DIY appliance repair

We've had a messed up timer dial on our washing machine for probably a year now, or maybe even longer. We've just turned the inner ring by hand and it kind of works. Well, about a week ago, the washer stopped working, it wouldn't pump the water out. I got a hose and siphoned the water out. Then I started disassembling the beast. It's not that old of a machine, it's definitely an economy model though. I had problems getting the dial off, to see if anything was wrong in the control panel. I ended up destroying the already broken dial, and losing the plastic clip that hold it together. The clip showed up miraculously the other day upstairs, the magic of having kids I guess. I looked at the schematic for the machine, and couldn't really figure that out. I figured it was something to do with the pump, my mother in-law was talking about a solenoid that controls it, so I was looking for that too. I proceeded to take the front off, using the instructions found inside the control unit. I could hear that the pump was trying to drain the machine. At that moment, my neighbour came by, he gave the pump a couple turns by hand, and voila, it started working. So I put it back together, and we kept using it for a few days, sans dial. Well, using part of the dial, and figuring out where to turn it to, then pulling it out.
Then on Sunday night, the lower element on the oven broke. Deb said there was a big electrical light show in the oven, and there was a huge scorch march. The element was toast. So Tuesday I went to get all the parts, we could find a serial # for the stove, so the next day when I picked up the new dial, I brought in the old element.
So now the stove is working again, it was a really simple repair. I have the parts to fix the dial on the washer, so that shouldn't take too long. I started it last night. The timer is made of plastic, and was cracked, which I suspect was causing the dial problems in the first place, so I gorilla glued that back together. Tonight I'll put it all back together, and hopefully it all works. I just hope that pump keeps working on the washing machine. At least we don't have the old oil furnace that breaks down all the time. Appliance repair isn't my favourite thing, if it's something simple, it's not so bad though.