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Hello.
I have a Zanussi ZWF1440W (PNC: 914517516/01) which will intermittently not start any cycle which involves heating the water. Whenever it’s doing this it will still happily run all and any cycles which don’t use the heater. However, when trying to start any heating cycle it follows this sequence:
The door locks. The drain pump will run for longer than usual, the fill valves do not open. Then all lights on the display will go out except for the start button light which starts flashing, the display changes from time remaining to flashing a zero and then the door unlocks again.If I then select an non-heated cycle, let’s say a 45 minute rinse, it will run just fine and complete the cycle every time.
Sometimes all cycles will work perfectly. Sometimes I can run many heated cycles in a row, sometimes when one ends I go to start another heated one immediately and it won’t start. The fault may crop up once a week on once a month, seemingly at random. Sometimes (like now) it has been faulting on every attempt for several days..
I have not seen a fault code at any point since an “E40” some years ago which I cured with another interlock. EEPROM still shows “E40” as the last stored code.
I have to confess I haven’t pulled the machine out to check the heater yet. My back is bad and space around the machine is tight. I’m thinking the thermistor is at fault as when the heating cycles run the heater works and I’m used to seeing error codes for element shorts. I’m capable of component testing but I don’t know what range the thermistor operates in. Or am I more likely to be looking at a chafed wire somewhere? I did replace the drum bearings some years ago and they are still good now so I’m sure the drum has not touched the element.
We have a condenser dryer which lives next to the machine and my wife swears that the washer plays up more often after the dryer has been running. I haven’t noticed a correlation to be honest but I thought it worth mentioning.
Any help would be gratefully received, many thanks.
Re: ZWF1440W intermittently won’t start any warm/hot cycles
You’re going to have to pull it out and check that heater, the most likely reason it’s playing up. Any breakdown in its insulation it will screw up the electronics by misbehaving in the way you describe.
Re: ZWF1440W intermittently won’t start any warm/hot cycles
Thank you. I’ll do that and report back with my findings.
Re: ZWF1440W intermittently won’t start any warm/hot cycles
I agree, had a Zanussi do this not long ago. Had me baffled until I realised it was only on a heat cycle that it played up. I replaced the heater and it worked perfectly. I noticed that when the drum was full of water I got a reading between the element terminal and earth.
Re: ZWF1440W intermittently won’t start any warm/hot cycles
Well I replaced the element and NTC last Monday and it ran for three cycles in a row and faulted on the fourth. I left it turned off over night and the next day it worked and I did several washes over the next few days. My wife says it worked once out of two times for her.
This morning I went to put on a wash and it faulted and out of frustration I opened the door and closed it harder than I would ever normally do, and on trying again it worked!
So although it’s not faulting as often it is still not right. I think I’d better do some testing of the wiring loom.Unfortunately I don’t own a megger so I can’t accurately check for earth leakage on either element which was a shame I find it’s worth testing new elements before fitting. Out of interest I’ll do a live wet test with an RCD on the old one and see what happens, inadvisable I know..
Re: ZWF1440W intermittently won’t start any warm/hot cycles
An update:
The old element tested fine both hot and cold.
I worked my way back through the wiring to the main control board and found nothing. Testing the heater relay confirmed it worked so I refitted the board and the machine has now been performing faultlessly for two weeks. I can only surmise that it was a dirty contact onto the board and that disconnecting then reconnecting the wiring loom plugs cured it. Happy days.
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