57/58 frigidaire DW-DUZ repairs

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Patrick/Pdub - thanks for the suggestion. I called them and they looked at the motor. It needs to be re-wound which would cost $450. Thats seems reasonable considering the time he'd have to put into it.

Before committing to this, as its moderately crazy, I thought id ask if folks have parts or places to contact regarding replacement motors that i could simply swap out? I can't imagine anyone is sitting on a NOS motor or has a late 50s Frigidaire dishwasher laying around to part out....but figured it can't hurt to ask.
 
$450 to rewind the motor seems steep, but that's just me.

I'm sure these motors aren't just sitting on shelves anymore but it may pay to look around just in case.

Maybe give these people a call without mentioning your first price quote and ask what they would charge for repair. I also checked with Conrey once and they were very helpful. It's always good to get more than one quote!

 
I’m crazy cuz I had the motor rewound…..

Never did find a replacement motor so I went with Patrick’s recommendation. They took a couple months but considering the price I was in no hurry 🤪. He might have charged me the “I don’t want to do this price”, but I will say he did a very nice job, was very nice, and I get he needs to charge real prices to stay in business. I just mounted the motor and did a dry run - she came to life! Now that the the motor wasn’t shorting everything, The switch light came on, and after testing no current was passing thru to the cabinet I cycled thru the cycles and I could see and hear the drain valve opening/ closing. After turning the knob back to off I opened it up and the element had been heating too!

There are some minor repairs such as rust, gaskets etc but I’m pleased at the moment. I think the next test will be to hook it up to water. I am worried the motor shaft gasket will leak but I’ll cross that bridge soon. If I can get it fully operational then I’ll start to focus on the cosmetic stuff.
 
That's great news Christopher. I want to take a Frigidaire Unimatic washer motor in to have rewound and I too am expecting the price of a rewind to be much higher than when I had an Apex dishwasher motor rewound about 15 years ago.

Hopefully your shaft seal is good, there should be a generic number on that seal.
 
I worked at a television station in various roles over the years including Master Control, operating the satellite truck and equipment maintenance. Toward the end I was put in charge of building maintenance. I had many HVAC fan motors go bad and decided to have them rebuilt as they were real unicorns due to the voltage and mounting brackets. Most places won't touch a fractional horsepower motor (such as these or the one in a dishwasher) but I found a place in California, Eurton Electric. What you were charged was right in line with what we were charged for the HVAC motors, so don't feel like you overpaid. Just my 2 cents worth.
 
That’s good to know, thank you Valvadhon. Makes me feel better :)

So I boiled water and poured that into the motor based on past reads that it can help to soften up the old gasket under the impeller. It definitely helped, I can’t tell if it’s leaking (from there at least ) anymore so that is drastic improvement. It was very evident for the first 60 seconds that it was leaking.

Next problem - it leaked elsewhere at gaskets and bolt threads. I might use the yellow pipe dope which doesn’t seem to harden and has worked great on thread drinking water pipe. I’m all ears if others have a non silicone / ruins it forever suggestions!

I also realized I forget to tighten a motor- carrying bolt! Silly me. Well I tightened it and it just snapped. I’ll extract it on another day as I am not in the mood. However I need to replace that specially bolt. I’d ideally replace all three since they’re rusty but I’m guessing they’re rare/ not made anymore. Sooo…. Anyone have an extra they could spare/ sell? Thx - Christopher

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Edit to last post - shaft seal is leaking. I’m just going to take it back to the motor shop as they mentioned that they might have some better equipment to remove the impeller with. What kind of gasket should go in? Would they have that or do I need to procure that in advance because it’s unusual?
 
When you say the shaft seal is leaking, how do you know it is the shaft seal? Is water dripping out from the bottom of the motor or down the sides of the motor?

These Frigidaire dishwashers use an impeller that is threaded onto the motor shaft, but according to the manual it is a left-hand thread which means turns clockwise to remove.

The shaft seal is shown here with a red box around it...

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Water did appear initially at the bottom of the motor, however that’s mostly stopped from what I can tell. I noticed that the actual drain tube had rust/ salts in the bottom half indicating that it’s drained a lot of leaking water in the past. I cleaned out the drain hole with a small bristle brush and dislodged/ cleaned out some crud. It now flows freely when I put water in the impeller hole and out thru the drain hole. Happy that it’s now exiting thru the correct hole but it does mean the seal is shot! ( or something else is going on!)
 
Here is what I have

I have this motor/pump/timer assembly from a dishmobile that I stripped down to keep my pristine custom imperial undercounter spin-tube in operation for many more years.

If one of the bolts of this will work for you, just point to the one you want and I will mail it to you

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I appreciate it but those just look like regular bolts, that I could just get at a hardware store. Has me thinking that could work if I stack some washers on there to tighten against the various motor upper plate and tub parts. Thanks for the creative solution :)

Not related to the bolt: trying to fix the leak. I have the motor out, shaft off, impeller off, washer off. Wonder what I should do regarding the pump seal. Even if I can remove it, I’m not clear what it looks like or if replacements are available. WRT replacing the washer, what type of washer should I use? The old one looked like a black rubber washer. Thx
 
Can you take a photo of the washer you're referring to and the seal once you get it out? I would examine the seal for any crack in the rubber bellows part of the seal, if all is okay it may be leaking between the pump housing and the outer section of the seal. A little bit of cleaning and fresh silicone may solve that if that is where it is leaking from. Gentle cleaning of the sealing rings may help as well.
 
Posted pictures. Notice there was a small metal washer on the shaft per diagram. When I disassembled, it also looked like the metal washer / O ring had with a rubber washer stacked under it, AND that there was a larger rubber washer very imbedded into the plate. The diagram above only shows one rubber washer, so I am thinking that, perhaps my one washer has disintegrated and broken into what appears to now be two washers of different diameter. Not surprising seeing as the impeller and shaft are spinning very tightly against the washer to maintain a watertight seal doesn’t seem to be the best design as eventually I would assume it would tear. I tried to point out the larger diameter rubber washer with a screwdriver.

What I remain unclear about is what the pump seal is. It does look like there is a metal piece that is pressed into the hole with the coiled spring seen in the picture, but I have no way of pulling it out and I’m not sure what good that would do. It seems like the rubber washer is the primary water barrier. But would appreciate feedback or suggestions!

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It looks like the bronze washer on the impeller is identical to the washer used on the Pulsamatic/Multimatic/Rollermatic pumps, the 5433973 "Washer - Pump seal", and boot seal assembly looks similar to a standard dishwasher seal.

If there was a way to convert the bronze washer over a ceramic washer, I wouldn't be surprised if a seal for a KitchenAid 15-21 series pump would fit in the motor housing.

GM Frigidaire did have a conversion kit for these, that would update the washer to ceramic, and updated the impeller as well (full conversion kit - 6591902, last updated seal assembly was 6597961).

Ben

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What’s the point of the conversion kit? Isn’t this simply replacing the washer ( so bronze to ceramic)? Doesn’t seem like much of a conversion unless I’m missing something. Did the new ceramic washer require a different diameter and thus the impeller needed to have a different diameter? Thx - Christopher
 
Well, I figured it out at least. The pump seal was basically for lack of a better term a rubber condom that went around the spring, and its ring like base and was held very snuggly around and fully encapsulated the piece. So this point I am taking suggestions for flexible soft material that is waterproof, and can take abuse/ doesn’t tear easily. Perhaps a pool liner?

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