I had the same problem with my 8500 - along with a host of other vibrations, panel squeeks etc. I took the top off the machine while it was spinning and noticed that there is a black rubber hose that runs between the drum and the right panel. This hose was banging against the side of the machine. I pulled the hose up snug and no more banging. There is also a styrofoam piece that is loosely attached to the lower part of the hose (below the drum) that may have ridden to far up. This can also cause banging. While you are in there if you will also discover that the electronics board vibrates against the side of the machine during spin. I used some foam weather stripping to secure all the vibrating pieces and finally the machine is quiet. Overall I am less than impressed with the build quality of these machines. I had the Whirlpool tech out (for the third time) and he was going to look for a solution on the electronics board vibrating - however I have not heard back from them in a few weeks. Good luck!

Well it seems the Sport 8500 has two different washers out there and those with the older manual dated 2/06 only heat on sanitary. In my case I cannot further comment other than Whirlpool really screwed the customers by hiding this fact. Northwoods btw you have really put effort into your issue and wish you would post again on how you resolved this. In my opinion there should have been something numerical in model and serial number to designate such a change and there was none. The ones with the manual dated 2/06 still are filtering into stores with a production week as late a 12/06. According to sales in my area the first two digits after the letters in the serial designate week of production. As a builder I will no longer purchase these for upper floor laundry rooms and will advise another brand for customers.

I have had the 8500 for about 9 months and love it. The only place I have ever seen an 8400 was at Costco. It doesn't seem to have a heater and the price is more than I paid for the 8500 set. I paid $1500 for both. Go with the 8500. Mine are stacked in a laundry closet and they work great.

My washer will do 2 rinses as default, or 3 if you select Water Plus. I've noticed that with some detergents you can get away with using just the 2 rinses and not have any soapy residue, but with the majority of other detergents you have to use 3 rinses otherwise laundry feels soapy and scratchy afterwards. BTW, I've found that using just the water plus function without the extra rinse - i.e. 2 high level rinses (the button can be programmed to add an extra rinse, do high level rinses, or both), that rinsing is improved on towel loads over 2 rinses at the standard level - however 3 is still the optimum. As the saying goes, three is the magic number :-). I have used 4 and 5 rinses before mainly in my older machines (my AEG could allow you to select up to 5, but it wouldn't spin until after the 2nd rinse), but have noticed no marked difference between 4 and 3 rinses no matter the load or detergent, whereas with some loads/detergents you can always notice the difference between 2 and 3 rinses. Some here argue that the standard rinse cycles on their machines rinse perfectly well, which I don't doubt. However in my opinion and through my experience rinse cycles do actually need water, and I've always noticed a considerable difference in performance between low and medium/high level rinses in terms of dog hair & lint removal. As well as the correct water level, another major factor in rinse cycles is how fast and how long the laundry is spun for. My particular machine spins laundry for 4 minutes at 1000rpm after the wash, and 2 minutes at 1000rpm after the rinses and the spins help no end too with the performance of rinsing. These high speed interim spins are important in today's front loaders, which only do a double rinse as standard versus triple or quadruple of yesteryear, and at a lower level. Jon