The switched off washing machine draws water — what to do?

In this arti­cle, we will con­sid­er one of the fre­quent prob­lems with water intake­when the machine is turned off. Our instruc­tions will help you quick­ly diag­nose the cause and elim­i­nate the break­down.

Causes of the malfunction

The first step is to find out the cause of the prob­lem. Con­sid­er two sources through which water can enter the drum of a wash­ing machine when it is turned off. The first is a sew­er pipe, the sec­ond is a water pipe. We study the nature of the liq­uid, if the water is cloudy or smelly, it comes from the sew­er pipe, if it is clean, it comes through the water sup­ply.

Mal­func­tions, depend­ing on the water source:

• Mal­func­tion of the sole­noid valve, which is respon­si­ble for the water sup­ply;
• Absence or mal­func­tion of the siphon valve;
• Incor­rect con­nec­tion of the wash­ing machine to the sew­er;
• The drain or sew­er sys­tem is clogged with debris, caus­ing water to flow back into the drum.

Diagnostics

The water in the drum is cloudy and with a char­ac­ter­is­tic odor, we check the drain sys­tem in stages:

• The drain hose is not fixed or is set at a lev­el below 60 cen­time­ters. If the hose is not fixed in a spe­cial brack­et (see pho­to below), water from the sew­er will enter the wash­ing machine;
• The wash­ing machine is con­nect­ed to the sink or bath­tub siphon. The siphon clogs peri­od­i­cal­ly, while using the sink or bath­tub, the water does not have time to drain into the sew­er and enters the drain hose, then into the wash­ing machine tank.
• Gen­er­al block­age of the sew­er sys­tem. In this case, the water should not drain well at the con­nec­tion point of the wash­ing machine. For exam­ple, in the bath­room, toi­let, sink or wash­basin. It all depends on the con­nec­tion of the wash­ing machine. If the block­age is com­mon, the water does not have time to be dis­charged into the gen­er­al sew­er­age and enters the wash­ing machine under pres­sure. The siphon valve solves this prob­lem.

If the water in the tank is clear, you have a faulty water start valve. It is easy to diag­nose a break­down in this case, turn off the water sup­ply valve, the water sup­ply to the tank should stop. The valve can­not be repaired, it must be replaced with a new one.

How to fix

We will not describe in detail how to clean the sew­er in this arti­cle. Siphon dis­as­sem­ble and wash the task is not dif­fi­cult. If you do not want to do it your­self, call a reg­u­lar lock­smith, he will help. This also applies to sew­er clean­ing. We rec­om­mend that you read the mate­r­i­al on how to con­nect a wash­ing machine if you have a con­nec­tion prob­lem.

Before start­ing repairs, be sure to turn off the water and dis­con­nect from the mains. Replac­ing the elec­tron­ic valve is a sim­ple repair and we will help you with this.

Note! Break­age of the water sup­ply valve is a war­ran­ty case. Self-repair will void your war­ran­ty, if any.

Front load­ing machine, the sim­plest case:

• We remove the top cov­er of the wash­er, most often it is enough to unscrew the two bolts at the back;
• We remove the elec­tric­i­ty sup­ply ter­mi­nals and dis­con­nect the hoses, unscrew the screws that secure the valve to the body;
• Install the new valve in reverse order. Fol­low the polar­i­ty of the con­nect­ed wires, do not mix them up.

In top-load­ing wash­ers, you have to remove the back wall, it also hap­pens that you have to remove the entire body. In any case, it all comes down to the fact that you need to get to the valve, the valve is locat­ed where the water is sup­plied to the wash­er. We remove the valve and install a new one.

Impor­tant:

We do not rec­om­mend repair­ing the valve, it is eas­i­er to pur­chase a new one. But repair is pos­si­ble, watch the video below “How to dis­as­sem­ble the valve”.

Do not rush to close the lid or assem­ble the body of the wash­er. We car­ry out the test step, con­nect the water sup­ply hose and start any wash to check the per­for­mance.

Precautionary measures

A few tips on how to avoid such prob­lems:

• Install a faucet to con­trol the flow of water. Before wash­ing, it can be opened, and after, respec­tive­ly, closed. The method is not for the lazy, accord­ing to experts, the inlet valve will last longer;
• Install a siphon valve. This will help elim­i­nate the ingress of sew­er water into the drum;
• It is advis­able to use a leak pro­tec­tion sys­tem that is installed on the floor. Your neigh­bors will thank you.

We hope our arti­cle helped you solve the prob­lem. Write a com­ment or share the arti­cle with social net­works, we will be pleased!

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