At this point you need to brake the basket loose from the basket drive block, I have always done this by STANDING in the washers basket and rocking your weight from side to side, This usually quickly brakes the basket loose, I demonstrated this at Kevin's wash-in a few weeks ago while rebuilding his friend Mikes 1966 Turquoise LKM washer but maybe no pictures were taken. When my brother and I coauthored the Time-Life repair books many years ago the writers could not figure a way to get the wash baskets loose either. So I showed them how I have always done it and they were all amazed how easily it came loose. However they decided for liability reasons that they could not show this in the book. So be careful not to fall out of the washer as you will never live it down LOL.

As I was (frantically) running around getting ready for the wash-in, I remember looking up and seeing John standing in the wash basket of that washer, but didn’t think anything about it because I didn’t have TIME to think about it, but now what I saw makes sense.

As I’m easily 100+ lbs more than John, I wouldn’t be comfortable putting all my weight in there like that. So what I do is, firmly grab the edge of the wash basket and aggressively push / rock it up and down, effectively doing the same thing he was describing.