6657496001 Kenmore Trash Compactor - Instructions

First let me say that I read many of the other posts regarding this repair and without them I wouldn't have had a clue how to fix this. Since the ram apparently moved up and down when I shut it off and turned it back on I reasoned the directional switch must be the problem. Ordered the part, Quick delivery. To replace the switch I removed the draw and removed two screws on the frame that hold the control panel in place. Lift up to remove. My unit is a stand alone unit although it is installed under the counter. There are two additional screws to remove the top and expose the ram and power screw drives. To remove the directional switch from the control panel you need to remove two hex head screws that hold it in place. This is a little difficult because of the small space. With the help of a small nut driver I was able to remove it. Note: the screws are held in place by a flat piece of metal that acts as a nut. Be careful not to drop it. Then simply remove the wire leads (all color and letter coded) and remove the switch. I was careful to reattach the leads to the new switch as I removed each one. Be sure to replace the switch with the limiting lever in the same position as it was in (it is vertical). Put everything back together and you should be good to go. That didn't happen for me! Problem persisted! Next on my list was the power nut. I got access to the ram and power screw drives (see above for instructions). The two power nuts are plastic wing nuts that are held in place by metal covers. The metal covers are each held down by two hex head screws. To gain access to the power nuts you have to remove the metal covers. Note the position of the nuts in relationship to the power screw shafts so that when you reassemble it they will be in the same position as when you started. In my case the top of the screw shafts were even with the top of the power nuts. (CAUTION: the ram is held by this assembly. Depending on what position your ram is when you started this repair it may fall! My ram was in the up position and when I removed the second cover it slammed down to the bottom of the drive screws). My advice is to be prepared by bracing up the ram before removing the metal covers. No harm when the ram fell but it did startle me. I then removed one of the power nuts. It was split in half. The other nut was fine but I decide to replace it anyway. Ordered parts. Quick delivery. Before I attempted to replace the power nuts I removed the ram (it just lifts out) and cleaned every thing. I put some new grease in the places that I had removed it. Then sprayed WD40 on the power screws. When I put the ram back in, I broke the new directional switch I had put in. So be careful!!! I still had the old one so I ultimately put it back in. I then replaced the power nuts. This was a little difficult because I had to hold the ram up while I was putting the metal covers back on. I would suggest you either brace the ram or get someone to hold it while you put the metal covers back on (In retrospect I suppose I could have just put the nuts on when the ram was down). Reassembled everything. Should be good to go. That didn't happen for me! Problem was still there! I turn it on, ram goes down. I turn it off, ram goes up. Desperation!! The only other thing it could be is the drive gear assembly. Ordered parts. Quick delivery. The gear drive is on the bottom of the machine. Lay the machine on it's side to gain access to the bottom cover. There are 5 hex head screws that hold it on. Remove screws and cover. It's pretty simple from here. The drive gear was missing a few teeth but the rest were in tact. This explains why the ram was still moving up and down and led me to believe it was something other than the drive. The only difficult part was the removal of the pin in the drive shaft. I wound up using a bolt the about the same diameter and a hammer to drive it out. Then just reassemble. There are some instructions that come with the gear parts that tell you how to set the spacing in the gears but I had no problem just replacing the parts without making any "adjustments". Should be good to go! Yessssss! Everything worked perfectly!!! My final words of advice. If your machine has this problem CHECK THE DRIVE FIRST. It the easiest thing to do because you can visually inspect it and know or eliminate it as the problem. It's about a 5 minute job and can may save you some of the problems I had. A big thanks to PartSelect for sponsoring these posts. The repair company that I normally use told me the machine was too old and probably wasn't worth the $100 just to come out and look at it, never mind the additional cost to repair it. All in I spent less than $100 and had I checked the drive first, I could have been done for less than $30.

I ORDERDED THE SELECTOR SWITCH WHICH SITS BEHIND THE TOUCH PANEL THAT SAYS ON/OFF/START.i REMOVED THE 2 PHILLIPS SCREWS JUST BELOW THE DISPLAY.SLIDE THE WHOLE DISPLAY UP AND IT WILL EXPOSE 3 WIRES AND THE SWITCH.REMOVE THE TWO PHILLIPS SCREWS,REMOVE THE CLEARLY MARKED Y=YELLOW R=RED AND V=VIOLET .INSTALL THE WIRES MOUNT THE SWITCH REPLACE THE TWO SCREWS REINSTALL THE PANEL,HIT START AND GOOD TO GO!

Unplugged trash compactor and removed from undercounter. Took cover off and removed broken plastic gear. Replaced with new gear and put cover back on

Unscrew the bottom, pull out the chain, replace the gear.

Compactor ram would go to bottom but not return back up after compaction. Keep running until unplugged. After unplugging flipped unit on its side and remover bottom plate (5) nut screws, exposing gears. Found that the main large gear had fine crack which caused it to spin loosely. Ordered gear assembly and lossened four mount screw on motor to move it forward and give slack on chain. Hint: Loosen motor mount bolts, DO NOT REMOVE bolts COMPLETELY! Removed broken plastic gear and reassembled with new. Held/ pushed motor back to retention chain and secured four (4) mount bolts Then reassembled bottom plate with screw nuts and it worked perfectly!!

Removed two screws on the front panel cover and lifted off the cover , removed two small screws on the switch bracket, you need a short nut driver, removed the spade clipped wires from the old switch and replaced them on the new part and thats all there was to it.

Simply removed the two plastic gears (held on by some sort of clip), put the new gears in place using the spacing instructions that were provided in the kit ....... and it is working!

replaced switch and fixed the problem. Still had one more problem after that though, but got that figured out and fixed that to.

I broke the directional switch trying to replace the power nuts..duh huh... ordered a new switch, took off the front panel ( 4 screws) replaced the switch (2 bolts) be careful not to lose the small threaded plate used instead of nuts to secure the switch.. and now it works like new again....partselect is a great resource for the diyer

Replacement handle fit perfectly, removed the old one by taking out two screws. I was glad that the part was still available, although a little pricey, because the unit has to be at least 25-30 years old or more.

-Removed the forward sliding rail screws...lifted the rails up several inches to access the wheel assembly...bent back the steel tab to access the nuts holding the wheels to the frame...replaced the wheels and bent back the steel tabs to original position. Trash bin now rolls out completely as before

changed out the switch and that fixed the problem

I removed the unit from under the counter. After removing all of the bits of old trash and making sure the chain and gears were not slipping or striped, I knew it was the power nuts on top of the ram. After all of these years they were worn out, almost smooth inside where the threads are. They were easy to locate on your website. I received them in 2 days (faster than expected) and in 10 minutes the unit was back together and working well. Today was the first bag to be taken out after the repair, it is much heavier than the previous ones, a sign that we are now packing much more trash in a single bag!

Someone pulled a Conan on the compactor handle and broke it loose--no one admitted doing it but I have my suspicions. Since the compactor was installed during the first Bush administration, I assumed that the part would be unavailable. I tried to glue it with the latest "super" bond epoxy/space shuttle goop and it would not hold. A friend tried to plastic weld the crack--it worked until Conan showed up again and ripped it loose. I was ready to look for a new compactopr but since it had an insert that matched the custom cabinets--that I knew would not fit on a new unit--I looked on the internet for a part.
The part number was entered, the part was in stock and the order placed on Sunday afternoon. The part arrived on Tuesday and was installed in less than two minutes. It was the high point of the week.

Removed 2 screws holding the old part on. put the new part in place, re-attached 2 screws. Good as new.