Potential Maytag Center Dial Pair purchase - Yes or No?

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tecnopolis

tecnopolis

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 5, 2007
Messages
1,138
Location
Ocala/Dunnellon, Florida 34481
I came across this pair for sale a week ago and noticed it hasn't been sold yet. i called the seller and he runs a lil thrift shop in the neighboring town.
I'm planning on making a trip to go see them in the flesh and wanted to know if anyone could give me some pointers on what to look for before I begin negotiations.
One thing already in their favor is that the gentleman will deliver them or no charge, which is half the battle.
I can tell that this is the larger capacity washer from the four water level buttons and a 2 speed.
They appear to have aluminum dials which I had not seen before.
I guess I need to know what model numbers they are and verify it's a genuine 2-speed and not a Fabrimatic. Suds return? Year built and is the Dryer an HOH or a SOH?
Any information to strengthen my bargaining power would be appreciated.
I also became a "Paid" member, so as not to discourage replies.
Thanks!

tecnopolis++10-5-2012-08-46-13.jpg
 
I also asked him what that decal was over the dryer center dial and he said it said "Heavy Duty", which I've never seen before. Did someone place that on there to cover the pilot light that may have burned out? It's electric.

tecnopolis++10-5-2012-08-54-40.jpg
 
Maytag

The washer is 2 speed, not a suds saver. Likely an 806 or a 608, both fine machines.
The dryer is Stream of heat, much larger drum than Halo of Heat.

While they are both fine machines and Maytag runs forever with few repairs, here are some slight downsides you can use for bargaining purposes only, I'm not trying to pick on the machines at all.

Dryer----hard to tell from the picture, but it looks like the timer has both automatic cycles and timed cycles. There are no buttons to choose extra dryness or low heat, though probably the dial has air-fluff. The drum is larger than HOH, thank God, but not as huge as Whirlpool/Kenmore from that era. The SOH Controls were known to run a bit too long, wasting some energy. It's electric instead of gas, pricier to operate.

Washer----the lint filter won't do much especially on half loads, there's no extra rinse, the bleach dispenser just runs into the tub and it isn't timed at all, the machine uses lots more water than modern ones, various parts are NLA officially, etc.

Having said all that, go get them, great machines, nice matched set, you'll be very happy. I'm just stating minor downsides for negotiations only, you'll likely get long-lasting, well built, great washing and drying tanks. Tons of parts are Ebay available even though many parts stores won't bother after 30 years, 35. They look mid-late 70's to me.

And I've never noticed any problem with lack of response to non-paying members. Occassionally a "one issue" new non-paying member may not yet know enough to really understand a good answer or ask a clear question, but that is a problem of time and experience, not dues.
 
The washer is a LA608 and the Dryer is a LDE309.

The four buttons on the left of the washer are:
1. hot wash/warm rinse
2. hot wash/cold rinse
3. warm wash/cold rinse
4. cold wash/cold rinse

A LA608S (suds-saver) would have had a 5 button switch on the left.
The suds model eliminated the hot/warm option and then added the "save suds" & "drain suds" buttons

The "Heavy-Duty" over the dryer control was a silly sales gimmick that Maytag used for a while in the later 70s. They would slap these stickers on trying to make their product seem competitive with other brands that had put "heavy-duty" in their control panel language.

Maytag had discontinued all pilot lights by about 1976. This dryer never had one.

The LDE309 was made from 1978-1980 and the A608 was made from 1976-1980. Since they really are a matched set, I'm guessing they are from that late 70s era.

From the pictures they look pretty clean but that doesn't mean much in terms of how they are mechanically. These are good machines and are relatively easy to fix and still quite easy to find parts for. I'd definitely go take a look at them.
 
temps

4 switches are

HW, HC, WC, CC

no suds, no extra rinse.

2 buttons for speed are Normal for wash and spin, or gentle for wash and spin. The upgrade had 4 buttons, you could select speed of wash independent of speed of spin.
And I don't believe the dryer has any polit light, they just threw the HEAVY DUTY stickers here and there, would not have purposely covered up any pilot lights.

You are correct, 4 buttons for water level means large tub, not samll, Also interior shots would reveal 4 slots down the agitator for filtering, not three, also proving large tub.

As stated earlier, go get 'em!
 
Good Luck! Nice looking machines.

It looks to me like a deep tub, 2 speed machine with 4 water temperatures settings: Hot/Warm, Hot/Cold, Warm/Cold & Cold/Cold and 4 water levels. I think the model would be 806. The dryer is the new design from the large door so it has larger capacity than the HOH machines.

I would take a paper towel and put it over two fingers and reach up under the front of the cabinet to see if there is any transmission oil there. It's not a fatal flaw, but if it's there, I would certainly see a good bargaining point for the price. Given that you are in FL, pull the lint filter out of the agitator to see how mineraled up it is. That will give you an idea of how it was cared for. Also, if there are mineral deposits, you might expect to have to change the air gap/fill injector at some point because if minerals build up on that, it can start diffusing the fill stream and making a leak. As good as these look, they probably did not die from heavy service or abuse and are just being replaced by a high efficiency machine. You do realize that these are not really large capacity machines, especially the washer. They are good, durable machines. I still use my Maytags some.
 
 

 

Mark (Kenmore71) is right, this washer is a 608.   The next model up (TOL) is the 806.  

 

The added features of the 806: the fluorescent lit control panel and seperate wash and spin speed adjustments.

 

Yes they look like a great pair, you won't be sorry!

 

Kevin
 
Yeah - you low life, you better contribute. LOL!

if I had answers for you, I'd give them w/o condition of contribution. You've helped others here, and with a sense of humor, that I happen to appreciate (ok, we can't please all the people all the time).

Anyway- Good luck with those, they look great from this perspective.
 
I'm sure I've been filling up Roberts monthly bandwidth limits with my "media rich' content on the site, so I didn't have much objection to contributing now that my financial situation has changed for the better.
I have been a member here since well before 2002 and never realized how much easier it is to navigate the site with the upgrade.
Especially important to me is the access to the other forums which also hold valuable information.
Seriously, where else am I going to get this kind of access to the vast knowledge base for $12 a year?
Jus sayin!

tecnopolis++10-5-2012-11-39-33.jpg
 
Great DD

They're both good machines and as accurately noted, they're not as large as the WP/KM comparisons of that era, but never the less, great machines. The pictured dryer is electric - don't know if that makes any difference for you? I have 3 sets of 806s and love them all. I prefer the Maytag dryers over their WP/KM counterparts as they're quieter, less lint flying around the room (it seems that I always have more lint airborne with the WP/KM machines - maybe just me, and my limited observation. Sturdy, well built equipment. Would likely give you good service for years to come.
 
A few notes/thoughts

Mark / Kenmore71 says "From the pictures they look pretty clean but that doesn't mean much in terms of how they are mechanically." Wow is that ever true. In 1991 I had a beautiful 1977 Kenmore 80 washer, in a beautiful, lustrous Coffee color, that my buddy had rescued as part of our deal to decommission the compactor at the Sears distribution warehouse. I all too easily snatched up that machine, and took it home. It was pristine - you could have served food off of it pratically, if not for the finger prints on it from the delivery and dock guys. Well....not the same underneath. The pump was leaking, and had been, it had a white detergent trail on it. The belt was so well used that its cords had come separated and it was running around almost as three separate belts. Parts of the little cogs/teeth from the belt were everywhere. Upon further testing, the timer had dead spots galore - I don't know how it ran a full automatic cycle.

So, I re-sealed the tub, gave it the new pump, new belt, spin tube seals, etc. and got it all nicely buttoned up, cleaned and spiffed, etc. I paid probably close to $80 for a new FSP timer, and I felt like I had a winner of a machine which I could sell for about $150. Not a great profit, but for a guy with a hobby who wasn't running a real business, it was fine. Saving the machine was part of the program anyway.

Well, in running it after all the new installations, I was just letting it idle then spin, while I cleaned up my tools and debris from the work. I decide to look at the goings on from the service panel area. I got down on the floor, face about four or five inches from the motor. All of a sudden, the motor starts to make a buzzing sound, like a leaf has gotten into the fan, etc. That got louder about three or four seconds later, and became a rubbing grind sound. That got much louder, like rubbing a brick on a concrete driveway, then POP and a BANG! The motor locked up with no slow-down. I still remember the whole machine echoing the vibrations and the sudden stop. All I heard then was the motor humming - the armature had broken because the worn motor was not "used" to a snug new belt.

Within a week the Sears pile coughed up (sorry Andy, using your great terminology) a willing motor to transplant, but that was one VERY WELL USED UP machine that looked great, but probably had 400k miles on it.

Also, while the comment may be wholly true about the non-timed bleach dispenser (Sears called those 'direct in' dispensers), by the late 1970s, not very many machines had timed bleach dispensers anymore, not like they had a decade earlier. This was due to their cost --- a hose and a dispenser bezel are a lot cheaper than the mechanicals that go with an electric dispenser. In Kenmores by this time, only perhaps the top two machines in line would have had a mechanical dispenser.

GREAT looking Maytags though! Sometimes you just have to follow your gut and buy a machine or a pair of machines, and cross your fingers!

Gordon
 

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