Dryer Overheating

Checks you can do safely before you call

1. Stop it and cut the power. End the cycle, then unplug the dryer or switch off its breaker. If you see smoke or flame, keep the dryer door shut, get everyone out and call the fire department from outside. Otherwise let the dryer cool for at least half an hour before you reach inside, and on a gas dryer leave the burner panel, the valve and the gas connector alone.
2. Inspect the lint screen for damage. With the power still disconnected, take the screen out and look for tears or gaps around its frame. A torn screen lets lint into the cabinet, where it reaches the heater or burner.
3. Check the connector behind the machine. Keeping the power off, ease the dryer forward and look for a flattened, kinked, torn or loose connector, or one made of plastic or vinyl, which can catch fire and doesn't belong behind a dryer. Move a gas model gently so its flexible gas connector isn't stretched, and don't run a gas dryer whose exhaust connector has come off, because the burner exhaust, which carries carbon monoxide, would stay in the room.
4. Free the outside flap. With the dryer off, find where the duct leaves the building, clear lint you can reach at the hood from the ground and make sure the flap swings freely. Don't climb a ladder or go onto the roof to reach a high hood; mention it at the visit instead.
5. Run it again only after clearing a blockage. If you found and cleared a blocked screen, connector or flap and nothing smelled burnt, plug it back in, run a small load on medium heat and stay nearby. Feel the top after ten minutes, and if it is too hot to keep your hand on, stop and unplug it again. If everything was already clear, leave the dryer off: the cause is inside the cabinet.

When to call a technician

• You smelled burning or found scorched lint or clothes, even if the smell has gone.
• The cabinet still gets too hot with a clear screen, connector and outside flap.
• The drum or exhaust keeps heating after the cycle ends or with the door open.
• A thermal fuse has blown more than once.

What happens at the diagnostic visit

During the visit the technician checks airflow at the exhaust, then tests the cycling and high-limit thermostats, the thermal fuse and cut-off, the heating element for a short to its housing, the thermistor and heater relay on electronic models and the blower wheel. Lint inside the cabinet near the heater or burner is looked for while the dryer is open.

The diagnostic visit is $89 for a standard residential appliance and $129 for a built-in unit or commercial equipment; a premium brand on its own doesn't make an appliance built-in. You see the price before work begins. Our dryer repair page lists the gas and electric dryers we service around the San Fernando Valley and Los Angeles. If a fuse has already blown and the heat is gone, see dryer not heating.

Brand and model notes

• Samsung and LG: these dryers hold temperature through a thermistor read by the main control board, which switches the heater through a relay, so overheating can come from a sensor that reads low or a relay that sticks on, as well as from blocked airflow. LG models with Flow Sense also flag a restricted exhaust with a d80, d90 or d95 code. See Samsung and LG.
• Whirlpool, Maytag and KitchenAid: on these Whirlpool-built dryers, the thermal fuse is mounted on the blower housing next to the cycling thermostat, or next to an exhaust thermistor on electronic models. A fuse that blows more than once points to that thermostat or thermistor, to the airflow or, on electric models, to an element shorted to its housing, not to a bad fuse. See Whirlpool, Maytag and KitchenAid.