Been Frigged yet?

[stainfighter]

re: control panel...

our 2001 FWT647GHSO doesn't have as nearly as a nice control panel. Wish they had not done away w/the e/o/signal buzzer. Ours could wake the dead!!! It holds a LOT of clothes and wish that the dryer could do it all in one load. Unfortunately it usually cannot. IMHO if I do a full load (w/ just a fist of room at the top) we have to break the finished load into two dryer loads. Probably going to be on the prowl to replace it with a larger cu ft dryer. This is only I think a 5.7 cf which isn't enough for a full load.

 

[sudsmaster]

Stainfighter,

You could probably disconnect the buzzer. It might even be possible to add a volume control for it, either permanently set to a lower level, or via an extra knob on the control panel. I think what you'd want is a 25 watt variable resistor - the kind that's wire wound with a ceramic core.

Or you could order a replacement control from one of the online parts web sites, and then wire that into your machine (you'd have to drill a hole in control panel to mount it, of course).

My White-Westinghouse gas dryer is pretty much the same design as the Frigmore dryers. When I got it, I wasn't worried about capacity so much, because it had to fit in a fairly cramped space beside the gas range in my kitchen. At the time it was really nice to have, since my yard was about the size of a postage stamp and I couldn't hang many clothes out there. And the nearest other dryer was in another building on the property, a coin-op electric dryer that vented back into the laundry room, and consequently didn't dry worth a darn.

I quickly learned that there was never any need to put the WW dryer on "hot". "Warm" was hot enough, and "hot tended to scorch. Big items I would save for a day when I could hang them outside, which I still do even with the larger and more powerful Maytag dryer.

Speaking of which, I think the White-Westinghouse-Frigmore dryers' biggest drawback is that their blower fans are kind of weak. I know this because when I replaced the WW dryer with the Neptune dryer, the first thing that happened was a big clot of lint blew out of the exhaust ducting. That also explained why the WW dryer was taking longer and longer to dry, and its cabinet was getting warmer and warmer... Maytag to the rescue! Now I do most of my drying on the line, and for what little drying I do with the gas dryer, it's for socks/underwear or rainy days, and I clean out the vent every couple of years.

 

[stainfighter]

re: weak blower

it's on my to-do list, to reroute the vent line. When our home was built the builder vented it out the side of the house but it is quite long. Think will help with drying times if I have it go straight out to side of front door, no? (lots of air space yet will be hidden by shrubery)

 

[sudsmaster]

Another option is to put in a larger diameter exhaust duct. If it's four inches now, put in a six inch duct. If it runs through an unheated space, however, it's best to insulate it, so the moisture doesn't condense and trap lint.