A squeaking, thumping, rumbling, or non-spinning clothes dryer may only need a new drive belt, drum rollers, or idler pulley. These affordable parts can often be replaced together with ordinary hand tools, avoiding an expensive service call or a premature dryer replacement.
Electric clothes dryers are relatively simple machines, and many common repairs can be completed by someone with moderate DIY skills. When a dryer begins squeaking, thumping, rumbling, or refusing to spin, the problem may be a worn drive belt, damaged drum rollers, or a failing idler pulley.
These parts are reasonably priced, but reaching them requires opening much of the dryer cabinet. So, it makes sense to inspect and, when needed, replace the belt, both drum rollers, and the idler pulley during the same repair.
We have a Whirlpool WED5600SQ0 electric dryer. Many Whirlpool-built dryers sold under other brand names use a similar cabinet and drive system, but always verify the correct parts and repair procedure using the complete model number from your dryer.
TOOLS USED
• Putty knife or small pry bar • Small flat-blade screwdriver • Medium Phillips screwdriver • 5/16-inch nut driver or socket • Vacuum and clean shop rag • Fine sandpaper for removing minor shaft burrs
Always unplug the dryer before beginning. If servicing a gas dryer, shut off the gas supply before moving or opening the appliance.
REPAIR STEPS
1. Remove the lint filter and two screws near its opening. Place a rag in the opening so a screw cannot fall into the duct. 2. Use a putty knife to release the spring clips between the top and front panels. Lift and securely support the top. 3. Disconnect the door-switch wiring, remove the front-panel screws, and lift the panel off its lower tabs. 4. Photograph the belt path around the motor and idler pulleys before removing it. This will simplify reassembly. 5. Move the idler arm to release tension, slip the belt off the pulleys, and use the belt to carefully lift out the drum. 6. Inspect the belt for cracks, glazing, frayed edges, missing ribs, or stretching. The grooved side faces the drum. 7. Check the idler pulley for stiffness, wobble, grooves, or noise. Replacing a questionable pulley now can prevent another teardown. 8. Remove the retaining clips, washers, braces, and rollers, keeping the parts in their original order. 9. Clean each roller shaft and check for rust, grooves, or burrs. Smooth minor burrs with fine sandpaper; replace badly worn shafts. 10. Many rollers run on clean, dry shafts. Do not use oil, penetrating lubricant, or WD-40. Lubricate only if specified by the manufacturer. 11. Install the new rollers, washers, clips, and brace. Confirm each roller spins freely without excessive side movement. 12. Vacuum lint from the dryer cabinet, motor area, blower housing, and floor before reinstalling the drum. 13. Place the new belt around the drum with the grooved side against it. 14. Return the drum to the cabinet, seat it on the rear rollers, and route the belt using your reference photograph. 15. Turn the drum slowly by hand several revolutions to center the belt and confirm proper routing. 16. Reinstall the front panel, making sure the drum rests correctly in the front opening. 17. Reconnect the door switch, secure the panel, lower the top, and press until the spring clips engage. 18. Reinstall the lint-filter screws, remove the rag, and replace the lint filter. 19. Check that no tools or loose parts remain inside before plugging in the dryer. 20. Run the dryer briefly while empty and listen for smooth, quiet operation.
Replacing the belt, drum rollers, and idler pulley can restore proper drum movement, eliminate irritating noises, and add years of useful life to an otherwise dependable clothes dryer.
This video provides a step-by-step guide on how to repair a Whirlpool dryer that is noisy, refusing to spin, or slipping. The host, Dirt Farmer Jay, demonstrates how to replace the drive belt and the rear rollers to restore the machine's performance, reduce noise, and save money by avoiding a professional repair or a new appliance.
Hey, Dirt Farmer Jay here from DirtFarmerJay.com.
If you have a dryer like this,
and it's making a lot of noise,
or it's refusing to spin,
or it's just not doing the job it should be doing,
the repair is probably a lot easier than you think.
I'm gonna walk you through it, stay tuned.
Hey, Dirt Farmer Jay here from DirtFarmerJay.com.
We've had this workhorse dryer for many, many years.
This is a Whirlpool,
and we just keep repairing it,
because it keeps running,
and I'm just too cheap to buy the upright one
to match the front loader washing machine
that's off to my left shoulder here.
But it just keeps doing the job,
and not too long ago,
I needed to replace the belt,
because it was slipping,
I wasn't getting the turning action,
and there was squealing and resistance
of turning of the rollers,
and so I was able to tear in it and do the repair.
Now, I need to get the repair done,
and so I didn't do a great job of filming it,
so you're gonna see a lot of times I'm using a phone,
one-handed, it's kind of shaky, bad video,
please forgive me,
but I'm gonna walk you through what we did,
and the repairs have already been done,
but you'll be able to clearly see how to get inside
what is a relatively simple appliance,
do the repairs yourself,
end up with something that's gonna run a lot longer,
and save a ton of money.
Let's get to it.
As a courtesy to you,
both the list of the tools,
and the steps that it's gonna take
are all listed in detail in the description below,
as well as the part source,
where you can order the parts that I used in here.
Now, the tools you need are pretty simple,
you're gonna need a putty knife to pry open an area,
a 516 nut driver that you're gonna take apart
the outside panels here to get to the interior,
you're gonna have a Phillips screwdriver,
and a little straight bladed screwdriver,
I have a needle nose locking set of pliers here,
perhaps to grab onto some of the clips that hold
some of the rollers, that sort of thing.
But generally speaking,
if there's some other pickup tools
that I find that I'll need,
they're not gonna be complex,
and they're probably the kind of tools
you already have in your toolbox.
So, and then as I said, as I go through this,
you don't have to watch this over and over again and pause,
you can go to the description below,
and all of the steps are there.
Well, let's tear into it.
Step zero, that is, before you actually even start the job,
is to make sure that the dryer is unplugged.
So go ahead and get that undone,
pull that off, and don't touch the blades as you're doing so,
keep your hands on the rubber,
and then move that off to the side.
Okay, you're gonna begin by pulling the lint screen,
and when you do, just set that off to the side,
somewhere safe.
And then the first thing you're gonna notice,
there's two Phillips screws right here.
Well, the first thing I do,
because we're gonna be taking those out,
is I'm gonna put something down here,
so if that pops off, I don't lose it down here,
and it goes to where I don't ever wanna try to get it back.
So I'm just gonna go ahead and plug that off
with a rolled up towel like that,
and then we're gonna go ahead and remove these screws.
Take these and set them off someplace safe
where you know where they are.
Now you can remove that.
Now that is taken off from there.
Now we're gonna move to the front edge of the cabinet.
There's two clips that are holding the top
that we're just gonna pry up,
and then this whole top will pivot up.
Here we go.
They're probably about right in here,
so what I'm gonna do is push in.
There we go, first one comes up.
And pardon my space between us here.
There we go.
All right, now that that is there,
I'm gonna go ahead and scoot the dryer out
just a little bit.
Now I'm gonna tip this back.
So the next thing we need to do
is disconnect the wiring that goes to the door switch,
which is right here,
but there is a plug connection right here
that you need a straight screwdriver
to pry apart the tabs and disconnect the junction.
All right, the next step is,
is you need to remove the fasteners
that are holding the front of the dryer in.
So right here, use a 516-inch nut driver
and simply back that out.
And again, keep control of your fasteners
because you don't wanna have those drop
down in the middle of nowhere.
So once I loosen them up,
I'm keeping the fastener tight against the end,
and then I'm gonna go ahead and pull that out,
holding onto it.
You need to finagle it, but now I've captured it,
and I'm gonna put it off the side.
Now, we're gonna come over to the other side right there
and do the other corner.
And for the second side, we'll do the same thing,
kind of step and repeat.
We'll go ahead and 516-inch driver.
And there you can see that the front has now let go.
Let's go and stow these screws and then get the front off.
All right, now we're gonna pull this up.
And as you can see,
the drum is already kind of tilting forward.
This is the belt that actually turns it
and goes around to the motor.
Need to cover a towel over and put it,
the bottom edge of that has enamel, it can be sharp.
And so we're gonna just pull this up.
And when we do, now you can pull that away
and put it away to the side.
All right, on the first part of this repair,
what we're going to do is get the belt off
that turns the drum and get it ready to replace.
And to do so, I'm gonna put my left hand under the idler
and move it that direction, taking tension off of it.
And my other hand is gonna be used to take the pulley
or to remove the belt from around the motor pulley.
So here we go, we're gonna go like this.
I'll push that idler over.
When I do, that takes off the tension off of the belt.
I'm able to let my idler go.
Now this belt is ready to come off of the entire drum
and to be replaced.
If I am this far in it, why not put new rollers in the back?
All right, I'm gonna work now to get the drum out.
However, if you were only replacing the belt
and not the rollers in the back,
you wouldn't have to take the drum out.
I'm taking it out so you can see the innards of the machine
and the secondary repair,
but you would simply put the belt back on,
retrace the path, which I'll show you on the idler arm
to get the tension correct on this
and to provide drive tension to the drum.
But we're gonna take this here
and we're gonna lift it like that
and move it out of the machine.
And as I said, it's pretty simple in there.
There's not a whole lot going on,
but now we're doing the innards of the machine.
Okay, as I promised you,
all the steps here are in the description below.
And what we've actually done is jump past
the replacement of the belt by taking out the drum,
by coming to the back to get access to these two rollers.
If you're gonna do this other part,
it's my opinion that you go ahead
and replace these two rollers.
They're probably $35 for the pair.
A new idler, this one here,
which that was replaced when we did it before.
It's still in good condition.
The black that you see,
it is actually the belt powder as it runs.
So the repair has already been done.
But what you would do here, and let's walk through it.
The first thing you would do
is use a 5 16th inch nut driver,
pull off this brace right here and rotate it off.
And there's a clip right here that'll be removed.
When you do, this gets you access to this.
And in the original video, these would barely turn.
They certainly didn't free spin like that.
A lot of resistance made it hard on the motor.
The thing was slipping, it was running slow.
So when I replaced these,
it greatly enhanced the performance of the machine
and lowered the noise level of the machine as well.
So to get to this, after you pull that,
there's some clips here, you're gonna pull it off.
The new clips come in.
You can use a little pry bar, a needle nose,
something to get behind, even a stiff putty knife.
And then you just simply replace this,
put this back on and that one is done.
Really simple repair.
The work's not done here yet on rollers
until you move to the other side.
This one doesn't have a brace.
This one over here does not have a brace like this.
And it moves a little bit on the shaft to self align
on the indent around the drum.
So same idea, you're gonna pull a clip,
which it comes in the package right there.
There's a indent all the way around this.
This whole old roller, of course, this is the newer one
and it spins nicely, comes off.
You put the new one back in, put the new clip in
and now the rollers are done.
The idler assembly is just that.
It's the whole thing.
It's just gonna go in the groove right here.
And when it comes time to assemble it,
it's gonna sit here and provide the tension
on the belt that you need.
So here you are.
You've now replaced the parts you need for this repair.
It's time to actually put the drum back in
and start the reverse process.
All right, let's go and replace the drum.
This is not very heavy at all.
You just need to wheedle it into the cavity here
and you're gonna lower the back edge
over those two pulleys that you had replaced in the groove.
There you go.
You can feel it roll, but it's gonna wanna tip forward.
If you have a helper that someone can hold that up,
that's helpful, but not absolutely necessary.
It will stay in place.
So if you were only doing the belt replacement,
this is where you would be after just pulling off the belt.
And as you can see from this shot,
the old belt that we had before we did the repair
was in really bad shape.
We put in the new belt.
You can see in this other shot
where there is a grooved side of the belt.
The groove side goes towards the drum
to provide needed traction,
works around the pulley or on the motor
to provide the right traction to get around this.
So when we put this on,
we're gonna put it around the whole drum
with the groove side facing the drum
and just slide it in, get it back.
And you can see on the drum where it was before,
where it needs to be.
You're gonna just line that up out here.
And now we're gonna go around the backside,
get it around the idler pulley and on the motor pulley,
and then provide tension to this.
So now that this is ready to do work again.
All right, we now have our belt here
that is hanging loosely.
There's not tension on it,
nor is it around the pulley on the motor,
but the grooves are towards the drum as it should be.
Now we're gonna put in the idler and put it like this.
And here's the twist.
You're gonna take this
and put it down underneath the idler like this.
Let me do that again so you can see it.
Straped across the top of the idler pulley.
We push it in like this and pull it through the other side.
And now we're gonna pull that forward
until we finally have enough space to put the pulley on.
And there it is.
So now it's around the motor.
This is providing tension.
That is tight around there.
And when this activates here in a little bit,
it will rotate the drum, okay?
All right, we're ready now
to go ahead and put the front back on.
Okay, we're gonna go ahead and put that back together.
I wouldn't drive it all the way home
because you probably need to adjust on the drum.
All right, let's go to the other corner.
Now that we're able to align the other side,
let's finish driving this home.
Now both these corners are tight.
And while we're here,
let's go ahead and put back this terminal right here
that is for the door switch.
And it also controls the circuit
for the light to come on in the interior
when, as you can see, it's pulled together.
We're now solid.
All right, we're gonna go ahead and re-lower the top over,
making sure that we align on these clips here.
I'm able to pop that down so that all looks good.
Boom, that went down, that went down.
And now it's time to put the screws back over here
in the lint collector.
All right, let's line these up.
Let's move the second one.
Okay, let's go ahead and remove that safety cloth
that we had there.
Put back our lint screen.
Okay, we've plugged it back in.
Let's fire it up and see how well we did.
Let's turn it on here.
And let's just hit a, running beautifully.
Smooth, nice.
Here, open the door so you can see it rotate
as it goes to a stop.
See the light come on, boom.
We'll go ahead and let it shut, get it to start again.
Fully operational, and you did it yourself.
Another great repair you can do quickly
is replacing the door switch right here.
Check out this video where we walk you through that one,
point by point.
It's even easier than the repair we just showed,
and we'll show you there in the description
where you can get the part.
Hey, until the next time, this is Dirt Farmer Jay
enjoying saving a lot of money
and having a great appliance to boot.
