Celebrate a chronology of evil hatefulness with me

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roto204

roto204

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Take a spin through my tear-apart photos of my 1961 Kenmore to see how bad "bad" can be :-)

It was a great learning experience, and my spray-painting technique has improved :-) I wouldn't have traded it for anything.

Plus, I got to meet a lot of great people, get help from and spend some fun time with some really good friends, and prove that I could tear something all apart and then get it all back together.

(The world's heaviest thousand-piece puzzle.)

Thank you all for your help. I promised pics, and here's most of them.

BTW, I haven't forgotten about videotaping the Kelvinator, but I have no digital video camera at my disposal. I should be able to use Nate and Melissa's iSight, though, so I'll work on that. I appreciate your patience :-)

--Nate

 
Wow

That is some JOB Nate! I don't know if I would have gone that far but it IS rewarding no?

Great progression shots and the comments are hilarious esp the "my go away look n0.2!"

Nice waterfall filtration,and I must say if everybody knew just how much those center posts rusted I think there would have been fewer kenmores sold.
I am working on mine right now and it is gross! Just think of your whitest whites in that bath!
 
Thanks, everyone, for the kind words :-)

Thank you all very much :-). Yes, Jon, I completely concur about the centerposts--blecch! No wonder the spin was crunchy on this machine when we got it.

Even though it didn't make it, it was a great learning experience, and I have some really great tools to apply to future restorations.
 
Really?

Glenn, did they really have a SS replacement? I wouldn't be surprised. Personally, I think that would have been the smart way to go from the get-go, but live and learn (for Whirlpool), right? :-|
 
Nate, I really appreciate you taking me down the brief memory lane of you attempting to restore theis obstant beast. I look at all that hard work, blood, seat, & tears and I get misty-eyed thinking about it and the final result. I love the expressions on your two "you can now leave" pix and will paining the panel(s) for the livingroom. BTW, have we seen a pic of the artistic gallery taht is now contained within? Look forward to seeing you next spring. GRR Hugz to ya both. Bob
 
Hi Bob! :-)

It was my pleasure!

LOL--I'll take some pics of the artistic stuff so you can see what they ended up being :-)

I'll be looking forward to seeing you in the spring! Big hugs to you!! :-)

--Nate (and Will)
 
The epilogue

"So," you may ask, "what the heck happened? Why all that to toss it?"

Several reasons. First was its intrinsic desire to not live. Ever had one of those machines? You'll remember it and differentiate it from the ones that are grateful for attention.

Second, the bearings were toast, and the insides looked like someone had carved the Zorro "Z" in them, over and over. It was obvious that this machine had a hard and poorly cared-for life, and that (and the tub guard--good Lord!) was a big sign.

Third, the centerpost had disintegrated. What I didn't catalogue for posterity was making--literally--a "sleeve" of RTV silicone from top to bottom of the centerpost, because it was so thin that it had many pinholes in it. Yikes.

Fourth, the tranny never recovered well from the rebuild. I didn't want to silicone it, because I was afraid I'd need to get back in it, and I didn't want a bunch of scraping to hurt the spots where the tranny sealed, but the crapola gasket that Sears has for it now did not seal as well as the original cork. It peed so much oil on the floor that Exxon offered to send a cleanup crew.

Finally, the clutch assembly between the spin pulley and whatever-it-meets-up-with-to-drive-the-basket was toast. That's what was causing it to not spin--and the problem went from a lethargic spin to just not spinning at all. We probably would have noticed that if the machine was in suitable shape for initial testing when we got it, but since I already owned it, it wouldn't have made much of a difference.

Moral of the story? Hard to say. Obviously if I hear crunchies in a basket in the future, I'll pass a machine up. But the underside of the machine, as you can see from the pics, was very pristine, so it was a tough judge of character, to be sure.

Like I said, I'm just glad to have had the experience and learned so much, and also had such great friends who helped out (Ross, Roger, Nate, Melissa, and also profound thanks to Steve R. [Gyrafoam] and Greg [gansky] for the wonderful lint filter and agitator.)

--Nate

P.S. -- Wanna know something else horrific? I completely repainted the inside of the cabinet, too.

ARGH! :-)
 
Nevermind on that angel

The poor dear was so elated that today she would recieve her wings. But as it turned out, no washer, no wings :-( Oh well, it was an excellent try at saving a washer. You saved the agitator, lint filter and controll panel I hope.
 
Hey Nate, how nice to see your work! Great job! I remember when you all found this machine in Phoenix. Love all those pics of the appliance yard. Looked at all of them again, but more specifically your New Machine!

Steve
 
Nate, there was no stainless centerpost far as I know. It was just Ted musing and wishing on the situation, an idea for a different design with a threaded baseplate for easily replacing the centerpost.
 
You sure gave it a great try Nate!! Sorry it didn't make it but like you said, you really learned a lot. I fear that many of the machines up there in the Phoenix yard will meet the same fate. Terry
 
Congrats, Nate! I grew up with a 1960 KM Model 80 featuring a preggers Roto Swirl and waterfall lint filter. The damn thing lasted so long (I finally got rid of it in 1984 after my Mom died) I thought I'd never want to see another KM again. Needless to say, I wish I had it back, now! They were cool machines. Get ready for a lot of suds-locking first spins.
 

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