust that was scraped off the inside of the tub. After drying a load that caused the dust/smoke the smell was completely gone. If it had been smoke I think the smell would’ve stayed in the clothes.

I was able to find a replacement spider/driveshaft assembly and install it. Everything is back working again.

The areas of the tub where the drum was rubbing were not very deep so thankfully I didn’t have to replace the tub too.