Idler or bust

I should have taken a closer look at the idler pulley wheel when Kieran and I opened up the dryer 2.5yrs ago to take care of the loud squealing it was making.

Just the other day, I was putting stuff into the dryer turned it on and the dryer wasn't  spinning.  The heat was flowing but the drum was not turning.
I vaguely recall that it made a weird nose a few days earlier but i thought it was just the stuff in the dryer tumbling.  Now I realize it was the belt that made that odd sound.

Great, I thought.  Middle of winter, lots of snow on the ground making the roads slick.  Now I gotta go and get a part to fix this.  Hopefully it's not expensive.

I was trying to remember how to open the dryer.  I know it's pretty simple.  In any case, with putty knife in hand to press in the 2 front tabs that hold the top to the front.  I saw right away the problem.  The belt was not tight around the drum.

Disconnect 5 wire connections and 6 screws later.  I see the reason the belt is not wrapped tightly around the drum.   The idler pulley wheel is in two pieces.  I thought it just came off, but it's worn out and busted.  I think the previous belt wore it down to the hub.   What this thing does is it puts tension on the belt that's wrapped around the dryer drum and around that drive wheel with the grooves.  One side of the belt is flat.  The other side has grooves.  So groove side rests against that drive wheel and drum, and the the idler pulley applies force from the spring on the flat backside of the belt.  This makes the belt grip the drum and turns it.

I tried to put it back on and see if that would do the trick but it was so brittle it was breaking apart as I was manipulating it.   I needed a new wheel or the arm and wheel assembly.  It shouldn't be much for such a simple part.

$42.00 with tax later.  I get a new part.
At first the guy at the Reliable thought I had the model number wrong.  But I didn't. He said it was just an old model.  Yep...like over 20+yrs old.

These parts shouldn't cost this much.  I mean. it's a bearing. stamped metal arm, plastic wheel.  I'm sure it's cost is a few dollars.   Replacement parts are big business!  And you don't even get a new spring or bolt.  You should get those too.  but then it'd be $80.00.

I imagine that if a repair guy were to come and do this, he'd add 30% to the cost of the part, plus labour, plus his Tim Hortons coffee run, plus his time to take my phone call and schedule it and a little more because it snowed, and it's a Friday so that's 1.5x. So I'm guessing somewhere in the ballpark of $150 - 200 with taxes.

Was a bit tricky to get the bolt back on, as it was a little hard to reach under the motor to hold the nut, but I got it back on with the aid of a little magnet tool.
vacuum cleaned the dust on the inside and put all the pieces, and screws back in place and voila...Fixed! Back in business.   About 12hrs of downtime.

It even seems quieter than before.  Maybe this was why it was squealing.  But it's no longer doing that lobster in the boiling pot of hot water squeal any more.  It just went away on it's own.