Question About Front End Washer

I hate it when this happens too. I do the same as the last poster in the doing a load of bleached stuff. about once a month I run it with nothing in it except the soap and bleach and do it on hot water. that helps. but the thing that i did that helped the most is i took the whole contraption out that you put the soap / fabric softener into. it was molded at the back. gross gross gross. look at your user manual to figure out how yours works. mine was just pressing on a plastic pc and the whole tray slid out. it had black slimy mold. Grossest thing I have ever had to clean. but it made a huge difference. I do it every couple of months now. good luck

Like someone else mentioned, clear out the drain filter. Also make sure your drain tube (not inside the machine, but the tubing that actually drains into your house pipes) is not blocked. Unfortunately it's possible for socks to get stuck in there! And we all thought it was the dryer that eats socks... :)
If that doesn't do it, you can do the hot water cycle with just bleach and/or vinegar-which you should do occasionally anyway to clear things out. If the smell gets really bad, I have found that Whirl-Out is the best thing to clear out all of the pipes, etc. It is what was suggested to us by our manufacturer when we first got that smell a year or two after we switched to the front load machines. It is a whirlpool cleaner that you can find at Lowes or Home Depot (you have to ask, and make them check their system even if they've never heard of it. They will almost always have it and the clerks there have no idea about it), or you can order it online.

We have had ours for nearly 5 years, and with 7 kids (and 2 dogs) ours gets entirely too much use-usually around 20 loads/week. Between regularly checking the drain filter (use a pitcher like someone mentioned-there is a LOT of water in there!), and the clean out wash cycle, with using Whirl Out once a year, as well as a good wipe down of the rubber seals around the outside every week, it's running good as new, and odors have been kept to a minimum!

My washer has a small door at the bottom that has a tube with a plug in it, and a cap next to the tube that unscrews (the cap is actually a lint filter). The door has to be opened with a quarter or flat screwdriver. First, I have to drain the water from the tube - I use a pitcher because it holds quite a bit of water - and the water is STINKY!!! Then, I unscrew the cap and clean the lint. This really helps. Check your owner's manual to see if your washer has something similar. Good luck!

I literally just asked the guy that came this week to fix our washer this question! He said they sell something at walmart called "smelly washer". No kidding, that's its name and it's specifically for this! Good luck!

We grow slime in the gasket and have to wipe it out every once in a while.

I have a front end load washer that is about 3 years old and I have never had this problem. Sounds like a problem with the older ones? We have a Kenmore from Sears. Just so some of the other ladies know (esp. the one who is contemplating buying one), this is not a problem with all of them. And we wash some pretty nasty things in ours.

I can't give you an answer, but I'm interested in the answers you get. I have been contemplating buying a front-loader until the other day, when I read about this situation. The article said it was because there's always a little water in the machine, and that sometimes the, um, fragrance showed up a couple of years after purchase. I know one of the experts' solutions was to use only the HE detergent, but I don't recall the rest.

Hi J. - the best thing to do for it is to run an empty hot water wash with some bleach. If you have scummy buildup on the seal around the opening, my appliance tech said I can use a dishwasher tab and run a hot water cycle. I also found some cleaning tabs call "Affresh" or "Refresh" - something like that. They were at Lowe's. It says if your washer smells to run 3 empty washes in a row and then once a month after that.

I've found that if I use those Tide detergent booster tabs in every wash, the washer stays pretty fresh.

My washer is 10yrs old and the seal was getting black spots on it. I had the seal replaced for about $200. Lots better than spending $1000 or more on a new washer.