older washers and there neutral drains...

[vintagesearch]

Hello all, I have a question I've been crazy to ask I've been looking everywhere online even here dont seem to find the answer anyways, its sorta simple:

Why do washers when in neutral drain if interupted they pop into spin?

Our older whirlpool did that if we had water backing up and stoppped it during drain it would release the tub and upon restarting the drain it would go into spin. I realize it was somewhat common and never a problem. However our GE washer that we bought in 2002 NEVER does that! If for any reason we need to stop it while its draining it would not go into spin for anything.

Is that characteristic common among older washers?
Do current toploaders that do neutral drains if interupted do they then go into spin?

anyways always had a curiousity why they did that I we always found it extremely annoying in our whirlpool it used to go off balance becuase of that and almost always during the neutral drains it would sometimes start spining .

Thanks Vintagesearch ;P

 

[coldspot66]

Whirlpool washers accomplish the neutral drain in the transmission. When the motor reverses to drain, after it has been agitating, the tranny shifts to neutral to drain the tub. After 2 or 3 minutes, depending on the timer, the timer pauses the motor, and that pause shifts the tranny into spin mode. Obviously, if you lift the lid, or there is an interruption in power, the tranny will shift into spin prematurely. As the tranny ages, neutral drain tends not to work well, and then will spin drain. When that happens, and then the timer pauses, it does shift the tranny into neutral drain for the spin period, thus wet clothes at the end of the cycle. Hope this helps!

 

[vintagesearch]

thank you coldspot66, finally I have an understanding why they did that.

 

[DADoES]

This pertains ONLY to direct-drive Whirlpools (and Kenmores, KitchenAids, Roper, Estate, and now some Maytags!).

Belt-drive Whirlpools are in neutral drain by default whenever the motor runs, unless the electromagnet shift mechanism is in agitate or spin mode.

 

[alr2903]

I will just page frigilux

the new frigidaire gallery T/L has a neutral drain but I think its an entirely different animal with a separate motor on the drain pump. I offer this wondering if the newer GE has a similar setup with the pump having a separate motor?

 

[cvillewasherbo]

frigidare

I have a stacked (one piece) TL model not even a year old yet and I swear that there is a separate drain motor. The sound is so different from the washing and spinning. BTW it spins so smoothly and quietly and I've never had an unbalanced spin. I do not like the indexing tub however--it seems to me that the clothes just spin counterclockwise the whole time.
Courtney in Virginia

 

[DADoES]

Some toploaders nowadays do have separate pump motors.

 

[toggleswitch]

Yes the newer GE has a separate pump motor.

In the old days one motor for both functions (move agitator & tub / pump water) and was considered way more reliable. Engineers sometimes went through hell to accomplish it.