Hi everyone. My husband & I are attempting to fix our dryer. It is a Roper & the model # is rex5634kq1. I read a previous post about this model but we are still uncertain of a few things. He is a diesel mechanic & has never worked on a dryer so bare with us haha. It spins but will not heat so we’re guessing the problem is the heating element or thermal fuse? Just basing this off some of the stuff we’ve read. We checked all the breakers going to it. It is plugged in :p. We have removed the heating element & checked the ohm’s for it. It was at 10 ohms. We are unable to locate the thermal fuse. I have searched for a diagram but so far I have not come across one. Any direction or help is much appreciated.
Here is your diagram.
Replacement parts for WHIRLPOOL REX5634KQ1 | AppliancePartsPros.com
There are two thermo fuses on the side of the heating element case.
There is also a white plastic like thermo fuse on the back of the blower housing.
Thanks so much, the diagram helped him quite a bit. To be sure we’re testing correctly…what ohms do the heating element, thermostats, & thermal fuse need to be? So far the heating element tests at 10, he has to test the others tomorrow. I really appreciate your help, we just spent 150 to fix our fridge & we’re broke. I guess this is appliance break down month haha.
10 ohms sounds about right for the heating element. Any good thermo fuse or thermostat should read around 0 ohms or shorted. If the thermo fuse is bad it will be open and you won’t have any reading.
You may want to check your power.
The motor will run on half the line but the heating element requires the full 240 volts.
Just because a breaker looks OK does not mean that the unit is getting power.
Try flipping the breaker off/on slowly a couple times, sometimes you can loose half the line without actually tripping the breaker.
If this does nothing, check the voltage at the plug
L1 to L2 should be 240 volts
L1 to Neutral and L2 to Neutral, both should be 120 volts.
If OK
Unplug the unit and check the wires at the terminal strip in the machine to make sure none are loose or burned out
If OK
Check the power at the terminal strip.
[COLOR=“Red”]Be careful as 240 volts is lethal !!! [/COLOR]
Thanks for all your help. The only thing he doesn’t understand is what are L1 & L2…is there a simpler way to put it? Sorry we’re both in our early 20’s & have never done anything like this before. Thank you SO much for your time!
He says on the thermo fuse he is getting about .6 ohms. On the thermostat he is getting about 1.5 ohms on both. Also…from the green wire to the black & red wire it is 123.5 volts. From the white wire to the black & red its the same. We have flipped the breakers multiple times. Not sure if this helps?
L1 and L2 explanation.
They are the power sides of the line with a common Neutral (White).
It is alternating current.
So L1 (Black) to Neutral is 120 volts and L2 (Red) to Neutral is 120 volts but they are 180 degrees out of phase
Basically when L1 is at positive 120 volts, L2 is at negative 120 volts so if you measure L1 to L2 you should get 240 volts.
240 volts is what is used to power the heating element.
So measure Black to Red.
When using a meter, it is a good idea to short the meter leads together as there may be a 0 offset. In other words a 0.6 reading may actually be 0 ohms.
Also a good idea to disconnect one side of any device you are reading as this prevents reading an alternate /parallel circuit path.
When checking thermostat use the most sensitive scale on the meter.
He claims he gets 120 when he puts black & neutral together. And 120 when he puts red & neutral together…but when he puts the 2 prongs on black & red he gets zero. I have no idea :-/
OK he is on the right track.
You are missing one side of the line.
The reason he sees 120 on both sides is that the side that is good is feeding voltage through components and so you see it on both black and red.
Where is he measuring?
If measuring at the wall receptacle then you have an electrical problem.
Probably one of the breakers is toast.
If measuring at the machine, measure it at the wall receptacle with the machine unplugged.
If he gets 240 at the wall receptacle then there could be a problem with the unit’s power cord.
With the unit unplugged and using resistance (ohms) check each of the connectors from the plug end to the terminal strip in the machine.
Use the most sensitive ohms setting.
All of them should be 0 ohms.
Ok, he works nights at the 24 hour Freightliner dealership here so he’s at work tonight. When he gets home in the morning (between 8 & 10am) I will read him your recent post & let you know ASAP. Sorry to ask so many questions, I can’t thank you enough for your help!
Do not worry about asking questions.
I get a kick out of helping people and it is better to ask then just continue blindly.
At one time we all had to ask questions so this is sort of like a pay back.
He was originally measuring from the point the cord connects to the back of the machine itself. Apparently the prongs on the multimeter are not long enough to get a reading in the wall receptacle. So we took the cover off the outlet & it appears the black wire is loose & or disconnected from the receptacle. He thinks he can reconnect it but would of course want to cut all the power to the house first. We rent but our landlord is not so pleasant so we avoid contacting him unless we have to. What is the ground to complete the circut when you put the black & the red together to test for 240? He checked all the wires to the plug, and they read zero.
[COLOR=“Blue”]What is the ground to complete the circut when you put the black & the red together to test for 240?[/COLOR]
If I understand the question then there is no ground as far as current flowing in the circuit. Current flows between the black (L1) and the red (L2).
Neutral (ground) is only for 120 volts circuits.
Ok, he was just curious he said. I guess we’ll cut the power when he wakes up (he just got in from a 14 hour shift) & try to connect the black wire. I’ll let you know if we have any luck after that. Thanks again.
My husband decided he didn’t want to make anything worse by messing with the wire, we also suspected that was just part of the problem as one of the breakers was hard to flip. We contacted the landlord & had to wait for him to send an electrician. Someone finally came out today. The black wire was disconnected so he fixed that & also said the breaker was bad as well. The dryer starts & HEATS…so glad we didn’t go buy another one because we really didn’t have the extra cash so close to Christmas. Thank you SO much for all your help Denman, I felt like we could do some trouble shooting on our own because we had someone to advise us! Merry Christmas to you & yours.
Glad to hear that you are up and running.
And thanks for getting back to us. Now when others search for a similar problem they will see what actually worked instead of just suggestions about what could be the cause.
Have a happy holiday season.
CHECK OUTLET TERMINALS - THEY MAY BE LOOSE After taking apart the dryer and testing all the parts, it turned out to be one loose terminal in the outlet, so the dryer was only getting 120V so it would turn on and spin, but no heat. I SHUT OFF AND REMOVED THE DRYER BREAKERS FIRST 220V WILL KILL YOU SO BE CAREFUL TO SHUT OFF ALL POWER*** I bent the terminal closer with needle nose pliers and now it’s heating fine. I also replaced all of the breakers before checking the outlet, hindsight is 20/20!
This is the cheapest thing to try before replacing breakers, wires, outlets, and dryer parts for a “no heat” issue with dryer.