The Washer...

Friday night, Sandra put a small load of laundry into the washer.  I was in the kitchen cooking when I heard what sounded like the motor going into overdrive.  "Nuts," I thought, "the pulley fell off again."  I unplugged the washer, opened the bottom panel, and took a look.  The pulley was nowhere to be found. Strange, when it falls off, it's usually sitting right underneath... Then I noticed something else: a whole lot of little, black, plastic shards, and all the way toward the back of the washer was what was left of the pulley!  Or at least what I thought was the entire pulley.  I looked at the belt, and it took was a bit ragged and cracked.  I figured both would need to be replaced, and I also figured I could do it myself.  Yes, I know, dangerous last words. 

Saturday morning, I looked up the washer information.  It was an Amana NAV3330EWW.  The website was good enough to list local parts suppliers, so I started calling them.  Everyone was closed on the weekends, and for some reason they all transferred to their cell phones ... so they could tell me they were closed till Monday.  One woman, though, was at home with access to the store's inventory!  I gave her the make and model of the washer, she gave me the part numbers for the pulley and the belt, and was able to verify that it was in stock!  Monday, during lunch, I walked the 3 blocks to pick up the two parts.  At roughly $50, the parts were non-returnable once opened.  :-/  They better work.

We went to the Giants game after work, so I didn't get started on the washer till a little after 10 PM.  I looked at the motor, the pulley lever, and the belt, and thought how nice it'd be if it could all just come out.  It turned out that's what I needed to do to replace either the pulley or the belt!  Four bolts held the motor in.  They were easy to remove (bad sign), then the motor took a little finesse to take out.  I left the electrical cords connected, since I had unplugged the washer from the wall.  I also had to disconnect the two hoses (get a towel because water will come out even if the water is shut off).  I had to remove the top part of the motor - three screws - to replace the belt.  If you're doing this, make sure you make a mental note of how the belt is run.  I didn't, so I did it twice. 

The new pulley, I noticed, had a brass interior.  The one that kept falling out of my washer didn't.  I thought it was an improvement - false.  It was that the plastic disconnected from the brass, and that's why it kept falling off!  Removing the brass fitting form the pulley lever was a pain.  It has a clip very similar to the clip that holds the chain to the speed bag in the garage, but much smaller and harder to remove.  I used a set of needle nosed pliers to slowly and forcefully open the clip then slide it over the pulley lever.  It took me about 9 attempts to get this right.  In the process, I once pushed a little too hard, resulting in the pliers pinching my finger.  What's a little DIY without blood, right?  Once it was off, I noticed how stiff it all was.  I put lithium grease inside the new pulley, and greased the washers.  This assembly was really easy to put back together. 

The plastic cover went back on smoothly.  Getting everything back into the washer was a little harder.  I ended up lifting the bucket from inside the machine to make more room on the bottom.  This allowed me to put the motor back easily.  Getting the holes to line back up to bolt it back - not so easy.  I think this literally took me about 45 minutes, all the while I thought this was due to the time I moved it from upstairs, and it hare-goshi'ed me.  I was so frustrated that I thought about calling a repairman, just to rebolt the motor.  What I ended up doing was putting a 45 pound Olympic weight on the bucket to hold it down, then lifting the motor and manually screwing in the top two bolts as much as I could.  The bottom still didn't align!  I could forcibly lift the motor and get the right side in, but the left side was about 1/2 an inch off!  I kept thinking I bent it when I removed it.  I needed a lever or jack of some sort to hold this dang thing up just to get a good angle!  What I ended up using was a hammer head!  It was pretty much perfect to bracing the bracket and leveraging the motor up.  With all the bolts in, I grabbed a wrench and tightened them even more - as much as I could.  I reconnected the hoses, closed it all up, plugged it in, then made a note of the time: 12:18 AM.  Great, roughly two hours had gone by.  This better work.  To test it, I put the bloodied towel and laundry room rug in.  IT WORKED!  Not only did it work, but the spin cycle worked so well that both items were damn near dry!  Not bad for my first time!  I should moonlight as a repairman!

Door Knob Lifesaver!

I managed to remove the handle to the exterior door in the laundry room today.  I was going to replace it this morning, but I ran into a hiccup - the plate on the door wouldn't come off!  There is a little thing that moved, but I pushed it in and nothing happened.  Given my propensity to exert too much force on things (and break them), I decided to just hold off for a bit to Google this situation.

I came across a blog that had a perfect description of what I needed!  I'm a bit anxious to go home and try it.  Maybe at lunch...

How to Remove a Door knob that has no screws.

I'm trying to just put something in that's newer... and works.  I think I picked up something like this:

Repairing the Laundry Room Ceiling (3)

This was one of the three holes the contractors cut into my ceiling for shits and giggles. They ended up cutting into my sisters walls to do what they had to do, since they couldn't reach through my ceiling. WTF, right?!

One last layer of compound with plaster of paris did it. It's all smoothed out and looks fine. I guess I have to paint this room now to make that square go away. Crap.

Repairing the Laundry Room Ceiling (2)

The hole in the laundry room ceiling is pretty confusing. Not only is it oddly shaped, but it has a beam and two walls around it. I decided to screw down a piece of plywood above the hole, and cut to fit some purple board into the hole. This hole was really deep, so the 5/8 inch purple board fit well here.



I wanted to make sure this was sealed well, so before putting in the purple board, I puttied the edges of the holes to close up all the gaps. I also put joint compound on the backside of the purple board before screwing it to the piece of wood. Satisfied that it was all there, I used the rest of the joint compound for the edges and screw holes.

Laundry Room Cabinets

Sandra thinks the laundry room cabinets need to be more like shelves. She's been reading all these design blogs, and it's a minimalist thing, I guess. I agreed with it somewhat, and let her be in charge of the project. She'll be removing the cabinet doors to the bottom cabinet, sanding it down, and refinishing it somehow.

Here's how it looks now:


She ended up removing the doors, but I forgot to take a picture of it without the doors. I'll do so and upload one. The hinges were painted over, so she had to chisel the paint out in order to get to the screws to remove them. She filled the screw holes with wood bondo.

Repairing the Laundry Room Ceiling

The holes in the back bedroom were now dry enough to texture. I used my 45/Plaster of Paris mixture and a roller to apply texture to the back walls. The back bedroom is now done and ready for paint! Too bad we're using it to store tools...

Remember when my sister's contractors cut holes in my ceiling? Since I finished closing up the holes and texturing the walls in the back bedroom, the kitchen was the newest project.

Today, I cut and secured plywood behind the holes. Since this whole area opened up directly into Michelle's kitchen, I decided to completely cover the holes with the plywood.

I had to cut this hole in the laundry room bigger, since the plaster was already separated from the lathe, and the area around it was sagging.

I had to cut the lathe as well, since it was the end of a piece.
I forgot to take pictures of the holes in the kitchen with just the wood in it, but it looked pretty much the same. There's one hole that hasn't been closed yet. It's the one above the fridge. Michelle's gas line hasn't been secured yet, so I'll let them take care of that before I close up that hole.

I couldn't use the pieces of drywall that had been up previously (the ones cut out when the hoes were created), because they were just regular drywall! The cut outs had already begun to grow mold, so I've tossed them out.

Sandra finished applying primer in the front room.