DE8600 Dryer - Instructions

How to disassemble the dryer has been covered in past repair stories. I will add a make shift repair that will get you up and running until you get your replacement blower wheel. We repair gas dryers for a living and this repair works and some machines are still running for two years. Remove the blower wheel. Cut a piece of plumber strap of similar sized metal to about 3/16" x 1/2". Hold it with vise grips and then heat it with a torch. When it is hot melt it into the hole in the blower wheel. This will give you a flat spot in the shaft hole that will keep the blower from spinning on the motor shaft. Some trial and error fitting is involved. If you do it carefully the blower wheel will fit very nicely and will not vibrate or make noise.

Googled Maytag dryer troubleshooting and arrived at partselect.com. Using their site, I was able to learn more about how my dryer operated, was configured and how to remove the front panel. I then removed front panel. Tested fuses and thermostats. All were good. Visually inspected heater element. No apparent break in heater coils. I ultimately removed the heater assembly to get a better view of the heater element and then noticed the break in the heater element. Once I saw that it was obvious where my problem was. I then ordered the part, installed it and tested it and it appeared to work fine. My wife tells me it works great and she is impressed. FYI - I don't know much about dryers except that it drys my clothes. Thank you partselect.com!

First I removed the two screws near the bottom of the front panel. Then I removed the front panel by rotating it outwards. Next I removed the front frame section by removing the four screws. The tumbler rests on this frame piece so remove it carefully and it will stay put - no need to take it out. The grinding noise I was hearing was the tumbler (drum) running on the frame - the glides (bearings) were worn out. This had generated piles of metal powder which I vaccumed up. It was easy to locate the reason there was no heat - the thermostat was burned to a crisp. It torched part of the blower seal in the process. The reason the thermostat fails in this manner is the lint duct gets clogged up increasing the duty cycle of the heater which fries the thermostat. I had to strip back the red wire and install a new blade connector but the thermostat just bolts on easy enough. You'll need a rivet gun to replace the glides. Drill out the old rivets and pull them out with some pliers. Easy enough to do and it runs like new! Good luck.

The repair was very simple. I took off the two screws on the fron of the dryer to remove the front panel which gained me access to the drum. I used a nut driver to remove the two screws that held the orignal short baffle and screwed in the new short baffle. Very simple very quick. The amazing thing with this problem is that I ordered the part on Thursday and recieved it on the very next day!!!!!!

I first unpluged the dryer, then I removed the front cover of the dryer. The Heating unit in located in the lower right side of the machine. I unscrewed the heating "tube" from the dryer and unpluged it from the dryer. ( good idea to mark the wires because they are same color.) I unscrewed the two halves of the heating unit and saw that indeed the heating coil was broken. I unscrewed the coil and fed it through the insulators. The coil was old and uncooperative, so I decided to cut it at each insulator with wire cutters. This sped up the process and protected the insulators. I carefully fed the new coils through the insulators and attached the ends to the terminals. Be careful not to over tighten or you may break the insulation on the terminals. I reinstalled the heating unit and attached the wires and tested the dryer. Job Done! Thanks Parts Select!

ordered new filter,,,,

I set the dryer on its back to make alignment of the front drum guide cover easy to reinstall in the seal after completion. I removed the 2 screws at the bottom front then removed the white and yellow wires to the interlock switch and set the front cover aside. I then removed the 4 nut screws holding the front drum cover and removed. On the back side there are two teflon and cork "bearings". I had ordered two even though only one was worn down to metal. On each one I then removed the two rivets by drilling them out. Then I placed the corks into the bearing slots with a little glue then inserted the teflon into the slots and riveted them into place with the rivets that came with the kit. I replaced the drum cover, connected the switch and screwed the dryer front cover back on. I set the dryer back up. Connected the vent hose and turned the dryer on. Beautiful sweet smooth and quiet operation. I had replaced the front and back drum seals a few months ago and saw the teflon was missing but did not have the kits at that time. With a complete job I would recommend replacing the front and rear drum seals and the two teflon/cork bearing kits at the same time.

This was pretty much as easy as most other folks had described on this site.
1. Removed the two screws at the front bottom that are holding on the fromt panel, and then lift up and remove the panel.
2. Disconnect the door-open-safety-switch, remembering which color of wire goes on which connection.
3. Remove the four screws (two on each side) on the front bracket that supports the drum and tthat contains the front glides.
4. Remove support bracket and lint trap, letting the drum rest gently on the stuff underneath.
5. Remove the screws holding the lint trap to the support bracket. (My model had five screws.) Remove lint trap from support bracket.
6. Drill out the two pop rivets on each of the two glides, noting the orientation of the teflon pad and mounting strip.
7. Secure - and here is where I had a little problem - new glides in place with pop rivets. (I hadn't use a rivet gun in a while, so I messed up the first pop rivet and had to go to the hardware store to get a replacement. I didn't hold the pop rivet in all the way while I was accuating the gun!)
8. Reverse the process for assembly, and you are all done.

It's simple.

I don't think it would take others as long as it took me.
I had to take the drum out to get to the limiter. And my dryer is in a builtin housing with limited space in front of the dryer - so lots of manuevers to get access.

The limiter was very easy to find, thanks to diagrams on this site. The space between drum and limiter made it impossible to get to the limiter screws without removing drum. Found very helpful drum removal instructions on PartSelect here:

http://www.partselect.com/PS1148434-Frigidaire-134503600-Dryer-Drum-Belt.htm?SourceCode=13&ModelNum=FSE748GFS0

Great site - thank you.

Old latch and door striker were pried out with a flat blade screwdriver. New components popped right in. Repair was less than two minutes.

While changing power cable from 3 prong to 4 prong connection on a recently purchased used dryer I found the terminal block partially melted due to improper connectors which overheated. The bracket and cover were also missing which presented a shock hazard for anyone touching the exposed connections and there was no way to connect the strain relief. I disconnected the old 3 prong cable, removed the old terminal block, installed the new terminal block (required opening the dryer top for access), threaded power cable through bracket and fastened with strain relief leaving loose, attached the neutral/ground wires to middle terminal connection point, red to red wire in terminal block and black to black wire also in terminal block and tightened bracket and added cover.

Took off front panel, removed drum and replaced parts listed. A bit tricky to keep small parts in place. However, masking tape helped. Best of all was the online diagram of how the parts were assembled. In addition, taking step by step phone pixs aided in replacing parts since there was some down time between diagnosis and installation.

Followed advice from here; unplugged machine from power source, removed two phillips head screws located just out of sight below the little indentaion on the front panel, removed front panel & set aside the machine. Unclipping the door switch wires allowed for enough slack so that they didn't need to be disconnected. Unscrewed (or un-hooked, don't remember) the lint box, pulled the drum out slightly, removed the belt, pulled drum out all the way & set aside. Removed the snap rings & wahsers from the idler wheels, removed wheels, put a light coating ot synthetic grease on the shafts & in the idler bushings, re-installed idlers, washers, & snap rings. Re-assembled in reverse order of assembly with alittle difficulty iin getting the new belt in the proper configuration. Removed small access panel in rear of machine to assist in installng the belt finally realizing that the belt DOES NOT go in the indented area of the drum, but on the larger diameter of the drum itself. Tested by rotating by hand, re-assembled front cover, plugged it in & dried the laundry......QUIETLY!

Used nut driver to remove screw and cover from dryer cord terminal block, used screw driver to remove two screws securing old terminal block, cut dammaged wire and stripped wire back and crimped on new terminal connecter, replaced old terminal block with new one, replaced two screws, installed new cord, and replaced cover plate and screw.

Shut off or unplugged dryer for safety.

Slipped thin blade putty knife up under bezel of switch to unlatch from the panel and pulled forward to remove the swwitch from the dryer. Unplugged the quick connect terminals (3) from the old switch and plugged them onto the new switch. one of the terminals had gotten quite hot and darkened the insulation so it was replaced with one that was supplied with the switch. that was a cut, strip, crimp process. Placed the new switch into the panel and snapped into place.