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UPDATE: It's a miracle! Randy the repairman arrived today all cheerful, then got progressively more fatalistic as the washing machine came apart. Diagnosis: the circuit board was shot. Repair estimate: with labor, well over the price of a new machine. For a machine bought new in 2012, in a world where new washing machines are designed to last 10 to 12 years. Of course I refused the repair estimate. Which meant I had to pay for the service call. As I was filling in the form with my credit card number and thinking ahead to how I was going to go about getting a new one, he was putting my broke-down old one back together.

Then I heard a familiar little electronic blibbety-blip-blip! and Randy says, "well, would you look at that!"

Incredibly, the machine was working again. I said, "how did you do it?" He said, "I have no idea." He thought maybe it only needed a reboot. I came to a more logical conclusion: he's a magician. He charged me just for the service call, and I've done two loads of laundry since then. Not only the best possible, but also the least probable outcome.

We got a nice covering snow this morning, and tonight the air is bell-clear and the moon is nearly full and casting shadows. Clearly, leprechauns and sprites are out dancing in the snowy woods. The chipmunks are consorting with field mice, and fisher-cats are smoking cheroots. And I stand a chance of getting through tax season without having to buy a new washing machine. I'm ecstatic about it. Truly, a miracle.

Mike

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Featured Comments from:

Peter Jeffrey Croft: "As an electronics tech, it's no miracle that it came good. Connectors are the weak point of electronics PCBs, and simply removing then re-plugging will often make something come good. The other point is that electronic components are cheap. To be asked to replace a complete board for the sake of a 50¢ capacitor or a $2 semiconductor is a manufacturer ripoff. On the other hand, the chargeable hours needed to diagnose and fault-find at component level probably makes it cheaper to replace the whole board these days. It's a tough call. What you hope for is a tech who's familiar with the component(s) that fail and can replace/rebuild in quick time. But good techs like that are rare and unrewarded."

Dave: Re 'And I stand a chance of getting through tax season without having to buy a new washing machine.' Well, I hope so. But as easily as it started working again, it could stop. Plan to save some money each week to pay for the inevitable replacement machine. I don't know if any washing machine is available without electronic circuits for all functions, but it would be nice to have an all-mechanical method to time the wash cycle, rather than trusting electronics in a somewhat moist environment. Good luck!"

Daniel: "Start looking for a new Washing machine. Once you have circuit board problems you are asking for a flooded room or failure without notice. Might as well get ahead of it before disaster strikes."