Common Clothes Dryer Problems

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My thanks to all the Liberals and Conservatives who have stopped by.

You probably spent, like, a year's salary on high-tech drying equipment. Nestled quietly in your basement reside a matching washer and dryer. Daily you dutifully deposit soiled garments in the former and clean but wet togs in the latter.

One fateful day the dryer discontinues its' appointed duties. You could sit around and fret, but try reading this helpful article instead. If you don't find an answer here, feel free to revert to fretting or call a qualified repairperson.

How many of us faithfully remember to empty pockets before doing laundry? Movie tickets, dollar bills, cell phones, coins, keys, and even the odd monkey wrench end up enduring the wash/dry cycle. Don't let this happen to you.

Listen closely for incredibly annoying banging sounds when you turn on the dryer. It may go 'round and 'round, but it may also distribute an incredible clatter throughout the house. That clatter could indicate a wayward wrench that you missed in the triage phase.

Good news: even if your favorite wrench processes through an entire wash/dry cycle you should nevertheless find yourself with a clean and functional tool. Wrenches are made of sterner stuff. You might shrink a shirt or bleach a blouse but that wrench will persist.

A city the size of Detroit burns down every year due to dryer fires, or something like that. You can do your part by hiring Smokey the Bear to sit in your laundry room. Alternatively you could clean out the dust occluding your vents and filters. None of us wants to be known as a person with dusty vents and filters.

Typically a filter can be found at the front of your dryer, just below the big opening where you shove the ball of wet clothes, sans monkey wrench. That filter should be cleaned every time a new sphere of soaked shorts is submitted. The dust represents dead skin, cat hair, and assorted flotsam ejected from the previous load of clothes that tumbled into dryness. If you're careful you might remove the dust in a single continuous unit, almost like a piece of fabric designed to precisely block air flow through the filter.

Sadly, much of the dust evades the filter. It accumulates farther down the vent, but not far enough to escape into the outside world where your neighbors can choke in it as they grill burgers on their new deck. This recalcitrant dust must be tracked down manually, probably not by you. You, although a really good accountant or roofer or dental assistant, are not remotely qualified to safely remove this dust. A qualified dryer vent engineer should me invited.

When a clothes dryer operates properly it generates a pleasant low frequency hum that shakes the entire house. When something goes wrong, it's very quiet but much less efficient.

Clothes dryers typically operate by converting electrical current into mechanical work and heat. Current originates in a coal-fired complex, picketed by long-haired twenty-somethings who would not recognize the business end of a clothes washer. If your dryer doesn't turn-on, check to see if it's plugged in.

For better or worse a typical home is not replete with infinite amounts of electrical outlets. Your dryer consumes an outlet on an ongoing basis. Possibly another family member needed to charge their phone or hook up their backup X-Box, thereby causing them to appropriate the outlet previously dedicated to your clothes dehydrating device. It could happen.

In 700 words or more I have explained three things that could cause your clothes dryer to operate at less than peak efficiency. I also tried to sell you three things through strategic deployment of Amazon capsules, also known as spammy elements.

Be sure to leave a comment below so I know how much you enjoyed my exposition. It wasn't a PhD dissertation, which I am supposed to be writing, but I did my best.

Whoops, I just realized I am not quite up to 700 words. I will add a poll but I don't believe it affects the word count. Google is watching and I don't want to disappoint.