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A year or so ago the owners of our building installed new, larger dryer exhaust ductwork. We share the same external exhaust pipe with our upstairs neighbor -- both dryers are connected with a T-shaped adapter. There's a flapper valve between the two sides that closes when the other apartment is doing their drying, and opens when we're doing ours, and vice-versa. This is to prevent dryer exhaust from escaping into the apartment, which contains carbon monoxide and other bad stuff.
Lately our dryer was taking longer and longer to dry clothes. I put in a load of clothes Thursday and it took four full 70-minute cycles for them to dry. I clean out the dryer about once a year and it hadn't been that long since the last time I did it so I didn't think that was the problem.
I thought maybe the thermostat that controls the level of the dryer heat had gone bad. I took off the back of the dryer to check the thermostat and to clean out the exhaust fan compartment just in case there was lint in there.
I wish I had had my camera. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the exhaust fan. It's not a fan like an electric cooling fan; it's what's called a "squirrel cage" fan - a horizontal cylinder with vanes that suck the lint out.
The fan and fan compartment were clogged -- packed tight -- with compressed dryer lint. I never saw so much lint. There was so much lint that it completed filled the Electrolux bag.
That's why it wasn't drying again. (The thermostat was fine, thank goodness.)
Then I took off the other end of the exhaust hose where it connects to the exhaust duct that goes outside so I could clean it out. It was also coated with a thick layer of lint.
I was BAFFLED as to where all that lint had come from. I looked closely at the flapper valve, and it seemed to me that it was backward. I tested it and sure enough -- when I turned our dryer on, it made the valve shut instead of open. All this time stuff has been packing up inside there because the flow of exhaust was cut off by the improperly installed valve.
I fixed everything and got it back together, and the dryer works like a champ now. It dried a good-sized load of whites in about 45 minutes.
What would Arlee do without me?!
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A year or so ago the owners of our building installed new, larger dryer exhaust ductwork. We share the same external exhaust pipe with our upstairs neighbor -- both dryers are connected with a T-shaped adapter. There's a flapper valve between the two sides that closes when the other apartment is doing their drying, and opens when we're doing ours, and vice-versa. This is to prevent dryer exhaust from escaping into the apartment, which contains carbon monoxide and other bad stuff.
Lately our dryer was taking longer and longer to dry clothes. I put in a load of clothes Thursday and it took four full 70-minute cycles for them to dry. I clean out the dryer about once a year and it hadn't been that long since the last time I did it so I didn't think that was the problem.
I thought maybe the thermostat that controls the level of the dryer heat had gone bad. I took off the back of the dryer to check the thermostat and to clean out the exhaust fan compartment just in case there was lint in there.
I wish I had had my camera. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the exhaust fan. It's not a fan like an electric cooling fan; it's what's called a "squirrel cage" fan - a horizontal cylinder with vanes that suck the lint out.
The fan and fan compartment were clogged -- packed tight -- with compressed dryer lint. I never saw so much lint. There was so much lint that it completed filled the Electrolux bag.
That's why it wasn't drying again. (The thermostat was fine, thank goodness.)
Then I took off the other end of the exhaust hose where it connects to the exhaust duct that goes outside so I could clean it out. It was also coated with a thick layer of lint.
I was BAFFLED as to where all that lint had come from. I looked closely at the flapper valve, and it seemed to me that it was backward. I tested it and sure enough -- when I turned our dryer on, it made the valve shut instead of open. All this time stuff has been packing up inside there because the flow of exhaust was cut off by the improperly installed valve.
I fixed everything and got it back together, and the dryer works like a champ now. It dried a good-sized load of whites in about 45 minutes.
What would Arlee do without me?!
