I think I’m done buying washing machines. I have been hand-washing my clothes for over a year now. If I buy a machine, I become part of the problem… I become part of the financial support system for the scandals.

I can’t quite tell from what you describe if Samsung did something wrong. It seems reasonable to have a sensor. But if it’s too sensitive and gets false positives, then indeed that’s junk.

I think nothing is worse than what I experience with Beko: secret codes that force us to trash machines where all components work, but the manufacturer will not reveal the secret code that enables the machine to run. Nothing is more infuriating.

Controller boards tend to cost about as much as a complete working 2nd-hand machine.

I have not checked yet for the machine at hand, but my other Beko which is also trapped in an error state and the parts shops can no longer get the controller board. Beko themselves cannot get one either. And I must say, replacing hardware to change the state of software is not an acceptable solution for me.

A jumper, I can handle. But I need the information. In fact that’s all I need – information. Which pins need a jumper?

I appreciate the effort. That manual is for a model beginning with ZFC, and mine is simply Z… I tried anyway, despite generally refusing to deal with the manual cartels. I could not get past the reCAPTCHA forced by manualslib. But I doubt it would help anyway. What I need is a service manual containing the resistence measurements. User manuals never have that info. The slightly different manual that I have (ZD 19/4 D) does not have anything useful.

Regarding fixpart.co.uk, I just get 403 forbidden on that site.

I’m not sure to what degree it helps, but if your problem with acquiring a part is geographical in nature I’m in Ireland, and am happy to get and mail the part for you if it is available in either EU or the UK. Good luck and keep us posted!

I appreciate the generous offer! I’ll keep that in mind but I will first try to diagnose more precisely which part I need… whether it is the relay or the thermostat. Then I will try to find it locally. If it’s the relay then I’m probably toast. But I might see if something universal can be rigged up.

oh wow! That looks close for sure. Great find… I’m sure it will be useful. I’ll look at it more later today.

Thanks!

(update) By searching for B7S B7SLED, I found the same service manual with a filename the contained WMB 61431B. So it’s not exact. But it’s close enough to be useful. It’s perhaps showing the same error codes. Although the ultimate problem of resetting the error state is not well articulated in the WMB 61431B service manual so I am still looking for a more exact service manual. It’s really a long shot though because these service manuals are just templates of others anyway. I don’t expect to find what I need.

Thanks!

Indeed I need the heavily protected service manual… but nonetheless I’m still happy to have the correct user manual.

I have done nothing so far. My current crankset has 3 sprockets. The middle sprocket is worn to the point where the chain slips, so to drag this out I just stay on the biggest sprocket. But that is probably going to start slipping this year in which case I will be forced to change it.

I found a flee market seller who sells just the right crank, with one sprocket riveted to it, for $€ 5. So it’s cheap enough that it may be my next move. It seems to have holes in it to add another sprocket to it.

But in any case, I will not throw away my dead crankset. I will keep it just incase I one day find compatible sprockets and then I will try grinding.

Is there any noise to speak of, like the door lock clicking?

No noise. It’s completely silent (which suggests it may be just trapped in a stored error state). So I disconnected the garden hose because if it does not even trigger the water inlet solenoids then it does not help to maintain water pressure for future tests.

User manual seems to be pretty readily available online,

I’ll have another look, but I generally ignore the dedicated third-party manual websites as they are just time-wasting Cloudflare-enshitified rabbit holes. If I am convinced a service manual is in one of those walled gardens, I might go through all the boot licking hoops and do a dance to get it.

In any case, I appreciate your feedback.

(edit) i was able to get a user manual for a WMB 51221s from storage.beko.co.uk. It’s just a user manual and for a different model, but it might help in some ways. I have heard that there are WMB 7 series, 8 series, 9 series, etc, which I am guessing is marked by the first digit in the model number. So perhaps the manual is at least close to another model in the same “5” series.

(edit2) ah, shit, now I recall from videos that there is a huge variation between WMB 5xxxx machines. Some have an LCD and some are just LEDs and knobs. I have no idea what models might be close to mine. There are many more manuals on archive.org than what is even known to Beko’s websites, but no model numbers are numarically close to 51420. Model wmb 51241 has an LCD.

https://www.repairtogether.org/ is involved and there are links that give locations and times, though I don’t have it at the moment.

I assume you measured 5V in reference to the machines GND.

Indeed. It was in fact the 0v pin on the washing machine that is next to the RX pin.

When I meter gnd against 5v on the adapter, I get 5.15v. So both the adapter and the DMM are fine.

I heard that connecting two DC supplies together would have no problem if they both output exactly the same voltage. Of course we would never have an exact match, but the only strain on either side of the connection would be from the difference between the 5v from the adapter and 5v from the washing machine.

So I’m tempted to conclude no damage was done and the serial port was sabotaged at the factory.

(edit) The w/m also gives 5v. Turns out my alligator clip was bad. So the port may be fine.

I had the two 5v pins connected (from 5v on the adapter to the 5v pin on the washing machine). I had it that way for maybe 10 or 15 min until I was told not to. The USB→TTL adapter was a little warm when I disconnected it. Now I wonder if I damaged the washing machine port because when I meter the 0v against the 5v, there is almost nothing there. Did I damage it, or did the manufacturer disable the serial port before it got to me?

Right but I think that safety capacitor (SC) is the last thing I care about. IIUC, I could perhaps even simply bypass the SC because it’s merely improving the power quality/safety. It’s not worth buying an SC unless I can fix whatever is broken. If I could get the machine working, I could then of course consider replacing the SC as a final protective measure – but I’m not even sure anything is wrong with the SC.

The task at hand is testing every essential component of the washing machine, starting with the motor and tacho. I would like to understand what happened with the SC and motor though. Did I wire the motor wrong which caused the SC to flash and produce bad output for a moment? I don’t want to repeat that. I could power the motor directly without the SC, but if the motor is doing upstream damage then I guess I wouldn’t want my breaker box on the chopping block.