Washer fills and drains and spins just fine. But it doesn’t agitate. "Lid" and "check" switches are good. When drive belt coming off motor is manually rotated in one direction, the agitator and tub spin just fine. When drive belt is manually rotated in the other direction, agitator moves as it should, first in one direction and then the other, making me think the transmission is working. From all this, I conclude that the motor is not reversing as it should, although it turns in one direction just fine. Is there a straightforward way to test this, for example, manually direct power to the motor through the yellow or blue or red or black wires going into it? On the other hand, maybe it’s clear from the above description that the main switch used to set the duration of washing and permanent vs regular washing needs replacing?
thanks…
Check the water level pressure switch. In full position, it applies neutral for motor operation during agitation. You can jump it out as a test, jump pressure switch white wire to yellow wire.
Eric
My water level pressure switch has white and gray wires to one terminal, brown to another, and yellow to a third terminal. I have the washer filling with water. The yellow wire is 120V and the white/gray wires have no voltage. When I jump the yellow to the white/gray wires, there is no movement in the motor. Would it help to put 120V directly across the appropriate wires at the motor? Can one direction of the motor stop working although the other direction works just fine?
Does the motor hum after it fills or when you jump the pressure switch?
Eric
No motor hum when I jump the yellow to the white/gray wires. But I observed some other interesting behavior… If I allow the machine to go through its cycle, as the tub is filling, the yellow line is hot (120V). Then, when the wash cycle starts, the brown wire goes hot and the yellow goes to zero (no humming of the motor at this point; it’s just sitting there and not running). About halfway through the wash cycle, the brown wire drops to 40V and the yellow remains at zero. Then, through the rinse and spin cycle, the brown wire alternates between 40V and 120V at about one and two minute intervals. (I have a wiring schematic that I’m beginning to understand. Do you have/need a copy?) I’ve also been monitoring the five wires going to the motor switch/motor. I see that, during the fill cycle, they are all at 120V (motor is not turning and is not supposed to be turning at this point). Then, throughout the rest of the entire cleaning cycle, these wires remain at 120V (and the motor remains motionless) except for the last few moments when the motor starts turning the tub for the final drain. At this point, the red and yellow wires leading to the motor switch/motor drop to about zero volts and the other three remain at 120V. (Do you know which wires should be at 120V and which at zero volts to make the motor run in the opposite direction… which would drive the agitator?) I’m beginning to strongly suspect the cycle switch (for dialing in the minutes of wash and regular vs permanent cycles) is not sending proper signals to the motor. Sorry for the length of this note… but I’ve been doing a lot of playing with the machine…
The motor uses the same windings for agitate direction as it does for spin direction, the only difference is the polarity of power to the start winding is reversed via timer contacts 2 and 4. This causes the motor to start in the opposite direction. Once the motor gets up to speed, the start winding is switched out of circuit by the centrifugal switch. In agitate, you should have 120vac at motor wires black, white, yellow and near zero volts at red and blue. If you have 120vac on the motor red wire during agitate and the timer is advancing, then it looks like timer contact 6 is not closing during agitate but is during spin and you would need to replace the timer.
http://www.appliancepartspros.com/whirlpool-timer-22001530-ap4026841.html
The reason you are reading 120vac on all motor wires and pressure switch yellow wire during fill is because the circuit is not complete, and thus no voltage drop, until the pressure switch goes to the full position. In spin mode, the pressure switch is bypassed by timer contact 10.
Eric
BINGO! Contact 6 is indeed malfunctioning! Good work!
I just ordered a new timer from appliancepartspros.com. In the meantime, I disassembled mine and can see a combination of scorching and partially melted contacts at the #6 position. I also used a continuity tester to determine that the other functions of the timer were working fine, and, since I largely understand the wiring diagram now, I electrically removed the motor from the washer system and applied appropriate voltages and found that it ran just fine in forward and reverse directions.
Thanks so much for the help. This is a great service…
Final note… I received the new timer last week and installed it and cleaned up all the tools that were lying all over the place… and now we have a washing machine that’s working great!
Thanks again!