This is Little_Wren responding to Beachseeker and others. I do not really have resolution. As I mentioned I used the low water test with the "normal" cycle from the Whirlpool website on a washer in the Maytag store and about 1 ¾ inches of the baffle was above water. I also tried it at another Maytag store and the results were the same. When a new Maytag store opened in April, I tested their 9600 which was most likely manufactured later than the floor model machines in the older Maytag stores. This newer machine had 2 inches of the baffle above the water level. Ours at home is 2 ¼ inches. None of these meet the test given on the Whirlpool website. I also ran the other cycles and compared our machine at home to the floor models  some water levels were the same and some were different. The 9500, which is new to our area and a "lower" model, tested at ¾ inch of the baffle above the water. The Whirlpool engineer was suppose to phone the A&E repair person after the Whirlpool engineer got back from vacation. Then the A&E person was going to phone us. We have not heard back and it was been months. I find that unprofessional. The A&E person said that the manufacturers made changes and keep the same model numbers and do not inform repair people of changes. However, the clothes seem to get clean. I have observed that some of the cycles have more water, so I use those cycles. I do like to see at least some water in the wash and in the rinse. What have others found? Thanks, Little_Wren

gzec, does your washer have an internal heater? If so, my suggestion would be to run a couple of sanitary cycles with bleach first and then with liquid dishwasher detergent. If you don't have sanitary, the longest and hottest cycles your machine can achieve should work as well (it may be Whitest Whites, or something similar). Clean out the drain trap, the rubber seal around the door opening (make sure you pull back the rubber seal and get into all the nooks and crannies ;-) and the detergent/softener dispenser (including the dispenser drawer opening in the machine). Oh, and don't forget to run off the cold water before you begin your hot/sanitary cycle. Basically, you need the hottest possible cycle with strong detergent or bleach in order to kill the mold and mildew. My old Duet Sport without a heater had an occassional smell issues when I didn't know any better about HOT washes. My new LG with an internal heater (I regularly run HOT and SANITARY washer in it) has absolutely no trace of mold, mildew or smell after a year and a half of use. Good luck and let us know how you do.

I've had a Kenmore front loader for 15 years that has been a great washing machine. It originally cost about $600 in 2001, and has just kept on chugging. Right at the moment, it is dripping a bit from the bottom from a leaking outer tank, but not enough leakage that it doesn't dry out between uses. Since it's on a slab, not a big issue, but I expect to be replacing it within a year or so, Can't really complain about that length of service for what we originally put into it. I'll be looking for another front loader, this one has gotten our clothes clean without damaging them with minimal water use. No smell, but we leave the door and the soap drawer ajar between uses so that they dry out inside. Yes, it does vibrate, but it doesn't rip out pipes and walls or walk around, just makes some noise on fast spin. I haven't got enough money to buy a washing machine that doesn't make any noise. And yes, there's a certain amount of luck involved with any major appliance purchase, and I'm well aware that we've been lucky with this one. Lemons do happen. But you can take a lot of the doubt out (except the probability of getting a lemon *smile*) by doing your research up front. Good luck!

I have a Miele front load washer that had a terrible sewage/rot odor for years. I live in AZ so it's very dry here, but we always leave the washer door open, thinking maybe that would help. I tried running baking soda, vinegar, Smelly Washer, etc. through the machine and they all helped for a short time before the smell came back. All of our clothes gained that gross smell to some degree and God forbid you leave the clothes in the washer for more than 5 minutes after the wash cycle was finished. After cleaning the door gasket even though there was no mold there whatsoever, we finally switched to POWDER DETERGENT and the problem went away after 4 or 5 loads and has not returned over the last few months. We make sure to run a hot water load once a week, but I think the rotten odor was 100% caused by liquid detergent (we never use fabric softener). Even using small amounts of the HE liquid detergent perpetuated the problem. It's hard to find dry detergent these days, but it's worth it to hunt some down! It SOLVED OUR STINKY WASHER PROBLEM.