Here’s hoping it stays working.

Today, we finally had a chance to test out the washing machine as the appliance guy described.

Which is when we discovered that when he said “back panel”, he meant the small back panel of the electronics at the top, not the large back panel of the machine.

The small panel took a lot more effort to get off. We ended up having to pry it off with a butter knife. !!

His instructions were to blow into the air hose (which turned out to be MUCH smaller than I expected) to make sure it wasn’t clogged. My daughter figured out where the end of the hose was, how to get it off, and tested it.

While we manually pumped water out of the tub, we couldn’t quite get all of it, so when she blew on the hose, we could hear air bubbles in the tub.

Which was good. It meant the hose wasn’t clogged.

That meant the next step was to do an empty wash cycle. After everything was put back together, we plugged the washer in and started the empty test load.

After we taped the spare sump pump hose to the end of the washer’s drain hose, running it out the window of the storm door. We still weren’t sure about the drain pipe in the wall being unclogged enough to not spray water all over the place again.

One of our other concerns was the washer’s tub. It was still lower than it should have been, and I was concerned something got broken under it. My daughter pointed out that it did still have water in it, so that was likely why it was lower.

With nothing in the tub, the timer set itself for only 35 minutes. She and I both stayed and watched through the window in the lid, her behind the machine and me in front of it, for the whole time.

I gotta tell ya, we were just thrilled when the washing machine actually stopped adding water when it was a few inches deep, just as the appliance guy said it should, and again when it finally reached the rinse cycle and actually drained properly, with no leaks in the cobbled together hoses leading outside.

Part way through, my older daughter came by to see if she could help. I got her to fill a container of water so we could test the drain pipe. It seemed fine, but with the washing machine going, we couldn’t be sure things weren’t gurgling further down the pipe.

Once the washer was done, with everything working fine and even the tub lifting itself up as high as it normally does, we tested the drain pipe again. This time, while my daughter poured the water down the drain as fast as the funnel would let her, I had my head in the kitchen sink, listening to the pipes.

Normally, we’d be hearing all sorts of gurgles. We always have. This time, I heard nothing.

Just to be on the safe side, though, we used the last of the Max Gel drain de-clogger, both in the kitchen sink and the drain pipe. While that was left to sit for half an hour, my daughter and I pushed the washer back into place, then she started working on the dryer hose.

She was able to get it on the fitting in the wall easily enough, but the one coming out the dryer is slightly larger. The hose is held in place with an iron spring clamp. I was expecting a screw clamp. The spring clam is such a pain! It took her almost an hour to get it on. It simply did not want to fit around the pipe from the drier, and the hose, at the same time.

While she fought with that, I waited on the drain cleaner, (and kept an eye on a roast in the oven) and boiled up a kettle of water to flush them both with. Usually we just run hot water, but the kitchen sink is far from the hot water tank and takes forever to get hot. Once the drains got their boiling water treatment, I ran the hot water in one sink, listening to the drain in the other.

Not a gurgle to be heard.

I honestly think we got finally got the pipes clear.

After all the troubles we’ve been having, though, we aren’t confident.

My daughters had to do some laundry, so as soon as the dryer hose was finally attached, they decided to give it a go. While the washing machine tub seems to be behaving properly, they’re still going to do a couple of small loads, instead of one big one – and the washing machine’s drain hose is still set up to drain outside!

The problem with the drain hose is that the only way we can be sure if it’s clear enough is to actually let the washing machine drain through it. There’s nothing else we have that can push that much water, under that much pressure, though the drain pipe. If it does start backing up again, we’ll end up with the same mess all over again.

For now, we’re going to baby the darn thing, with small loads, until we’re sure the tub can handle the weight before increasing it.

Then we’ll test out the pipes.

The Re-Farmer