How to replace a bearing in a washing machine with your own hands: repair steps with photo

How to under­stand that it is nec­es­sary to replace the bear­ing in the wash­ing machine? In the process of wash­ing clothes, it begins to make noise, knock, creak. And over time, these unpleas­ant sounds will only inten­si­fy. If the bear­ing is not replaced in time, then it will be much more dif­fi­cult to do it lat­er. Also, if you do not change the bear­ing in a time­ly man­ner, the wash­ing machine may com­plete­ly break down, and will no longer be repairable. The best option is to imme­di­ate­ly replace it with a new one if a bear­ing fail­ure is detect­ed.

Replac­ing the bear­ing your­self will not be very easy and not at all fast. There­fore, before chang­ing it, you need to decide whether you can do all the nec­es­sary work with your own hands? If such work is not with­in your pow­er, then it is bet­ter to call the mas­ter. Bear­ing replace­ment, includ­ing the cost of a new part, will cost you about a third of the cost of a new wash­ing machine. Of course, there are dif­fer­ent prices for house­hold appli­ances and their repair today, and there­fore the cost of repair giv­en by us is con­di­tion­al.

So, if you still decide to do the repair your­self, then let’s take a clos­er look at how to do it.

Preparation for repair

Do-it-your­self wash­ing machine repair begins with the prepa­ra­tion of the nec­es­sary tools and spare parts. Remem­ber, the fur­ther life of the auto­mat­ic machine depends on the qual­i­ty of spare parts, for this rea­son do not pur­chase cheap ana­logues, give pref­er­ence to orig­i­nal parts.
So, you will need:

1. A ham­mer
2. Open-end wrench­es of var­i­ous sizes
3. pli­ers
4. met­al pin
5. Screw­driv­er Set
6. Sil­i­cone based sealant
7. Water repel­lent or lithol
8. Cam­era
9. 2 bear­ings
10. Stuff­ing box

In order to be guar­an­teed to pur­chase exact­ly the bear­ing that you need, you must first remove the old one and select an iden­ti­cal one with it. You may need a cam­era to help you assem­ble your repaired car. Before dis­as­sem­bling a par­tic­u­lar sec­tion, take a pic­ture of it and then you will know exact­ly how to assem­ble it after repair. When shoot­ing, pay spe­cial atten­tion to wiring con­nec­tions.

Before replac­ing a bear­ing in a wash­ing machine, make sure that reg­u­lar lubri­ca­tion will not fix the prob­lem. It often hap­pens that the wash­ing machine starts to rat­tle from the thin­ning of the lubri­cant lay­er. How to lubri­cate a bear­ing in a wash­ing machine? To lubri­cate this ele­ment, it must be released from the pro­tec­tive cov­ers with a scalpel. Remove the cov­er care­ful­ly. Lubri­cate the part with a spe­cial water­proof lubri­cant for wash­ing machines. Next, take a new oil seal, also treat it with grease and install. Close the lid. If after these steps the noise is not elim­i­nat­ed, it is nec­es­sary to change the bear­ing.

Stage one — disassembly of the washing machine

First you need to remove the cov­er of the device. This is done quite sim­ply. You should unscrew the two bolts on the rear side pan­el of the cov­er and sim­ply lift it by slid­ing it back a lit­tle.

Next, you need to pull out the deter­gent tray. Pull the tray towards you and press the spe­cial latch, while pulling the pow­der recep­ta­cle towards you. These actions should release the tray, and it will eas­i­ly come out of the slots. In some mod­els, there is no such but­ton, then you just need to pull the tray, press­ing it down a lit­tle.

To remove the upper dash­board, you need to care­ful­ly inspect it. Find out where in your mod­el the bolts for this pan­el are locat­ed, and unscrew them all. If the pan­el does not come off eas­i­ly after this, then you missed one or more bolts. After the pan­el cov­er is unscrewed and eas­i­ly comes out, dis­con­nect all wires from the sock­ets and com­plete­ly remove the ele­ment. Don’t for­get to take pic­tures of all parts dur­ing dis­as­sem­bly. The next step is to remove the bot­tom pan­el. The process should­n’t be dif­fi­cult. Using a flat­head screw­driv­er, press the tabs that hold the bar in place and it will release eas­i­ly.

Stage two — remove the cuff of the hatch

The cuff is a spe­cial rub­ber gas­ket that con­nects the hatch open­ing and the laun­dry drum. It is fas­tened very sim­ply with the help of a spring and a clamp. To release the cuff and gain access to the removal of the entire front pan­el, you need to find the clamp. It can be detect­ed visu­al­ly. To remove it, use a flat screw­driv­er to pry off the spring and pull out the clamp. After that, care­ful­ly detach the cuff from the hatch hole and place it in the drum. Now the part we need is com­plete­ly free, you can start dis­man­tling it.

Step three — remove the front panel

Hav­ing snapped the hatch of the wash­ing machine, you need to unscrew the bolts that hold the pan­el. After that, you need to care­ful­ly remove it from the hook. Don’t pull hard. The pan­el is con­nect­ed by wire to the hatch lock. Don’t dam­age it. As soon as you were able to push this part towards you, dis­con­nect the wire, only then you can ful­ly remove the front wall and free access to the rest of the device.

Stage four — remove the tank

First you need to get rid of the inner top pan­el. First of all, you need to inspect the back of the machine and find the screws that secure the water sup­ply valve. Hav­ing unscrewed these fas­ten­ers, you can begin to twist the bolts on the pan­el. Do not rush to remove it, because you still need to care­ful­ly dis­con­nect all the wires and pipes. When every­thing is dis­con­nect­ed, you can remove the pan­el itself.

Next, we pro­ceed to dis­con­nect the drain pipe. It con­nects to the tank of the wash­ing machine with a clamp. Unscrew the clamp and dis­con­nect the drain pipe.
After that, we pro­ceed to dis­con­nect the heat­ing ele­ment. In dif­fer­ent mod­els, it can be locat­ed in front or behind the struc­ture. If your tubu­lar elec­tric heater (TEH) is at the back, you will need to remove the back wall. Care­ful­ly dis­con­nect all leads going to the heat­ing ele­ment. Do not for­get to pho­to­graph the ini­tial state before this. At this stage, the wiring must be dis­con­nect­ed com­plete­ly. Please note that in some places it can be attached to parts of the machine using dif­fer­ent fas­ten­ers. After dis­con­nect­ing all the wires, we pull them out.

We get rid of con­tra­dic­tions. This must be done so that the tank is not too heavy. Unscrew them care­ful­ly. Then dis­con­nect the water lev­el sen­sor. Shock absorbers can be detached. Armed with a wrench, unscrew the bolts hold­ing these parts. For these jobs, it is best to use a noz­zle with an exten­sion cord.

Keep in mind that the tank itself is light­weight, so you don’t have to use much effort to remove it. Put one hand into the tank and lift it up. With the oth­er hand, release the con­tain­er from the springs on which it is attached. After that, it can be pulled out.

The final step is to remove the belt, unscrew the engine and shock absorbers. The ful­ly emp­tied reser­voir can be dis­man­tled to replace the bear­ing.

Stage five — disassemble the tank

After the tank is released, you may notice that it con­sists of two halves. These halves are fas­tened togeth­er along the entire perime­ter of the con­nec­tion. Fas­ten­ers depend on the brand and mod­el of the wash­ing machine, these can be bolts or spe­cial latch­es. You need to sep­a­rate the halves. We act depend­ing on the type of fas­ten­ers. Hav­ing removed the front part, you can often observe the pres­ence of debris and dirty deposits. Before assem­bly, it is desir­able to get rid of dirt. On the back half you will see a drum. It is he who is our goal.

This stage is the most respon­si­ble and requires increased atten­tion and cau­tion. We need to care­ful­ly detach the drum. First of all, remove the pul­ley. Just unscrew the fas­ten­ers hold­ing this part and remove the pul­ley from the axle. After remov­ing the pul­ley, screw the unscrewed bolt back. At the same time, we spare no effort so as not to spoil the shaft dur­ing fur­ther work.

We take a ham­mer. At this stage, do not be zeal­ous, pro­ceed with cau­tion. We are try­ing to grad­u­al­ly knock out the shaft. If these manip­u­la­tions are in vain and the shaft remains in place, it is bet­ter to replace the bolt in order to avoid dam­age to it. We keep knock­ing. As soon as the shaft is lev­el with the top of the bolt, we remove the bolt, and pull out the drum.

We pro­ceed to a visu­al inspec­tion of the bush­ing and shaft. Often, with untime­ly repairs, these spare parts can wear out so much that you have to replace the cross. In order to assess the con­di­tion of the shaft, it should be wiped with a dry, clean cloth. After that, care­ful­ly inspect it from all sides for the pres­ence of devel­op­ment. To be com­plete­ly sure of the integri­ty of the shaft, put a new bear­ing on it, and deter­mine if there is any play. If you still notice a flaw, change the shaft with the cross with­out hes­i­ta­tion.

Next, inspect the bush­ing. It is locat­ed on the shaft and is intend­ed for dress­ing the stuff­ing box. The bush­ing should also not show signs of strong wear and mechan­i­cal dam­age. If you find strong­ly pro­nounced trans­verse grooves, such a part will no longer be able to per­form its func­tions. An oil seal put on such a sleeve will not be able to pro­tect the bear­ing from water, and the repair will need to be done again.

Stage six — replacement of bearings

To remove the bear­ings, you need to remove the oil seal. It pulls out very eas­i­ly. Use a flat­head screw­driv­er to pry out the oil seal and pry it out. Next, we take a met­al pin in our hands. With its help, we will knock out these ele­ments. Putting the pin to the bear­ing, hit it with a ham­mer. Then we strike oppo­site, the strikes should be in the form of a cross, on the four sides of the spare part. With this sim­ple tech­nique, you can knock out both bear­ings.

With these manip­u­la­tions, keep in mind that the small­er bear­ing must be knocked out from the inside, and the larg­er one from the out­side of the tank. Also, when per­form­ing these works, exer­cise max­i­mum care so as not to dam­age the prod­uct. It is best to knock out, rest­ing the part on one knee.

At the end of this stage, pay atten­tion to the back wall and the places where the bear­ings sit. These areas should be free of dirt or debris. They should not just be cleaned, they should be pol­ished to a shine. Only in this case you will not have to repair the car again for a long time.

Well, now it’s time to unpack the new bear­ings. We take the one that is small­er and ham­mer it into place of the filmed one. We also apply a met­al pin to oppo­site sides, and ham­mer it with light blows of a ham­mer. In order to deter­mine whether the ele­ment has sat down in its place, care­ful­ly lis­ten to the sound at the next impact. When the part is in place as expect­ed, the sound will be more sonorous.

We car­ry out a sim­i­lar oper­a­tion to change the large bear­ing. Next, we move on to installing a new oil seal. It must be treat­ed with lubri­cant, only after that the oil seal can be placed in place. Experts advise using spe­cial lubri­cants designed for wash­ing machines. How­ev­er, such lubri­cants are not always avail­able com­mer­cial­ly. If you have not found a lubri­cant, you can use brand 24 lithol. This mate­r­i­al is freely sold in auto­mo­tive stores.

Stage seven — final

Now you can be con­grat­u­lat­ed, the main part of the work is com­plet­ed. You have replaced the nec­es­sary ele­ment, it’s time to return every­thing to its place. First of all, it is rec­om­mend­ed to lubri­cate and install the sleeve in its place. Next, con­nect the halves of the con­tain­er. In order for the tank not to lose its tight­ness after assem­bly, it is bet­ter to change the seal­ing ring. If you do not have one, treat the joined edges with sil­i­cone sealant and con­nect the con­tain­er.

Next, fol­low­ing the pho­tos or just the instruc­tions, we assem­ble the wash­ing machine in reverse order.

For many of us today, a wash­ing machine is an inte­gral part of house­keep­ing. The machine does a sig­nif­i­cant part of the work for us, giv­ing us com­fort and extra min­utes of rest. How­ev­er, in order to pre­vent your machine from fail­ing at the most inop­por­tune moment, it is rec­om­mend­ed to car­ry out time­ly reg­u­lar ser­vice main­te­nance. This will guar­an­tee the long and trou­ble-free oper­a­tion of your machine.

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