Tub Bearing

Outrageous bad design for GE. We bought a SS tub washer but during repair found hidden aluminum components as 'wet' support structures, with massive corrosion; GE's SS tub is a fraud. Main seal went bad after 2 years, washer has a drip pan - no wonder, the problem was hiden for another year while parts burned up. Replacing transmission is basically simple if you have a large hammer and pipe wrench to remove the left hand turn aluminum main holding nut. Replacement parts were okay but we are going to sell washer & dryer immediately because of bad design - it will be a good machine for someone else for a couple years.

The video with Steve is invaluable. I followed the video to replace the tub bearing. Had to jump over to the tub seal video to make sure I got it seated into the outer tub correctly. The tub bearing video skips past the seal part. Be aware that the video cut aways can be a considerable amount of time. Highly recommend a few things: 1) if you think you need to replace one of the things on my parts list (bearing, washer, seal, etc) then just replace everything at once. It's not worth it to try to reuse old nasty parts. All of the parts + 1 11/16 spanner wrench came to around 60 bucks. 2) get the washer out of its confined area and give yourself some room to work on it. I took the time to shuffle it out into my garage and setup a table to spread out the parts and tools. This procedure is a complete washer dismantle job. So take your time and be patient. 3) the aluminum hub nut is a bugger. I had to use penetrating oil and make a couple of small angled cuts with a hacksaw to relieve the tension between the nut and transmission shaft. 4) the main lower tub bearing (bushing) was also a bugger and all gummed up and rusty. Be very careful getting it out. You don't want to ruin the integrity of the outer tub cavity that it goes into. Light taps and patience using the butt end of a hammer and flat blade screwdrivers. From beginning to end, with a few breaks to let the penetrating oil do its thing, it took about four hours. I took my time, reviewed the videos throughout that time, and I've never worked on a washing machine before.

When disassembling I could not remove the 1 3/4" tub nut with in house tools and had to order the spanner wrench. Almost mandatory unless you have a socket wrench.

Worse machine ever made. Installed all parts per videos .they helped a lot. Inner tub went on crooked and first wash ruined inner/outer tubs top piece. Took to dump.

I had no difficulty dismantling the washer until I got to the hub nut. It was frozen to the cone shaped fitting it was resting in. I had to take a drill and a 3/16" drill bit and drill the flange of the hub nut and then take a chisel and break it off piece by piece. Once that was off, I lifted the tub out and tried to pry off the split ring under the tub and it too was corroded and broke when I tried to pull it off. So I would advise you to buy a hub nut and a split ring if you are replacing the tub bearing, just to be safe. I went to an appliance parts store here in town and bought them. When reassembling the tub, I couldn't get a wrench or pliers on the hub nut to get enough torque to tighten it securely. And since I didn't want to spend $43 to buy a spanner wrench for a one time repair, I went to Harbor Freight and bought a $15 dollar adjustable wrench and cut 3 1/2" off the handle so it would lay flat to the tub and used a hammer to tap on the handle to tighten it securely. If you do not find some way to tighten the tub securely, it will come loose in the spin cycle like it did on me twice before I purchased the adjustable wrench and modified it to work. Plus I still have a useable adjustable wrench. Additionally, I took the washer cabinet, the tub and the tub sleeve and power washed it to get years of grime off of it. The washer now operates like new, saving me hundreds of dollars.

Tub seal was found completely broken. Replaced it.
Then replaced tub bearing, tub bearing washer, shaft & mode shifter assembly and 6-rib drive belt.
Reassembled and tried, more quieter and like new machine.

Loosening tub nut was a challenge as it was bit corroded, use of WD40 was a great help.
Knowledge from you tube was a great help.

I dissasembled the machine and it took about 30 minutes. Orderd the parts recommended for noisy spinning. Reinstalled the new parts / changed all drum straps. Cleaned the drain drum and spin drum and after complete reassembly the washer is still noisy in agitation and spin cycle. The motor,transmission,counter weight,and drum look ok but there is still a reason why the machine is still noisy. Spent 120.00 dollars on parts so far but the drum and motor,transmission and counterweight are very expensive to replace. I am just going to keep using the machine until the washer fails to work anymore. I'm not going to put any more money in the washer. I will just buy a new one. It's not hard to dissasembled and reassemble the washer. I purchased the parts that was recommended to fix the washer but they were not the ones.The new parts did help like the tub seal but the bottom line is that the washer is still noisy. I watched your videos to work on the washer and there were no special instructions on disassembly and reassembly. Like always there must be more than i know to repair this washer. Thanks

Followed instructions from video for shaft and mode shifter assembly and tub bearing, all went as in video except extremely difficult to remove tub nut. Could not get nut to loosen and when it did finally move it was spinning the whole shaft, had to have the shaft held with a pipe wrench from underneath (2nd person). The tub seal was another issue, removal was easy just as in the video but because water had gotten inside the seal it caused the internal metal of the seal to corrode and rust which deformed the old seal and the plastic of the tub where the seal sits. There was no way the new seal would go in and be tight enough to seal so I put a hose clamp around it, heated the plastic with a heat gun just enough to be able to tighten the clamp several times, let it cool and removed the clamp. It held its shape and the new seal went in snug so I proceeded with the reassembly. Test ran the washer and checked for leaks, no leaks. It has been a week now and approximately 10 loads of clothes cleaned, all is good.

Followed video on You tube that showed step by step how to compete repair.
The machine used in video was brand new and there was no corrosion on any parts so disassembly was much easier in video than on 9 year old machine.
Also reinstalling drive belt was a little tedious but overall job very straightforward and resulted in positive improvements in performance and greatly reduced noise levels.

Followed videos on partselect.com for changing tub bearing. Video does very good job of showing steps required. Repair would be easy if washer was new. First problem was conical tub nut could not be loosened even applying penetrating oil and heat. Finally resorted to 1/2" drive pneumatic impact gun (wrench) which hammered about 10 seconds before the nut came loose. Had to purchase 1-11/16 deep well 6 point impact socket at cost of about $30 for this task. Second difficulty was removing tub seal whose exterior rubber coating had apparently failed and the seal internal metal parts corroded causing it to expand. The tub seal had to be beat out from the bottom side using a drift. The next difficulty was removing the tub bearing which had corroded from minor leakage through the tub seal. Corrosion made the tub bearing outside diameter (OD) larger so it could not be removed using the method in the video. The outer tub bottom side was supported as close to the center as best possible and a socket just smaller than the tub bearing OD was placed on top of the bearing and was used to drive (hammer) the tub bearing out. There was a lot of cleaning necessary especially on the inner tub conical fit areas where tub rides on the split ring and hub nut. During reassembly the tub seal did not have a press fit into the tub; it was barely finger tight. I suspect the tub had permanently distorted in the seal area because the old tub seal had corroded and expanded. So silicone sealant was applied to the outside diameter of the tub seal to assure no leakage around the seal. I allowed that to cure overnight to be certain the seal would not move when inserting the shaft and mode shifter through the seal. A very light oil was applied inside the tub bearing. The last problem found was when tightening the bolts holding the base frame to the outer tub the base frame was pulled to one side so the mode shifter was not concentric with the base frame. This would place a side load on the mode shifter shaft and tub bearing. This was resolved by placing a 1/16" thick washer between one leg of the tub and base frame which maintained the base frame concentric to the mode shifter as the tub to base frame bolts were tightened. The repair is conceptually easy to perform but was challenging due to corrosion and detergent residue from 11 years operation. Now the washer rotating parts are essentially new, the repaired assembly is probably better than the original factory assembly, and the washer should operate for another ten years before the mode shifter bearing goes out again. A longer repair than anticipated but time and money well spent. Being retired helps.