Panic in the Techbelly family’s secret underground lair this morning when we thought the washing machine broken. A domestic disaster, given the child’s insistence of vomitting on or otherwise soiling everything we own, every day, more than once.
Just so others can find this post: the broken washing machine was a Siemens xlp1400 (or maybe xlp 1400), and the symptom was a flashing key symbol.
Turns out it wasn’t broken – the flashing key symbol meant that the child lock had been accidentally engaged. The fix, given by the friendly folks on the Siemens help-line: simply hold down the start button for two seconds. Bingo, the laundry cycle can crank up again. They also offered to send us a new manual for the machine. Which was nice.
Couldn’t find any information on the interweb of how to solve this – hence this post. After-sales service on the web becomes increasingly impossible through the spew of affiliate and review sites that vie daily to dominate the search results – to everyone’s disadvantage it seems. (Although, it would have been helpful if Siemens published their manuals online in a way that google could search them. Just saying).
This might be the most boring post I’ve ever written. And the most useful.
I'm Ben Griffiths: an escapee of web 1.0 and web 2.0 start-ups; a programmer; developer; architect; sometime consultant; team leader; agile exponent.
I live in Greenwich, London.
10 comments ↓
wow thanks for the advise this person is totally right !! hold the button 2 seconds (start ) !!
jo
Thank you. I have the xsp and this worked for me too. I just moved, have a 2 year old, lots of laundry and the flashing key symbol thing started – was kinda getting nervous, would we have to buy a new machine. THANK YOU!
Thanks – laundry crisis averted.
thanks for the advice regarding childlock, but after holding down the sart button yes the childlock goes off but when i start my washer again its back on and i need to keep turning it off when starting the washer and finishing its wash to open the door i mus keep pressing the start key
how can i turn it off pemanetly ?
You are a genius! Thanks for posting this. We were so lost!
Releasing Childlock… For ye who tried all of the above to no avail… here’s what worked for us: set mode to rinse & then hold option down arrow for 5 seconds (toggles on/off). My model is Siemens WM14S740BY
Thanks TechBelly. And extra thanks to Mark!
It was Mark’s tip that hinted at the solution for our machine. The illusive WM14S76, just try to find it on the Siemens website…!
Anyway, if you have one of these the way to release the child lock is:
-Set the mode to cottons, (dial clockwise once)
-Press and hold the option down touch button for 5 seconds or until you see the magic message ‘Child lock released’.
Thanks again.
thank you Declan, I keep doing this and can never remember how to unlock now I know I can find the answer on here, thank you.
WOW! Thank you so much for your blogg! It may have been the most boring blogg you have ever written but for me it has been the most usefull I have ever read!!!
Life saver!!
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