In this fabulous brochure from Greg
Bendix speaks of the "Magic Minute" pause between the intermediate spin after the last rinse and the final tumble, intermediate and high speed spin sequence. I am surprised that they let Kelvinator not only get away with using, but also trade marking Magic Minute even though it was a different Magic. After Jon told us about how much Westinghouse had to pay AVCO to use the tumble spray rinse, it is surprising.
Every combination washer-dryer used this pause after the preliminary spin to prevent the items in the load from sticking to the cylinder when the machine went into dry. I remember the first time I watched a 33" WP go through its cycle. I was sort of shocked at the slow speeds of the spins so I asked Mrs. Roddy what it was doing when it completely shut off after the brief spin following the 3rd rinse. She said that it was getting ready to spin. I asked if it had not already been spinning and she said yes, but there was a longer spin. There were variations and, of course, other combos did not spin at the high speeds of the Bendix, but even the combos that spun at the speeds between 200 and 400 rpm used the pause. The one exception that I know of was in the early 29" WP-made combos. Those machines balanced and accelerated to the 500, later 400, rpm speed for 4 minutes. Then they returned to tumble for what was called the Peel Off Rinse. The ballast water in the sump, about 3 gallons of the final rinse water, was sprayed, thanks to the front fabulous and fragile diverter valve that controls whether water is sprayed into the cylinder through the RotoSpray or into the ring that channels water into the balance tanks, in short bursts onto the the load to loosen it from the cylinder. Once it was all "peeled off" and tumbling, the machine returned to high speed spin for another 4 minutes. This was later replaced by a 4 minute period of intermediate spins mixed with tumble periods to allow water injected into the balance tanks to drain before the next spin period. Even the low speed spins in this portion of the cycle in these machines used the balancing system to correct unevenly distributed loads. This sequence of spins and tumbles which do some preliminary extraction to prevent the load sticking to the cylinder is followed by the final spin. As the load is balanced by injections of water into one or two tanks the speed builds to the maximum and real water extraction takes place. If not too much water was needed to fill the balance tanks, enough water accumulates in the sump that you can hear brief snaps and gushes of water through the drain hose as the rear diverter valve that controls whether the water is pumped into the recirculating system or down the drain opens and shuts to maintain the correct water level in the sump below the spinning cylinder. Because the sump holds 3 gallons, the machine can, theoretically, balance loads that are close to 30 pounds out of balance. CORRECTION: Actually, it can't because the machine would need to fill, at most, two tanks opposite the unbalanced area and those tanks could not, I think, hold three gallons. In cases where the load cannot be balanced, the speed is held down by the balance mechanism which, each time it tries to respond to the unbalanced load by injecting water, also bleeds off, with a brief hiss, the compressed air that inflates the clutches in the transmission to increase the speed. Given a load that cannot be perfectly balanced, that little mechanism will keep spitting like an angry cat for 4 minutes until the end of the spin.
Most of this knowledge comes from years of patient instruction by John & Jeff at the College of Comboology.
All combos that I know of, from the Bendix on, also come to a full stop after the final spin before beginning the drying part of the cycle. [this post was last edited: 1/20/2013-12:01]
