Alright, today on Repairs101 I thought Iíd like to try and tackle a request that I got
from a viewer a while back. She wanted to know about replacing the drive belt in her
clothes dryer. So, Iíve recently bought a new one and, um, weíll take a look at my
old one before I take it to the recycling centre. Be sure and turn off the power and
then pull out the plug. So I wonít be doing this demonstration on
my new machine because itís still under warranty. But I have purposefully held onto the old
machine that was here in the house when I moved in ñ with the express purpose of using
it as a demonstrator for this video. Now if I was going to demonstrate on this machine
Iíd show you that the first thing that you need to do is clean your lint-trap before
you have guests over. OK if I was going to do a demonstration on this machine the first
thing Iíd show you is that you want to remove your lint trap and youíll see ñ letís bring
you in ñ and youíll see thereís these two screws here that youíre going to remove to
separate the lid, here, from the lint trap tunnel. OK, you can see the lint-trap tunnel
right there and you just need to remove these two screws so that the lid will pop off and
this is the most common style, you just need to work a screwdriver in under the ledge here.
Sometimes thereís a notch ñ you just want to get down on your hands and knees and have
a look. There might be a notch in here somewhere or you can just dig in and undo a release.
Pop it off. And Iíll show you how itís done on the older machine ñ itís very similar
but a little different. This oneís got the lint basket out front
so thatís not a problem - you donít have to worry about that. But you will find that
there are screws here and here holding the lid down in place of those other two that
were connected to the lint trap tunnel. The drum is supported on this piece that is
the front ñ the face of it. So we just need to undo a screw right here and a screw right
here and if youíre worried about the wires you can just pull them back out of your way
like that. You can see, of course, the dust thatís collected inside the machine over
the years and you can imagine someone with long hair. Itís going to suck air off the
floor and blow it out through the exhaust so itís a type of ñ itís like a vacuum
as well. Itís like a vacuum cleaner. So itís sucking up whatever debris it can off of the
floor and you can see in this case itís a lot of dust. So if you have long hair and
or a lot of pets: youíre going to be doing this job a lot more often. You can see itís
just ready to come off all by itself. OK now with those two screws out youíre ready to
pull the front end forward. OK now you can disconnect these wires if you want to.
OK weíve got the belt here. Whether youíre fishing it off or fishing it on you know youíve
just got to get around that little roller there and again a little roller on this side
and out it comes. Put it right back on again because thereís nothing wrong with this one
and, also, as I mentioned this unitís going to the recycling centre right after Iím filming
this video. So Iím just going to lay it on top, reach underneath here and pass it past
that roller and Iím going to pass this side over here past that roller again and Iím
going to work it towards the back. I can see here thereís a stripe where it used to run
so thatís what Iím going to want it to run on. Now all I have to do is go underneath
and hook it over the drive motor and the tensioner and, um, slap a few things back together and
Iím done. So thereís the back of the old dryer. Go
on down to the bottom of it and get ourselves in here after I clean it up a little bit.
Yeoush. So the first thing we discover is what a horrible
mess it is inside. Anyway so Iím just going to clean this up real quick with my shop-vac.
Keep in mind the powerís off and unplugged.
Now we can see what weíre doing. OK so straight up you can see that this is
the tensioning device right here. Iíve seen some that are spring loaded. This one is a
spring in of itself, by its nature. You can see the very base of it is tied into this
little tab right here thatís holding it in place. Itís simply a very springy piece of
a steel rod and so you just pull on it like that.
I donít know if youíre going to be able to see. Letís try zooming in a little.
Put it over the end of the drive shaft of the motor and then you want to pull the tensioning
device beyond it, to push up on it. Letís see if I can do that simply and easily. And
of course you donít want to twist the belt while youíre doing that. Letís try that
again. Iíll just pull the wheel on the tensioner towards myself and then up like that. Now,
again, you want to make sure that itís not ñ there we go - that itís not twisted at
all so that it rolls properly. So here weíll show you. OK so that goes on there like that
and that goes on there like that and it should roll nice. There we go.
Plug it in first and then turn on the power.