Just to prove I don’t always take forever and a day to post what it is I’ve been up to, here’s a story of my last hour or so.

I dropped in at the Goodwood Road Bruhaus to collect some of my things, and Mike mentioned in passing that the washing machine was stuffed. This was somewhat infuriating – albeit not surprising, given the origin of this washer – insofar as it would be the 2nd washer we’d busted. I figured it’d be worth a look at, and so we set about a troubleshooting session.

The main problem was that the water wasn’t pumping out of the tub, so first we had to syphon that out. I commend Mike for taking the risky job of getting that nasty stuff in his mouth, but then it was nasty stuff out of his nasty clothes, so that’s only fair.

Next we tried every different setting on the dial just to make sure it wasn’t doing what it was meant to, and it wasn’t. We then held our breaths and took the back off the washer. This represented a moment of truth, because neither one of us knew a damned thing about washing machines, so taking the back off could have just been a gesture to save our feeling of masculinity in being able to fix things. We both agreed that nothing looked amiss – as far as we could tell. Faced with the prospect of defeat, we both got scientific about it, and rationalised that there were only a couple of reasons it could be not pumping.

Firstly, there might be somethnig blocking the drain hose. We pulled that off and flushed water through it. OK, no problem.

Second – there might be something blocking the hose from the tub to the pump. It certainly felt dry (ascertained by an experimental squeeze). We removed that and flushed it, and no – not blocked.

Thirdly, there could be a blockage in the tub drainage hole. We tipped the washer back up, and the remaining water came pissing out into the inner workings of the washer. So that seemed fine.

Our last hypothesis therefore was that there was something wrong with the pump. We undid the bolts holding it on to the chassis, and took it out. After a quick peer down the tube it seemed apparent to me that there was something blocking it – I thought some exceptionally large lintballs or something. I grabbed the needlenose pliers and gave it a mighty yank. There was a tearing sound, and a thin blue strip of material came out partially. This worried me somewhat, as I realised that I had no idea what was inside a pump, and that this may in fact be some kind of internal belt. Mike cast a non-expert eye over it, and concluded that he had no idea either.

After a moment, I rationalised that the pump was now either completely stuffed, or the thing wasn’t meant to be there, so in either case it didn’t matter if we pulled whatever it was all the way out. A good theory, except it was lodged there good & proper. I stuck my finger in the other tube (where the water comes out) to see if there was anything in there, and sure enough there was material. We inserted the pliers and yanked again, and this time another piece of material came out, with what looked like letters. It said “Bonds”. Mike at this point went “Oh bloody hell, that’s one of my good socks”.

We excitedly removed the sock, bolted the pump back on, reattached all the hoses, put the back on, and hooked up the washer again, and apart from making a godawful noise which Mike assures me is normal, it appears to be working again !

HA HAAAAA! In your face domestic appliances ! We the nerds are too smart for you !

Oh yes, this weekend I’ve also been pretty busy, but I’ll get to that later. The washing machine was the important bit.

2004-04-26 : Nerds 1, Domestic Whitegoods – 0 !
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