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Comment by tgb | Hacker News Reader

I think modern washers weigh the clothes and change their cycles based off that and other information. Mine is similar but seems to always overestimate the time instead, which is probably the better failure state.

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Some industrial laundries do this, but I have heard this over and over again to describe residential HE laundry machines but never actually seen one with a way to measure this. The usual method is to tumble the clothes until the water level in the tub stops dropping. Now they're saturated with water.

What you are probably getting when you start your washer is an estimate considering the steps of the cycle and loaded to capacity. Some machines have turbidity sensors - mine doesn't - this could deliver information that might shorten the cycle. Also the time may go up if it has to deal with suds or stops spinning to rearrange the load if it shakes.

Most of the variation in how long mine takes is during the spin cycle, which seems like an easy thing to get a sensor on. Drain the water then spin until you stop getting more water to drain.

We bought an LG washer and drying last year that tries to be smart and it drives me nuts. When you start it, it takes several minutes moving the tub in very small increments. It starts and stops and reverses over-and-over and I assume it's sensing the load. Then it starts and occasionally the balance is off and I does the thump-thump-thump thing. So I stop it, rearrange the load and restart. Instead of just resuming, it goes through the sensing dance again and I have to stand there three or four minutes before it actually starts to spin again.

If I could turn all the load sensing stuff off, I would. All I really want is two sliders that give me 0-100% for load size and temperature and a switch for delicate.

From what I understand, it has to do with 1) the time displayed is for an "optimal" load (not too full, normal soilage, balanced, etc.) instead of the actual load, and 2) the machines may pause and restart or lengthen parts of the cycle if the weight and/or balance are slightly off.

In any case, the washers at my apartment complex are always off, but it's at least consistent so that I can add about 6 minutes to whatever it shows at the beginning and plan around that.

The semi-old one in my building weighs it when you start the load and gives an accurate minute timer. The odd thing is it is always different, almost no correlation to weight, sometimes 50, sometimes 70.

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