Our Whirlpool washer has a sensor that makes sure the lid is closed before it will start the spin cycle between wash and rinse, and again for the final spin after rinse. The part of the sensor’s housing where the two screws were - the ones that held it in place - have both broken over the course of time. My husband tried to fix them with epoxy, but the fix kept failing.
We wired the lever into the down position (there is a stub on the lid of the washer that goes through a hole, then pushes down a lever - that completes the circuit and tells the washer it’s OK to spin), but in the course of doing that, the unit broke open.
Since it’s just completing a circuit, and since it was ‘well broken’, we just stripped them back a little and connected the two wires together with a wire nut and then covered the entire thing in electrical tape. It seems to work just fine…but my husband is worried that it could overheat or something and burn the house down. I am thinking that since the circuit was complete any time the lid was down anyway, this is basically the same, and the only feature we’ve lost is that someone could open the lid during a spin cycle and that might not be safe. There is no one here that would do that, so I don’t have big concerns.
Still, I told him I would come and ask - is our repair OK, considering it’s an older washer? He said he would be more comfortable if I unplug it when it’s not in use. That is easy enough to do (there is easy access to the plug), but I think there will be times I forget. Comments appreciated - thanks.
