JUST J J J JIGGLE IT A BIT*

 * With apologies to The The The Guy - and Arkwright.

The Old Girl was using the washing machine today and called out to alert me that the machine had stopped working halfway through the wash cycle. It had locked up and was beeping its head off trying to tell us that there was a problem.

"We'd better get a man in." she said.

"A 'man' would cost us several hundred dollars" I replied, "it'd be cheaper probably to buy another (reconditioned) one."

The washing machine - A Fisher and Paykel GW series has given us great service for about 20 years.

I said that I'd check out the instruction manual (fortunately I've learned to keep all of the manuals that come with things we buy) and, if necessary, on-line to see if there was a solution. There were lots of suggestions but none that seemed to relate to our particular problem.

"We'd better get a man in." The Old Girl said again.

I wasn't going to do that straight away as tradespeople, particularly fix-it people** for dedicated company products charge 'an arm and a leg' for services and this is exacerbated by the fact that we live 30 minutes from town meaning an hour's travelling time.

What I did, when The Old Girl was at work in her office (my study) was manoeuvre the machine out of its dedicated space, empty out the heavy and wet towels and clothing that most likely contributed to overloading and set the machine to 'spin'. Nothing happened but the machine made some noises like it was trying to engage the motor. I then turned it off, removed the plug from the wall socket and tipped the machine over to a 45 degree angle. I propped it up so that it wouldn't come down on top of me and made sure that no water was leaking out. I looked at the workings underneath - things like this pump and wiring ...

... plus the bottom of the drum.

Using all the knowledge of things mechanical and electrical that I've built up over the years I poked, prodded, twisted, thumped and j j j jiggled everything that was within reach. I then re-righted the machine, pushed it back into place, reattached the water lines and the drain hose, plugged it in and turned it on to the 'spin' setting. 'Clunk', 'clank' and 'whirr' it said before starting up its spin cycle and emptying out the water in the drum. Job done. I put half of the amount of wet washing back into the machine - just in case - and set it to the normal wash settings. It's now working perfectly.

Hey! I'm pleased.

** The more observant reader will have noticed that I wrote 'tradespeople' and not 'tradesmen'. I'm not being particularly PC as, on the last 3 occasions that I've had tradespeople call in to do jobs - air conditioning yearly service, heat pumps filter changes and window washing - the tradesperson was a young woman. "More power to them" I say.