Death, Destruction and Clean Tighty-Whities

When I moved into my current apartment I bought the cheapest washing machine available at the appliance store (we're not talking about Bob from Atomic Laundromat here...).  The salesman talked me into getting it without paying an extra $150 for installation, saying it's easy to do, just remove the shipping bolts, hook up the hoses and plug it in...  He also suggested that just tipping the delivery guys a little extra and they'll be happy to do it.  I went with the last option, though in fact, I had little choice, the delivery guy just did it as he brought it up...

When I ran it the thing vibrated and shook.  It seemed like it was trying to escape from the closet.

The machine in the closet
with the box and blanket.

Over the course of a couple of months it got worse and worse.  I crammed a box with another appliance's packing material in between the wall and the washing machine, and it helped it a little, at least keeping it from shaking and moving enough in one direction to bang out the door...  But it still hit the door jamb enough to often turn itself off by knocking in the power button...

To get around that I took a green blanket I had and tried to jam it in hard enough between the machine and the door jamb so it wouldn't move in that direction, and it mostly worked.

Some friends suggested trying to adjust the feet to get it level as that could cause it to make noise.  But using my iPhone with some spirit level software, it was already fairly level, though various parts of the top were off level in different directions, so I couldn't easily determine which way I'd adjust it, even if I had the strength to pull it out of the closet to get to the feet...  So, I didn't do anything...

But then it just got louder and louder.  For a few loads I seriously worried about it.  I thought it was self destructing.  I thought I should be sure not to stand or walk in front of the door as shattered machine parts might come flying out with force as the machine tore itself apart.

Finally, there was one load when it started going into a spin cycle and made the loudest BANG! noise I've ever imagined a washing machine making.  And then there was dead silence...

I sighed and reiterated my determination to track down the purchase and warranty information for the machine, which I'd already misplaced somewhere in the apartment.

Then I got up and opened the closet, not sure what to expect...

What I didn't expect was that the blasted thing was spin drying my clothes.  Without a peep.  In dead silence...

And since then, every load is like that.  The loudest it gets is when sloshing soapy water around during wash cycles, maybe a little shaking and shuddering for as much as five seconds when beginning a spin, then all quiet...

Now what a total luxury it is to have a quick and easy washing machine, to toss a load into it after work and not worry about being tense and stressed out about the horrible noise...