"6) I notice many people said they rinse in warm water, and I don't understand why - won't it cause wrinkling?"

warm water rinses out a lot more of the detergent. cold water, especially unmoderated cold water which often below 60 degrees and often as low as 40 to 45 degrees will not rinse nearly as well.

it also does not cause any more wrinkling in the least if first rinse is warm and second is cold. wrinkling is also not an issue for many people for most of their laundry (towels, sheets, underwear, jeans). for clothing which it is an issue, such as cotton dress shirts you won't see any more wrinkling with warm and then cold rinse as you will with two cold rinses.

David,

I have the first generation of your machine, then called the HE3t. Here are the temps for my machine:

77F Cold
104F Warm
122F Hot (Normal cycle)
127F Hot (Whitest Whites[WW], Heavy Duty[HD])
153F Extra Hot (Sanitary)

The washer will use the ATC (auto temp control) to try and reach the set temperature, according to what I wrote above. If you select tap cold, then straight cold is added. If the preset temp has not been reached by the end of the wash cycle fill, the heater will turn on to bring the temp up to the set temp on the HD, WW, and Sanitary cycles. The amount of time the heater remains on depends on the cycle and soil level setting.

If the stain treat option is selected, then the ATC will fill at the warm temp (104F), and the heater will heat the water to the hot temp for the selected cycle. The wash time is also extended. While the heater is not used during a normal cycle, it will be used when the stain treat option is selected. The top temp is the same with or without the stain treat option, though the stain treat option extends the wash time, and thus the time the heater can be active.

Just because you use a cycle that activates the heater, it does not mean that the set temp will be reached. For example, a WW cycle, hot wash, med soil, will only run the heater for a max of 7 minutes. At that time, the heater will shut off even if the top temp has not been reached. If heavy soil is selected, then the max heater time is 16 minutes. When stain treat is selected, then the wash time is extended, and the heater could be on 30 minutes or more.

Once the wash temp has been reached, the heater will shut off and it will not turn on again during the wash cycle.

When I start a cycle, the first 50 seconds of the fill is either cold, warm or hot, depending on the wash temp selected. After the initial 50 seconds, the hot and cold water is modulated to reach the selected wash temp. Once the fill is complete, I have up to one minute to change the wash temperature. After that minute is up, the heater will come on to heat the water to the set temp, if necessary. If I change the water temp after that minute, the change does not take effect. So even if I change the wash temp from hot to cold, the heater will still contine to heat and try to reach the temp (hot) that the washer was set on one minute after the fill completed. One benefit is that if I wait until after that minute and the heater turns on, I can change the temp to warm/warm, and get a hot wash and warm final rinse.

While I believe your washer has some additional cycles that mine doesn't (like kids wear), I belive its operation is fairly similar.

Joe

Thanks for the replies - very helpful. Joe, in particular, great details. I'll try some profile washes with your info.

Meanwhile, anybody else with HE4T specifics?