1. Which model of Neptune do you have? Mine is MAH5500BWW and it looks
exactly like
http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr/prod...at=Front+Load+Washers&vertical=APPL&ihtoken=1
1.a Is yours different?
I believe mine is MAH4000BWW and the one I gave my mom is a 4500. They
share the same basic mechanical structure and electronics as the rest of
the Neptunes in that series including yours. Differences are only in the
various bells & whistles, the motor and main control boards are identical.
2. When did you purchase the original wash machine? I bought mine in
summer of 2001. I am still evaluating the possibility of replacing the
motor/board and trying estimate how long it will last after the repair.
I didn't purchase either of them, I picked them up from people who for
some reason decided it was better to spend $1000 on a new machine than
$200-$300 fixing the one they had, in all fairness, one of them was
quoted $450 to do the job but if you're handy with basic hand tools and
can read directions you can easily do the job yourself. The first one I
got about 6 months ago, the other was put into service in early January.
The colleague who gave me the motor kit had his machine repaired in late
2001 and he said it hasn't failed since. He has kids so it gets a lot of
use, seems the redesigned components did in fact fix the problem.
I have never noticed any mildew on my machine. I have also performed
all the board control tests and my "machine" control board seems to
work fine. It visually looks ok too. As of this writing, on my motor
control board, R34, R35, Q5, IC3, IC18 and the 10Amp fuse are damaged.
IC18 is the part that I can't find (well cheap) :-(
One of the ones I got had mildew in it when I got it, presumably from
sitting in the person's garage for a couple months before they got rid
of it. I wiped down the door seal with some 409 and ran a load of just a
few old rags with the bleach dispenser filled and that took care of it,
haven't had any return yet.
3. Do you know what might cause the "motor" control board to fail?
Some have said power surges, my own diagnosis is poor soldering which
caused intermittent connections. This is made worse by exposure to heavy
vibration in the spin cycle. In the case of the first machine it simply
stopped working until I resoldered it, on the other, as often happens
with TV sets and other relatively high power electronics, the bad
connections caused a component to fail, which started a big chain
reaction destroying most of the semiconductors on the board. The
replacement board is of a completely different design, it uses surface
mount parts and appears to have better soldering. It's also enclosed in
a strange mounting box to protect it from vibration and damage.
4. Have you noticed any other difference on your replacement part, such
as board layout, ICs, etc.?
See above, the replacement motor board looks completely different, side
by side you'd never know they were the same thing.
5. I found from other thread that the replacement motor is quieter.
It's true on you case?
Yes, much quieter, the first time I heard it I wondered if something was
still wrong with my machine which has the original setup. The new motor
is virtually silent, all you hear is the water sloshing around and
occasionally a bit of a "sticky" sound from the belt rolling on the
pulley. I do sort of like the jet engine spooling sound mine makes when
it does the spin cycle though, the new motor doesn't do that.
P.S. James Sweet, your technical information is much appreciated as
well. I will consider the 600V triac if I get this thing to work again.
It was just what I had on hand, you can get something similar at Radio
Shack though or if you can't find one I can send you one as I have a
whole tube of them I bought on Ebay for other projects. You have to
transpose two of the pins to make it fit where the old part was but that
isn't hard to do and it works well.
