Would appreciate info from anyone who might have a bit of experience with Beaumark clothes dryers.
Bought one of these used (2 or 3 years old). No owner's manual, and I can't decide whether I need to learn how to use it, or whether I need to fix it :)
Manual works just fine. Timer advances, buzzer sounds, and all is well.
The "auto" settings for delicate works fine. Starts hot, gets cooler, times out, buzzer sounds, and all is well.
However, the normal "auto" seems to go on forever and ever. Starts real hot, eventually cools down to lukewarm, but the timer never moves. (I can hear the motor running)
Left it run for a couple of hours with one pair of jeans. The jeans were super dry and badly beaten up, but the timer never advanced at all, and it appeared to be willing to go on forever.
Anyone any ideas? Anyone know where the humidity sensor is?
They say that one of the early signs is talking to yourself. Hope that doesn't also apply to replying to your own messages, but I'll do it anyway in the hope that it may help someone else :)
Found the humidity sensor - not in the exhaust duct where I had expected, but rather in the drum itself. Very large, can't miss it if you stick your head in with a flashlight. (another sign? :)
It's nothing more than a snakelike maze of pc trace wannabe's. Check it with an ohmmeter, should read open. (there's many megs in series with where it goes)
Inside the control panel there's a 3 x 3 inch pc board mounted beside the timer. It's job is to disconnect power to the timer motor in auto mode, until the humidity sensor in the drum is no longer "shorted" by wet clothes against it.
On this board are perhaps a dozen resistors, two diodes, one filter, two transistors, and another perhaps transistor (scr? triac? dunno?) The maker has nicely removed every last trace of id from these transistors.
Figured it would be cheap, so called GE to buy another. Only costs $285 plus shipping. Crazy.
Tried my best to figure out how it did what it does. Decided that the electrolytic's job was to filter rapid changes. Turns out that it slowly charges, unless and until the in-drum sensor is shorted when it rapidly goes back to zero volts. I guess this way the timer motor doesn't start every time the sensor is at the top (away from the clothes) and stop again every time it's back at the bottom in contact.
Did our old guys equivalent of what you younger folks call ESR, and sure enough - cap as good as open.
Had a 100 ufd 16 volt lying here; installed it; and it's good as new and working perfectly :)
GE, I'll keep my 285 plus tax plus shipping, thanks, Hope it helps some of you to do the same :)
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