the orange color staff is water softener salt. don't have to touch it till more than 10 years.
but i have same problem, it is so hard to remove the two connection with the wall of inside. it seams that we have to build a special tool to screw them. otherwise it is easy to damage the plastic parts.
i meet this problem before, it displays E15 error code. drain pump kept running long time, endless. i searched and there are many suggestion on webs. finally, there is one help that is correct; it is base trap being fill with some water by leak or condensed water from moisture. the water trigged...