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MyGenWashy: From Vienna Hackathon to Open Source Smart Washing Machines — A Blueprint for Resilient Tech

mayermakes

It all started at Mariahilfer i, Vienna’s grassroots hub for resilient technologies, circular economy
projects, and hacking culture. During a hackathon hosted in this unique space—also home to the
Kintsugi Repair Café—Patrick Awart of IoT Austria kicked off an ambitious idea: Give old,
mechanically sound washing machines a second life by retrofitting them with open-source, smart
control electronics.

The project immediately resonated with Clemens Mayer—known to many in the Element14
Community simply as Clem. Clem is well known for his personal mission to ensure there’s at least
one reliable, open-source version of every essential technology, strengthening society’s resilience in
the face of closed ecosystems and throwaway culture. So naturally, he jumped on board.

Backed by Mayer Makes, IoT Austria, and the Mariahilfer i community, the MyGenWashy project
quickly evolved beyond a weekend hack—blending hardware hacking, Smart Home integration,
repair culture, and open-source compliance into one focused initiative.

Smart Tech Meets Circular Economy

MyGenWashy retrofits old washing machines with generic control boards, designed to integrate
seamlessly into Smart Home systems via ESPHome and Home Assistant. Thanks to IoT Austria's
early ESPHome integration efforts, the machines can already be monitored and controlled over
local networks — with future interface options including reusing old smartphones as intuitive
displays and touch controls.
From a technical perspective, the team uncovered fascinating aspects of washing machine design
during teardown and reverse-engineering:

  • Air Pressure Water Level Control: A refreshingly simple mechanical system regulates
    water levels—efficient and reliable.
  • Mechanical Safety First: Even generic control boards include hardware-based protections
    against overflow and overheating.
  • Simplicity at Scale: Many washing machines, regardless of price point, share common
    components like Darlington ULN2003 relay drivers.

The takeaway? The hardware is already durable. By replacing only the electronics with open, user-
serviceable, and Smart Home-compatible alternatives, we extend appliance life, cut electronic
waste, and empower users.

The Power of Community and Open Source Certification

This project isn't happening in isolation. Mariahilfer i also hosts the Kintsugi Repair Café, making
it the perfect hacking ground for repair-focused experimentation.
MyGenWashy ties directly into Smander.com's work on the Open Digital Product Pass (ODPP) —
an ambitious initiative to fulfill upcoming EU requirements for product transparency, circular
economy documentation, and CE-compliant, truly open-source hardware. In partnership withregulatory experts, ODPP aims to create verifiable, safe open-source designs that meet real-world
legal and technical standards.

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Generous Hardware Support for a Repairable Future

The project wouldn’t have accelerated this fast without crucial support from hardware allies:

  • AISLER generously provided professional-quality PCBs for the prototype and development
    phases, reinforcing their commitment to local, small-batch, repair-friendly production.

  • Farnell contributed essential components, helping Makers and engineers realize a fully
    functional control board with energy-efficient, Smart Home-ready capabilities.

This shared mission—making hardware repairable, modifiable, and accessible—is at the heart of
the broader movement MyGenWashy embodies.

Once we get to a stage where Certification comes into play we can count on Smander.com to achieve this milestone.

Open Source, Fully Documented, Ready to Evolve

The complete MyGenWashy design, including schematics, component lists, and ESPHome
configurations, is available on GitHub for replication, modification, and iteration:
https://github.com/mayermakes/MyGenWashy
Beyond washing machines, the principles apply to other household devices—building a blueprint
for modular, repairable, connected hardware with community-driven innovation at its core.

Join the Mission: One Open Source Version of Everything

For Clem, Patrick Awart, Thomas Losert, and the wider community, this is more than a project—it’s
a movement toward resilient, sustainable technology.

  • Want to contribute to ODPP, open hardware standards, or MyGenWashy v2 and v3?
  • Interested in creating open-source, compliant alternatives to everyday tech?
  • Believe in empowering users to repair, reuse, and innovate?

The door is open:

contribute@odpp.at

http://odpp.at

Together, we can ensure the technology we rely on remains transparent, repairable, and open—
because resilient societies are built on resilient tools.

Parents

  • Awesome project, At a minimum it is a great way to introduce people to how commercial / consumer appliances are designed (Good and Bad :) I would think the same principles could also be applied to AC Home furnace , Fridge/Freezers, Cookers, Dryers etc, there all basically the same. Safety circuits, Monitoring, Power drivers (Relays or solid state) and motor control.

    I do agree with the conclusion that most appliances have not fundamentally changed in decades. I have repaired many fridges, Dish washers, Cookers and the likes and within each type there all the same and you simply pay more for a fancy display or wifi etc. nothing that makes the actual process any better. Fridges and Washers are the most extreme example of these where you look at the schematics of a base model vs the top of the line (AKA Most expensive) and there all the same except the user interface. with a few examples like Steam being added.

    If the replacement boards were not so overly expensive then there would be no need for this project outside of educational purpose but they are, control boards / interface panels costing a significant part of the original cost.

    I look forward to seeing were this project goes.

  • in reply to Robert Peter Oakes

    Dishwashers changed a lot. Recent ones default to a completely different process: lower temperature long time soaking, vs the traditional fast, higher pressure water spraying and hotter water...

  • in reply to Jan Cumps

    But from a hardware perspective there still basically the same, low temp, longer soak etc, that's all programming and better / different detergent right ?

    for heat pumps etc, laws of thermodynamics.. it still takes the same energy to convert x amount of water to steam / vaper to get it out of the clothes  and the control will still be basically calling for heat or not with a humidity sensor and temp sensor to provide feedback at best it adds another relay / sensor to assist (I have not looked at a schematic for a heat pump appliance but thats my educated guess from a control perspective )

    so from a system building blocks there still fundamentally the same. DC / brushless motors etc still needs a motor controller and yes they may be more efficient 

    A heat pump compared to a direct electric heater can provide more efficiency but im not convinced when compared to a gas powered dryer (Mine is natural gas powered for heat Slight smile )

Reply
  • in reply to Jan Cumps

    But from a hardware perspective there still basically the same, low temp, longer soak etc, that's all programming and better / different detergent right ?

    for heat pumps etc, laws of thermodynamics.. it still takes the same energy to convert x amount of water to steam / vaper to get it out of the clothes  and the control will still be basically calling for heat or not with a humidity sensor and temp sensor to provide feedback at best it adds another relay / sensor to assist (I have not looked at a schematic for a heat pump appliance but thats my educated guess from a control perspective )

    so from a system building blocks there still fundamentally the same. DC / brushless motors etc still needs a motor controller and yes they may be more efficient 

    A heat pump compared to a direct electric heater can provide more efficiency but im not convinced when compared to a gas powered dryer (Mine is natural gas powered for heat Slight smile )

Children
  • in reply to Robert Peter Oakes

    I'm with Robert  here, on topology nothing big has changed, just using a differnt kind of motor or controller in a few models has no topological difference.
    Same goes for the UI. 
    In terms of efficiency we do have plans for a mode to dynamicvally change your heat source based on current price and availability (like solarthermic, central hot water supply or heating within the machine) which just requires one more relay. We found some high end machines do have secondray inlet valves t oswitch to preheated water, but its not very common.

  • in reply to Robert Peter Oakes

    Well, actually, not quite.

    There are several topologies (for clothes dryers), the simplest is to suck in air, heat it up with a nice cheap and mucky  CO2 blasting gas flame, pass it over the wet clothes and out through the wall where it dumps most of the heat and the water.

    Next step is do the same thing but use an electric heater which at least could use CO2 free energy source.

    Then you add a heat exchanger on the out put so you pre-warm the incoming air and cool the exhaust air and condense the water in the machine - which is much more efficient and can (just about) allow you not to need an through the wall exhaust.

    Then you add a heat pump to help the heat exchanger, so you waste very little heat because the exhaust is cooler.

    I'm sure you could devise a controller based only on relays and and AVRTiny  -  but you might do better to control the whole system in  a more optimal way. Effective use of the heat pump will almost certainly need more sophisticated control  - there are a lot of variables to manage.

    Any future proofed domestic appliance will definitely need some kind of remote control so that it can help with dynamic grid load balancing (which will reduce the price of the electricity it uses.)

    An additional problem with tumble driers is their proven capacity to catch fire (combination of effective fluff gathering + heat) so the system design must pay due attention to this as well.

    MK

  • in reply to michaelkellett

    first. this is a washing machine  project (for now) it has nothing to do with dryers. At our projects base it is even very uncommon to have a dryer at all and those who do have no trouble just buying a new one if it breaks.So these are currently fully out of scope.
    Same goes for combined machines.
    You are welcome to implement a project for dryers of course.

    Second , the architecture of an MCU has nothing to do with achievable efficiency, its all in implementation and actual features needed which for machine controllers is commonly done with a vast selection across the whole board of existing MCu lines, there is 0 credibility to rule out any Plattform without first evaluating it in the actual use case.  Current state of the Art heat pumps are driven by 8-bit ATmegas without any restrictions from consumer units up to the latest Tech R&D units in Universities. High level UI is completelly separated from that , and runs on whatever Plattform is needed for the targeted Interface scheme, so it has  nothing to do with the actual machine control..