3DWED5605SQ0 Whirlpool Dryer - Instructions

The (front) bearing and seal are not metal parts but a fabric and and mesh like material. It is somewhat like a fabric belt made to hold up a pair of trousers. The belt sits in a channel that goes around the door on the inside of the front panel. To get to the combination bearing/seal you remove two screws that are located under the cover of the lint trap. These have to be removed to lift the top. Then using a putty knife or screw driver you must pop the top (which snaps down on plastic clips) at the front corners. The top lifts up and folds back on hinges. The front is attached to the sides by one screw on each side near the top. A nut driver will remove then easily. Once the 2 screws are removed lift the front panel about 2 inches to disengage the front panel from the clips that hold the front attached to the sides near the bottom. When you remove the front panel the dryer drum will literally fall out so you want to get hold of it before pulling the front panel away so it isn't damaged and and doesn't damage the gas burner assembly which is under the drum to the left side. The drum is very light. I supported it with an empty shoe box while the front was off.
Once the front is off you'll see the bearing/seal on the inside of the front panel and it will be obvious how to remove the old one and place the new one. There are three pegs on the front panel that receive the three holes in the fabric bearing/seal. The seal will stay in place while you remove the shoe box and put the front cover back on. The drum fits over the seal like a lid on a jar and just slides on the fabric when the drum rotates. Low tech but the drums slides easily on the bearing material and seems to last a long time.

I also did the rear dryer seal. This is similar to the front. To do this you follow the procedure above but to get to the real seal you will have to remove the drum. It will fall out on its own if the front panel is removed. The drive belt goes around the drum. It is about 3/8th of and wide and just wraps around the drum without any teeth or channels or anything. Let the belt fall to the bottom as you lift the drum forward and out of the cabinet. The drum is light. Just put it on the floor and strip off the old rear seal which is glued on. It too is fabric. Clean up the drum a little and fit the new seal on the drum. Once the seal is on the drum you can lift the edge of the fabric seal and glue the fabric flange to the drum. This becomes pretty obvious once you have the seal on the drum. If you put the glue on the drum first you will make a mess. Put the seal on properly and the lift the edge to apply the adhesive all the way around. The adhesive sets enough in a hour or so. Put the drum back in and replace the front panel. Don't forget the drive belt. It goes around the drive motor that is located on the bottom of the dryer on the right, around or over an idler pulley (my older model does not have a idler wheel but rather a bracket with a "slide" that the belt runs over that keeps sufficient tension on the belt to drive the drum. If your belt falls off the motor and the idler pulley falls out it may be confusing how the belt goes in. My idler bracket is held in slots on the bottom of the cabinet merely by the tension of the belt - no screws or anything. I suggest that you put the belt around the drum first, then the drive motor. You will have slack in the belt and it becomes a little more obvious how the idler pulley (which is mounted on spring steel) goes in and takes up that slack and keeps modest tension on the belt. The rubber side of the belt goes against the drum, the leathery side is the outside.

actually i found your site before i even looked at the dryer,thats how i knew to check for the thermal fuse.
I ordered the part and it was on my door in 36
hours,pulled the two wires off the old fuse and installed the new,put the back cover on and it has been working ever since,thanks ( your in my bookmarks)

Removed and replaced terminal block, power cord and black wire to timer.

After looking at the schematic to see what was in line with the motor, I found the fuse as the first item. I pulled the fuse out and used a multimeter to ohm out the fuse. Upon using the meter I found that the fuse was bad. I typed into Google my part number that was on the fuse and the PartSelect Website came up as one of the choices to pick from. When the part arrived approx. two days later I installed the fuse by first unplugging the dryer and then removing the bottom panel and removing the fuse from the exhaust by using a small 1/4 inch wrench and pulling out the old fuse. I installed the wires on the new fuse and re-installed and put the 1/4 inch screw back in. I started the dryer after plugging it back in and it worked like it should have. Thank you for the part and I have recommended your website to other people already.

My 14 year old son did it as I supervised! Pulled the dryer out on a dolly, unpluged the dyer, removed 9 hex head screws to remove the back cover, removed and replaced the thermal fuse, located next to the exhust outlet, set the cover back on, moved the dryer back in with the dolly. I had the thermal fuse over nighted to me for a total price of $35, figured I saved at least $150 on a service call by Whirpool.

My wife was doing a load of laundry when she thought the the dry cycle was finished she found the cloths still wet. When she went to restart the dryer nothing. I did some research online and found the most common problem was the thermal fuse. I removed the back of the dryer removed the fuse and checked for continuity with my volt meter. I thought that I was going to find alot of lint build up. However I did not so I decieded to also replace the thermostat, using the thermo cut-off kit because this might have caused the fuse to fail. I ordered the parts from partselect and they arrived in two days. Partselect has excellent instructional videos on how to make the repair. It was quick and easy and saved the money of just going out and buying a new appliance.

I bought a belt from a store in my area- What a mistake...I found this site and read all the stories on how easy it was and how PartSelect.com had the parts in stock and had easy instructions...I put the idler pulley in place, put the belt in place (all from instructions included) and put the dryer back together (which was easy). I actually did it alone. I would recommend this company to anyone in need of their parts and help!

First of all, you go in from the front. There a clip on each side that I just pried up to pop the front of the dryer up. A screw also needs to be removed in the lint catcher area. Also, two screws holding the door open switch must be removed as I never could get the electrical connectors to disconnect. No big deal. I had to figure out you must lift the front of the dryer up as the last two things holding it in are a prong on each side. Lift the front up and off and set it aside. As you do this the drum will either fall on your feet or you'll have it supported be another person or with something else. I used bungee cords and kept it in the laundry room. Cleaned out all the old lint, collected a few bucks in change. It took me awhile to figure out how the new belt routed through the removable pulley guide thing and around the wheel pulley. I don't remember right now as I'm not looking at it but remember pinching the belt and feeding it through the guide and around the wheel pulley which has a little slot and grooves matching the belt. Besides scrapping my wife's hand while she was helping me get the front of the dryer back on there were no casualties or further complications. Good luck!

Following the instructions that came with the parts, I removed the top off of the dryer, which was very easy, two more 5/16" screws and I had the drum out. I confess, this was my second time at this repair. 1st time I neglected to replace the rear drum seal which I strongly recommend you do while you have it open. I only replaced the 2 wheels last time and it failed very soon afterwards.
Lesson Learned: Always replace the rear drum seal when you replace the support wheels!!!

I took a ¼ inch nut driver and removed the rear cover from the unit, and then used a continuity tester to determine which safety device was open. According to the schematic there was one non-resettable safety device in the heating circuit, and that was open. The kit that I ordered came with thermal cutoff and a thermostat. I replaced both parts and the unit now operates normally. While I had the dryer open I thoroughly cleaned the dust and lint from the unit and also the 4 inch vent pipe. I ordered this part on Friday morning and received it early Saturday afternoon.

Disconnected supply. Lifted top (hinges on rear). removed two 1/4 hex head screws retaining front panel. Disconnected door switch wires. Removed front panel, lifting off from bottom tabs. Lifted out drum and discarded broken belt. Spent 30 minutes+ cleaning interior, drum skid area, dryer exit tube, motor pulley, belt tensioner, etc, etc. Checked wiring harness for possible damage (no damage found). Repositioned drum skid pads, which had become dislodged from their intended position. Reinstalled the drum with new belt, ensuring both belt & tensioner were correctly positioned, and drum rollers and felt seals were also correctly positioned. Reinstalled front panel, tightening the two 1/4 hex head retaining screws. Reconnected power. Checked functionality. Closed top cover.

There are a total of six screws that have to be removed to do this job.
Take the lint tray out and remove the first two screws.
Secondly, remove the lower panel in the front of the dryer. You do this by inserting a screwdriver at the top portion and pry it off. Next, loosen the two screws under the top panel in the front of the dryer.
Now take your screwdriver and pry up the top lid of the dryer. The last two screws are in the inside of the front panel. They hold together the front and side panels. Remove them and be sure you have a support for under the dryer drum. (once you remove the front panel, the drum no longer has a way to stay suspended)
(Make sure you disconnect the wires attached to the front door, making note of which wire goes where.)
At this point, You can follow the easy instructions that come with your new belt.
If you have a little mechanical aptitude, this is a very easy project.

It was so easy, that my wife did it the day we got the part before I got home from work. She wedged it out with a flat head screw driver and then pushed the new door catch assembly in with her thumb. Pretty simple, thanks for having parts like this available to the public!

simply replace vent filter

With the dryer taken apart to replace the broken belt it was obvious that the lint seals had not been working properly due to the excessive amount of lint covering all of the inside surfaces of the dryer. The belt idler pully had also moved from its normal mounting position and was laying at the bottom of the dryer. Because the lint had covered the bottom before the belt broke it was obvious to determine where the idler pully attached to the bottom.

Before cleaning I marked the exact location where the idler pully mounted to the bottom of the dryer.

While waiting for the replacement parts to be delivered a vacuum cleaner was used to remove lint from the inside surfaces of the dryer as well as the old fragments of the lint trap housing seals were removed and surfaces where the new seals would attach were cleaned.

Assembling the dryer with the new belt was a challenge due to the lack of support for the drum while getting the new belt in place, lined up properly, threaded through the idler pully and attached to the motor drive shaft. This is how I installed the new belt:

I used a piece of wood wider than the sides of the dryer, drilled holes that allowed for a piece of cloths line rope to be looped through and used to support the door opening end of the drum.

The drum was set on the seal and rollers at the back of the dryer.

The temporary wood /rope hanger was placed at the front end of the dryer resting on the sides with the top of the dryer raised.

The rope was adjusted until the drum rested on the back rollers and the rope like it would be positioned normally.

The new belt was then gently installed under the temporary support rope and around the drum.

The new belt had many kinks from shipping and was difficult to align with the location on the drum where it needs to ride so small strips of tape were temporarily used to hold the new belt in position until it could be fed through the idler pully and on to the drive shaft.

Several small pieces of a cardboard box were used to shim under the idler pully to hold it in its proper location as well as to make the belt attachment to the drive shaft easier.

With the belt attached, the temporary cardboard shims were removed from under the idler pully.

The front of the dryer was attached .

The temporary board and rope hanger was removed.

The tape that had been placed over the new belt to hold it in proper alignment was removed as the drum was rotated slowly by hand to ensure that all tape was removed prior to closing the top of the dryer.

The seals as well as the remainder of the dryer assembly was completed without any problems.

The dryer ran well for its initial trial spin and has dried several loads of laundry since.

Great parts and support Thankyou