Fixing The Vibrating Dryer! Splendide Washer/Dryer Combo Shakes Like Crazy.

Our rig came with a Splendide 2000 WD802M washer/dryer combo. Which is great since my wife was always tired of carting loads of laundry around the campground and finding rolls of quarters for the machines. 🙂

It’s a decent machine. Splendide has a newer model, but this is the one we have. I think even the prior owner of our motorhome bought this machine after market because it is a bit scratched up. But, hey.. it works.

When we finally got around to using it on our first extended trip in the rig, something came as a shocker.

It VIBRATES during the spin cycle. A LOT!

The whole rig would sit there and pulsate while the machine spun. It would do it a few times during the wash cycle, then it would go all out at the end as it does one massive spin cycle.

At first, I thought something was wrong. But, when I did some Googling around, I found this was pretty much par for the course. There are some things to look for, such as:

• Ensuring that the shipping constraints aren’t still inside the machine.
• Ensuring the machine is level.
• Ensuring the counter-weight inside the machine is where it is supposed to be.

You can tell if the shipping constraints are still there by reaching in and moving the drum with your hands. If all is well, the drum can move in relation to the machine in and out. If it is fixed, then the constraints are still in there and need to be removed.

Mine was fine. And while the machine was a tad off level, we fixed that and the machine still vibrated.

Since some vibration like this is normal, there’s really nothing we can do to get rid of it altogether. After all, an RV isn’t a fixed concrete slab like our home. The dryer at home doesn’t do this because it is fixed to a solid surface. A motorhome is sitting on rubber and air and it moves. Shocker, I know. 😉

One easy thing you can do to help is to ensure you’re using your levelers. And the less contact your tires have with the ground, the better. I don’t usually like to do this, but if you raised your tires almost off the ground with your levelers and made the rig sturdy like a home, it would likely help.

In my rig, we had another little wrinkle…

My washer/dryer wasn’t installed on the floor. It was in a cabinet. And when it shook, the cabinet bottom would sit there and vibrate and flex and this was less stable. I also had a concern about the vibration eventually causing that cabinet bottom to break or collapse.

So, I went ahead and built my own support to go under the machine.

I built in a platform below the machine in the cabinet compartment below the machine. It supports the shelf above using strong 3/4 plywood supported by stands which distribute the weight across the surface and not down on a single point. It was also important that the design not shrink the size of the cabinet since my kids store toys in there.

As it is now, this little rack I built isn’t fully supporting the machine. It is more of a backup. It provides some extra holding power to the cabinet bottom. And, if the bottom were to collapse, my rack would fully support the machine and it wouldn’t go anywhere.

Lastly, that vibration…

Well, I hacked it by cutting up some pool noodles.

I picked up a couple of thick pool noodles from WalMart and I cut them up to create foam buffers to go on either side of the machine. They are wedged between the sides of the machine and the cabinet sides.

The result is that the vibration of the machine is contained and minimized. It isn’t gone, but it helps alot.

So, with the machine as level as we can make it, the cabinet strengthened, and the foam buffers… this machine is set to do it’s thing without damaging anything.

And in the end, our clothes get clean and we’re not shelling out quarters. Win!