Three Trips to the Hardware Store Later

Due to circumstances beyond our control, the washer and dryer needed to be replaced.  Luckily, we found a set on sale.  They were delivered today and what I thought would be an hour or so getting the old ones out and the new ones in took only about 10 minutes.  I figured it would be a pretty easy thing to get them installed so I thought I would just take care of it myself.

The installation went fairly smoothly until it got the part of hooking up the hoses.  Because of the location of the hook ups on the washer, I needed to get some hoses with a 90° fitting so that it could bend/fit onto the fittings.  The old ones would have required the hoses to make a bend that would essentially cut the water flow, sort of like bending a garden hose to stop the flow of water.  So I had to go run and get some new hoses.

After the new hoses were put in place, it was time to hook up the drain hose.  My plan was to just use the existing one, but again there was an issue with the hook ups.  The old hose was roughly a 3/4" diameter, black, hard rubber hose.  The hook up took a 1/2 hose.  I thought no problem, because I had a similar issue with the old washer.  All I did was buy a double ended male connector with the proper size hook ups.  Well for whatever reason, it wouldn't fit on the new drain hose.  To I had to run back to the hardware store and find a connector that would fit.  I had to go 1/8" larger and get a hose clamp to make sure that it wouldn't slip off. 

Now it was time to get the dryer hooked up.  One feature the new dryer has is a wrinkle free setting, where it steams the clothes to prevent wrinkling.  However, this also requires that there is a water hook-up to the dryer.  And due to the location of the dryer, I didn't have a hose long enough to reach it.  Further, I only had two hook-ups, one for hot and one for cold water.  So this meant I needed to get a fitting to split the water going to the washer so I also had another line going to the dryer.  And that meant another trip to the hardware store.  Then I figured that as long as I was there, I would get some new dryer vent ducts too, and get rid of the ones we have had for the last 10 or 12 years that had a fine coating of lint on the inside. 

So after a 10 minutes delivery and removal of the the old appliances, it only took me four hours to get everything hooked up and running.  Which is three trips to the hardware store and about three and a half hours more that I was expecting.

Washer and Dryer install