your drum bearings have gotten water in them due to a bad lip seal on the back side of the inner drum,if you can buy the bearings and lipseal you can tear it down and replace these rusty noisy bearings,and leaking seal
A loud rumble noise during the spin cycle is a good indication that the bearings have failed. The bearings are located in the rear outer tub. See link http://www.appliancepartspros.com/part_details.aspx?part_id=4426951 There are actually two bearings an inner and an outer bearing plus a seal. Water must have leaked past the seal causing the inner bearings to corrode. Once they start to rust, it just gets louder and louder. You are correct that Whirlpool does not sell the bearings and seal separately, but you must buy a new rear outer tub currently the price is over $400.
I had it happen to a different brand of front load washer and was faced to either, replace the rear outer tub, junk it or figure out how to replace the seal and bearing. I opted for the last and did some research on finding replacement bearings and seals. I had to tear the washer apart to get the bearings, then pound out the old ones to replace with new ones. It been working find for the last 2.5 year so far.
I found a website that might help you locate bearings and seals for your machine. http://www.hometask.com/washerrepair.aspx The site has a video on how to tear down your machine and shows you how to remove and replace the bearings. He might have the ones that you need on his site. Hope this helps you.
It is a complete tear down to replace the main tub bearing. The bearing comes pressed in the rear shell, oversized shipping on part. If the inner basket spindle is froze or badly pitted or groved it is another expensive part, The repair is about two or three hours depending on how easy things come apart and how much working room there is if it is done in your house. So yes it is expensive to repair, and not a easy decision, good luck
Two possibilities, one that the drum broke off of the supporting shaft--very expensive part (but could possibly be welded) and a complete tear-down to fix. The second is that the main bearing just behind the drum is bad. You can replace the bearing--go to a bearing supply house with the old one--cost less than $20, plus full tear-down to remove and replace. We went the bearing route and years later is still working well. If you try to buy parts from GE, they want to sell you the whole outer drum assembly for many penny.
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