... almost to the day. Seems like that's what you can expect for a washing machine. I'd noticed an issue with the basement bathroom tile a while ago, but I though it was connected to issues we'd had with flooding from the roof/gutter problem. It turns out not. There had been an issue — probably the drain pump — with the washing machine that got a lot worse this month.
I was worried water was getting under the tile from the shower — maybe a leak in the plumbing there, but after pulling up (without breaking!) a few of the tiles and watching things for a bit it was clear the water was intruding from the other side of the wall … where the washer and dryer live.
Once the source was confirmed, the question became repair or replace? At first we planned on the repair option, but once I realized how long ago it was we'd installed this washer, read up on the likely problem, figured the cost of repair, and the likelihood of future problems, replace seemed the better option especially since everyone seems to be having sales on washers and dryers this week.
So out with the old Kenmore 4027 washer and in with an LG WT7005CW.
The Kenmore dryer gets to stay. This is a switch back to a top-loading model,
which is going to mean more water use, but Evelin has long been convinced the
front-loader just wasn't cleaning things as well as she wanted. It’s also a
slightly larger drum (4.3 ft3 instead of 4.0). Don’t tell
Celeste, but it also uses LG's ThinQ
IoT platform. I also picked up an Oatey washing machine pan to go below the washer ... just in case. Our basement lacks any sort of floor drain or grading that pushes the water towards the non-existent floor drain, so having something to hopefully constrain the flow of water if there's a problem in the future makes sense.
Just waiting on a delivery date/time now so I can take the basement door off to get the old washer out …
UPDATE
(April 24): It's arrived and installed without a hitch (excuse the mess in the photo).
For the delivery, the door did have to come off the hinges again to ensure the old machine could get out, but it was still a tight fit for the new machine to come it.
Turns out this model does not support ThinQ; it just has a smart diagnostic feature that will produce audible error codes that can be "read" via smartphone. C decided that "feels analog, so it's fine for a washer." (We have diverging opinions about IoT appliances.) In a related vein, I'm going to put a Govee water sensor alarm in the pan as an early warning system. (I'm a little paranoid about the water thing...) We have a few of these and they've proved helpful, like when the water filter broke.
