TAA600 Amana - Instructions

Well the washer died and would not turn on in the middle of a wash cycle. Absolutely dead. I disconnected it from power and opened up the front panel on which all the control switches and knobs are mounted. This is removed by unscrewing 4 screws at the top of the washer.

Checked the fuse, and found blown. Replaced the fuse, closed the panel and plugged it in. Still not working. Checked the Check switches and found the Check Switch really limp. Checked with Digital Multimeter and found no continuity at either position. Unscrewed the check switch. Removal and re inspection with DMM of the check switch confirmed it was bad. Opened up the check switch and found contacts were blown.

Installed a new check switch making sure all the connecting wires go in the right places. The wiring diagram in the washer was very helpful in doing so since u dont want these wires reversed. Adjusted the plunger which operates the check switches when the lid is opened to make sure it is not over or under operating the switches. This is done by loosening the bolt holding down the check switch assembly and slidint the whole assembly forwards or backwards till the plunger has just enough push on the switches. This is done to avoid the plunger from exerting excessive pressure on the check switch and the safety switch in lid open or lid closed position. (both switches are operated by the same plunger according to the lid position)

Closed panel cover and plugged the washer in. There u go, it was alive again!

I suspected the lid switch right away. Where I went wrong was in thinking that I had to get to it from below. After going to all the trouble of removing the front panel and detaching the top panel, I discovered that it was located inside the control section at the top of the appliance. It only took a few minutes to remove four screws and gain access to the old switch assembly and swap it out with the new one. One thing to note; the new switch assembly has to be set in exactly the right place along a slotted channel in order for both contacts to be activated properly. It's not difficult to find the right spot, but you have to do it consciously.

VERY EASY!!!
SAFETY FIRST-Always unplug the appliance.
Use 8mm socket to remove front panel screws. Loosened up two hose clamps connected to the pump and removed both lines (Hoses contain water, use a towel) which is located underneath the motor. Disconnect motor electrical connector on the left side of the motor. With socket, remove 4 mounting bracket screws that secure the motor and pump assembly. Pull back the tension/idler pulley to loosen belt off the main pulley to the washer drum. Tilt and pull out motor/pump assembly. Underneath the pump, use star-bit to remove the pump from motor assembly to remove the belt. Install new belt on motor pulley (Good time to check for debris or anything restricing free movement of pump) and re-install pump. Install the motor/pump assembly and loosely secure the motor/pump assembly. Place the belt onto the motor pulley and pull back the tensioner/idler pulley to allow slack of belt to be placed on washer drum pulley. Put the belt on the lip of the drum pulley and rotate while pulling back the tensioner/idler pulley until the belt is seated on the groove of the drum pulley. Tighten the motor/pump assembley. Re-attach the 2 hoses and tighten down the clamps. Re-connect the electrical connector to the motor...Don't forget to plug in the washer and secure the front panel...Piece 'O cake, you're done! About 15 minutes to do the job. Much like changing a belt on most vehicles.

Removed the front of the washer, then lifted the top up and held it up with a prop. Pulled the agitator straight up and started the disasembly. Using the photos in the hub and seal kit was a big help. The large nut on the output shaft had to be cut off with my dremel tool and the hub removed with a wheeler puller. Assembly was pretty much straight forward. Primed the pump and started the machine for the stated time and was a sucess.

Used the online trouble shooting info. Tested as was requested. Found the lid switch. Noticed the fuse was bad. Replaced the fuse and noticed only water was cominf in. Ordered new lid switch assembly. Came with 48 hrs! Replaced and washed clothes! Great service!

This is not a bad repair, but give yourself some time. I did not have to take the tranny and motor out, but the inner and outer tub and all related parts had to come out, along with the outer tub base. If you are replacing the tub bearing, you HAVE to order the seal kit. Don't try to skimp like I did, since you will need the seal kit as this is what causes that bearing to fail in the first place. We forgot how quiet the washer was after I fixed it, and it saved us from buying a new washer since we were ready to say the heck with it and buy a new pair. You might need an 1.5 inch socket to get the big nut off the spindle, but I was able to get with a visegrip and hammer. The nice thing about this repair is even if you screw it up, you won't have water all over the place because of the seal design. I just checked under the washer a few times for the first few weeks and all seems fine.

Took off the agitator, removed inner tub, exposing the hub drive. Found fusion between hub drive and agitator shaft. Rather than using a wheel puller as instructions recommended I got my masonry hammer and removed the drive hub in pieces. Removed debris from the tub. Installed sealant around lower seal as instructed. Re-assembled inner tub, agitator with new upper seal. Plugged in the washer, turned on the water. No leak. Happy happy.

After removing the agitator and drive bell by pulling on them HARD, I found that the lock nut and hub were corroded in place. I used grinding wheels to remove them which took over an hour. The internal and external threads needed to be cleaned up with tap and die and the splines had to be filed in order to get the new hub on the shaft. I did not use antiseize compound. The tub seal went on easily and the lock nut was guestimate torqued using a wrench made for water heater elements. The drive bell seal was very stubborn. It is normally pressed on with a special tool, but I had scrap pipe sections that fit the inner and outer press-points and used a large hammer to drive it into place. The washer does not leak any more. Total time was around four hours.

I did as the directions said that came with the kit. Except everything came off by hand until I got to the hub nut. Instead of waiting for another shipment and buying a tool I would have used once and never touched again I called SEARS and a technician came to my house because I did not have the hub nut hex wrench. He called it a spanner wrench. Once he used the tool to get off the nut I was in business. Until I had to put the nut back on. I ended up wrapping a towel around the end of a 12" adjustable crescent wrenc and litle by little smacked it with a hammer until the nut looked like it was all the way down. Just to put the nut back on my way took almost an hour alone. The directions said that a puller was needed to get off the adjutator shaft (unsure of correct name), but it came off with a little wiggleing. Once I put the new one on it would not budge off so a small puller would have been needed to remove it if I needed to again. And puting it back on was a chore in it self. I ended up using a hammer and 6" 1/2" drive extension with a 20 something MM socket on the end to force it down all the way. And the shat that the large seal goes over also requires a tool which is also not mentioned until you read the directions. I was able to twist and force on the new one with a little bit of included grease around the meeting surface. For the most part the directions were correct, but left out a bunch of nice to know things that the average person who is not mechnically inclined may not have figured out. Overall the whole procedd was pretty easy once all the tools were available. Suggestions I would make are to say in the advertisement of the seal kit that the Hub nut hex wrech (spanner wrench) and seal tool will be needed inorder to complete the removal and/ or installation. Which are sold seprately.

1st, I removed the top, back and side panels. Then removed the plastic parts off the top of the tubs. Next removed the agitator from it's hub. In the center of the agitator hub was a retaining bolt to be removed next using a 7/16" socket. Had to use a gear puller to get the agitator hub up off it's spline. Then there were four 1/2" socket size hex bolts to remove facilitating the removal of the inner stainless steel tub. Next was the toughest part of my task, the removal of the large hex nut holding the inner tub hub down. Since I did not have a socket large enough to fit the nut, I used a ball peen hammer to loosen it by striking it on it's hex flats in an angle that would tend to drive it in a CCW rotation. It took several blows but finally it began to loosen. Then removed it with my Channel Lock water pump pliers. Once the Inner tub hub was removed, the lower seal was accessible. Removed the old seal from the outer tub flange, and scraped off all the old sealant with a razor blade scraper. Then installed the new seal according to the instructions supplied with the new hub and seal kit. Re-assembled the washer, ran it through a cycle while it was still out in the garage to ensure the leak was fixed and was happy to find that indeed it was. Everything went fairly well if you overlook the slight cut on my right thumb I suffered while re-assembling the covers. It wasn't too bad, a band aid fixed it up.

descovered blown fuse on lid switch assembly. Checked out info on Parts Select.com they reccommended the lid switch assembly. I bought it putting it in was very easy! Problem solved!

Removed pump/motor assembly. Had a difficult time removing pump from motor. Was not aware that the shaft was not connected some way! After looking over the internet for help....I finally realized that the shaft was siezed in the pump. After much persuasion on my part....it broke loose... I did use some WD-40....but don't know if it....or my prying between the pulley and the pump finally did the trick. Found that the idler pulley was seized. When I replaces both belt and pulley... It worked fine...

I followed the instructions that came with the hub and seal kit, which were pretty well written but not terribly detailed. Once I got into the job though, I felt confident that the instructions told me all of the important information--the rest was common sense. If you're reasonably handy you can pull this off.

The instructions call for some specialty tools, which I was able to do without by using the following:

• Drive Bell:
The old drive bell slid right off without a puller--I think I got lucky on this one.

To install the new drive bell I used a long 1/4-20 bolt, nut and fender washers. I spun a nut way up the bolt then slid the fender washers on. I threaded all of this down into the transmission output shaft until it bottomed out. Then I turned the nut down to push the washers and drive bell down until it hit bottom. Then I backed out out the bolt and washers and installed the shoulder screw.

• Hub:
I used a generic wheel-puller I already had to get this off and it came off with little effort. I put the old shoulder screw back into the top of the shaft for the point of the puller to sit on so it wouldn't mess up the transmission output shaft or threads (obvious, I know but a bad thing to overlook).

Drive Bell Seal:
• This calls for seal tool #293P4. I'm sure the seal can be installed by hand but it happened that the two extension tubes from my Shop-Vac were exactly the right diameters to seat the bottom and top parts of the seal.

• Lint filter:
The instructions just say "remove lint filter" but it was pretty stuck on and seems pretty fragile so I took it easy. I used a small scrap of 1/8-inch plywood to slide under the edge until it popped off.

The instructions say not to use the four rubber washers on the bolts that attach the inner tub to the hub if the machine has a stainless tub. Mine has a stainless tub and the original bolts had rubber washers on them so I used the new washers when i reinstalled the inner tub.

I found the 3M-800 Scotch Seal industrial sealant at a local appliance pats distributor. I researched it and it seemed like a specific enough product that it wasn't worth risking the whole job to use something I already had like Lexel. I learned that the reason it doesn't come with the kit is that it requires Haz-Mat handling, which would probably double the cost of the parts kit. One set of instructions I read from Maytag said that "the customer can use the machine after 15 minutes". But the sealant tube says it fully cures in 1 - 3 days. So I squirted out a ribbon on a piece of paper when I did the job so I could monitor the drying time and split the difference, allowing it to dry overnight. Seems as though that's long enough.

I did the job step-by-step and it seems to have worked. The first load is running right now and so far it's dry as a bone.

One thing I noticed is that some of the parts seem to have been updated over the original ones to improve performance. The drive bell and associated seal have a more sophisticated mating relationship that seems as though it will provide a better seal than the original.

Good luck

Unplug the washer
Took off the front with nut driver to two fasteners at the bottom.
Took off two tub springs using channel lock pliers.
Tipped the tub back for more hand room.
Took brake bolts off with box end wrench.
Put Screw driver above brake clamps and pried down to make the old brake pads drop down below the seats and then take brakes off. You might have to use a screw driver to expand the brake clamps so they will release the brake. (brake clamps look like a pulley but the edges will spread some bit.)
Twisted large screw driver between the brake clamps and pushed new brake in as far as would go while beside (to the left or right of) the brake seat.
Pried brake clamps down and rotated brake around until it is lined up with the brake seat. Then pried pads up into the seat.
Re-twisted large screw driver between the brake clamps to separate them and pulled the brake pad back to within 1/8th to 1/16th inch of the back. This lined up the bolt hole.
Inserted the bolt with rubber grommett into the brake pad hole and twisted it counter clockwise and tightened with wrench. (If the bolt would not thread, then you have to adjust the brake pad forward or backward until the holes line up.) Tighten the bolt until it is firmly tight.

There are three brakes. Each is installed the same way. The one in back required a little cross legged contortion for me to reach around both sides of the motor and two front brake pad mounts. The key is lining up the bolt hole in the brake pad with the mount. I pretty well had it figured out after the second pad install. Time for me.. 4 hours. Cost, leg cramps, sore muscles from awkward positions, and the joy of not having to buy a new washer.

Return the springs to the tub on the front. Close front panel and return the two fasteners with the nut drivers.

How did I know I needed the brakes? When in agitation mode the tub spun the opposite direction of the spin cycle. When the agitator turned the opposite direction, the water inside went into a very strong vortex and sometimes sloshed out the top or around the top edges When there were a lot of clothes and a high fill level in the tub. We also had trouble with straps winding around the agitator. The tub spun so quickly that the water without agitation was driven to the top outer edges of the tub by centrifugal force.

Replaced the lid switch assembly. The pictures were very helpful. Very easy to replace. Saved at least $150 doing it myself.