What is it with appliances these days?

[KiotiKowboy]

So many appliances are likely built with the same forced prison labor in China, regardless of the brand label. Therefore, they will share similar problems. I would like to hope our politicians will one day make our country once again business friendly.

 

[QueBota]

We have a "used" appliance store in our area. Two older (older than me!) guys run the place. They buy some broken ones off customers, pick some up off the curb before the recycle truck nabs it. They fix them up and sell them reasonably. Picked up a nice, non computer controlled upright freezer for the basement, $75.00 delivered and installed, like new, orginal manufacture date 5/79. They replaced the compressor and the door seal, works like a champ. Have two younger guys working with them, one son, one friend. Hope they stay in business for a while. You can buy most anything there for less than $200.

Q

 

[3930dave]

Most of the new stuff is junk.

Q - if word starts getting around, those guys should be busy. All they need are enough customers who are not distracted by the lastest bling.

Older compressors were designed for long-life. Any decent all-mechanical timer switch ran just about forever. When my uncle auctioned off the family farm in the late 90's, the (big bottom front service panel) GE electric fridge from the 50's was still running fine on the original compressor - AND, I've never heard another fridge that quiet, regardless of price.

For electric, what I may look at when my 25 y/o Fridigaire needs to be replaced is a Sunfrost fridge, after I get my HVAC neighbour's opinion on their current-production compressors.

Energy Efficient Refrigerators - SunFrost.com

Not cheap, but USA made, and great for off-grid households, or ever escalating utility bills. Their original products were developed for medical refrigeration, in really remote areas. Last I heard, their focus on reliablity was still alive and well.

Rgds, D.

 

[Johnny g]

I 've had the same dishwasher for 25 years. I thought about replacing her, but the alimony payments would kill me. /rimshot/

I also have the same dishwasher, sometimes it is a little noisy but it always calms down all by itself.

 

[HEC]

We have 2 sears chest freezers in the cellar still going strong for 25 years now , no repairs .

 

[super55]

I feel your pain. I have a maytag dishwasher that is about 2 years old and the circuit board on the thing is on the fritz. The washer every few weeks decides it has enough needs a rest. Reset the breaker still nothing. After searching the internet I found you had to hold two buttons to reset the circuit board. Nothing in the owners manual about how to do a factory reset. Just keep reseting the circuit board until that one day catastrophic failure.

 

[jrclark]

Awesome to read this now. Wife and I are building a house and will be in the market for all new appliances in a few months. I've been pouring through hundreds of models across all different brands for the past year and a half. My only goal is to find the stuff that will last the longest and suit my particular kitchen needs. Washer/dryer stuff is the wife's concern. There's nothing more annoying than a POS new appliance!

 

[Moves]

when my washer went out the first time, I looked for the cheapest one I could find (rationale - I dont want circuit boards and fancy crap that just breaks). Well, they dont even make em without circuit boards any longer. I tried to find one of thhose cheap Ropers that all the apartment buildings use...no luck.

 

[murphy1244]

Awesome to read this now. Wife and I are building a house and will be in the market for all new appliances in a few months. I've been pouring through hundreds of models across all different brands for the past year and a half. My only goal is to find the stuff that will last the longest and suit my particular kitchen needs. Washer/dryer stuff is the wife's concern. There's nothing more annoying than a POS new appliance!

I bought all GE and been having very good luck so far.

 

[300UGUY]

So many appliances are likely built with the same forced prison labor in China, regardless of the brand label. Therefore, they will share similar problems. I would like to hope our politicians will one day make our country once again business friendly.

And what would you have them do?