Why you should not buy all your appliances at once
 

For some reason we ended up buying our range, dishwasher, washer dryer all at about the same time, eight years ago.

Well guess what?

That's right.


What a PITA.

Eight years is a pretty piddly lifespan for significant domestic appliances.

They don't make them like they used to.

In America, you mean?

Planned obsolescence is a science in and of itself.

Remember people used to get toasters repaired? Ha!

When armageddon comes, those who can fix small appliances shall rule the world.

I feel your pain.

I got a new stormdoor. You wouldn't think something like that would wipe a person out financially for two months, but it did.

I'm creating amazing meals of pinto beans and rice and when those run out it's Ramen.

on the upside, I should lose weight!!

It doesn't matter what I buy or when I buy it...it's gonna be broken. Something about it will be effed up.

Every. Single. Time.

either that or the install guy will scratch his head and say, "I've never seen anything like THAT before....I'll have to call in another guy."

when your plumbing was put in in 1957 it tends to confuse the regular plumbers and they have to call in the Olde Guye Who Knoweth These Things. And he's usually a grumpy old cuss who gets pissed off that he's been called in. All he wants to do is retire, but oh no, he has to show these young guys the way of the ancient order of plumbers. He hates it but he does it for the good of the guild.

I think they do.

They used to make lots of cheap crappy stuff with a few good things here and there. By natural selection, the crappy ones are no longer with us, and we get this false sense of old products being good because all the old things we have left are good quality.

I think they make things exactly like they used to. The bastards.

Exactly. Sigh...

1) Oil change...your something pan is tricky, it's going to take a lot longer, if we can do it at all.
2) New tires...we don't have a 'key' for these tires and there isn't one in your car anywhere
3) We can't turn your gas back on until you have a plumber (a plumber?) fix the doohickey and the whatchamacallit and test it to 5 tons of pressure.
4) That new phone you just got? The sim card is bad. Please to give us 5 bucks. Then don't expect the interwebz to work even though your Droid 2 and it's predecessor never, NEVER, had any connection issues
5) Those caps you spent a couple grand on will break within a week and we'll rip them out of your mouth and put in new ones.
6) You can't buy a replacement lint screen grate cover uppy thingy unless you know your stackable washer/dryer model number. That's on the back. Oh, the previous owners built walls around it? Guess you'll need help with that.

There's more but I can't think of them right now.

Sorry foot for the hijack.

Yeah. I used to think along those lines, but you really can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.

The old appliances could be repaired, but new ones mostly can't. They are not designed to be. Especially controls. You have to replace the entire computerized control panel if there is a problem, and that costs more than a new machine.

That's why it's 'planned' obsolescence. If we could harness all the energy it takes for them to make stuff no one can fix, we'd power the planet. ;)

fix your computer?

hahhahahhahahhahahhahahhahaah!

it's cheaper to BUY a new one!


(you idiot!- said under the geek's breath)

With the dishwasher, the racks are shot (we're on our second round of racks) the spinner water jet thingy whose name I don't recall is all chalky. Replacing all the needed interior giblets will cost about 50% of the price of a new machine.

The range and the gas dryer both need new igniter dinguses, and the washing machine has either a bearing problem or a cracked spider.

DIY

Well, clearly you already know the drill here.

My internal spinner/washer plumbing crapola was also in need of cleaning. It is possible, it's kind of tedious. In my case, it wasn't hard water deposits that were clogging it up, but food schmutz and broken glass. Same effect though and cleaning them made a big difference. Cost, zero.

Racks probably have to be replaced, I don't know how I'd "fix" them. The washing/spinner giblets are possibly cleanable, so you could realize some savings there, but you pay in labor and language. Getting in there to remove is possible, or if not getting in there to do the actual cleaning/coring/scraping/rinsing... like I said, tedious plus contortion grief.

Igniters are actually pretty easy. I've been inside both appliances and have replaced the igniter on my dryer. It's one of those that glows almost white hot before the gasflow starts. It is similar to the one in my furnace pics (poor pics, so sorry. I can reproduce them with greater attention to the photo quality if you like). My oven igniter style is not known--could be piezeoelectric/sparking kind, could be glowplug kind. Not a pilot light though.

As a matter of fact, there's a pic of the gas dryer apparatus around here somewhere already. I'll go find it.

This is trouble--certainly beyond my firsthand experience. I'd probably wind up driving it completely into the ground while I saved for a new-to-me unit.

try moving to another country, simultaenously buy everything new.

I'v had a lot of success fixing ranges/washers and dryers and little things on the cars from intrusctions on the internet. Basic washer dryers and ranges are very simple mechanically and electrically.

Dishhwasher I. just replaced, it got all clagged up due to the great phosphate conspiracy

http://www.npr.org/2010/12/15/132072...re-still-dirty

Googling dishwasher phopshate is pretty interesting.

https://www.google.com/search?q=dish...x=&startPage=1

Phosphates, Fluoride, These people need a fucking hobby.

BigV. Yeah, the fixes are all easy (except the washing machine) The dishwasher stuff is all easy to reach. It's just that all the plastic has completely corroded and turned to dust, the metal has also corroded. I suspect it is from the new phosphate free detergent. I believe they boosted alkalinity to compensate.

I'll have to read Beest's article.

It's just more crap for me to deal with.

I just had a repairman to come out to see what was wrong with a Kenmore oven.

He asked me to kill the power to it while he started taking it apart.
Then he suddenly said to turn it back ON, and he reversed,
putting parts and wires back together, as before.
Total elapsed time... 90 seconds.

He then called me in to show me how to set the oven timer,
and showed me that when the "start clock" button was pushed IN, the "manual" oven control was disabled.
Total elapsed time... 3 minutes.

He then smiled and wrote up my VISA card tab for $65.
Total elapsed time... 11 minutes.

(Actually, I am :blush:, because anything more might have meant replacing
the entire stove and built-in hood which has been in use since 1988.)

Especially two new cars at the same time :eek:

#two new cars withing 10 months of each other this year:(

Lamp ... lol ... but of course that's call-out fee and stuff.

A lot of these cases sound like failures of planned failure. Properly done planned failure means every component wears out at the same time.

Consider desk chairs. It makes no sense to put a gas lift strut that will last 20 years on a chair with crappy plastic wheels that will break after five. You want all your components to be just wearing out at about the same time. For a cheap chair that may be five years, but at least you'll save by not putting a twenty year gas strut on it. For a good chair you'll pay more for the wheels, but the whole unit lasts twenty years. Either can make sense, but mixing the two doesn't.

Toasters that must be replaced for want of a few more bucks on the control unit? Bad design.

I think I've posted this before. And I think Lamp was the only dwellar who knew it. Then again, I might be having one of my deja vu seizures again.

Have you heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay,
That was built in such a logical way
It ran a hundred years to a day,
And then, of a sudden, it — ah, but stay,
I'll tell you what happened without delay,
Scaring the parson into fits,
Frightening people out of their wits, —
Have you ever heard of that, I say?

Seventeen hundred and fifty-five.
Georgius Secundus was then alive, —
Snuffy old drone from the German hive.
That was the year when Lisbon-town
Saw the earth open and gulp her down,
And Braddock's army was done so brown,
Left without a scalp to its crown.
It was on the terrible Earthquake-day
That the Deacon finished the one-hoss shay.

Now in building of chaises, I tell you what,
There is always somewhere a weakest spot, —
In hub, tire, felloe, in spring or thill,
In panel, or crossbar, or floor, or sill,
In screw, bolt, thoroughbrace, — lurking still,
Find it somewhere you must and will, —
Above or below, or within or without, —
And that's the reason, beyond a doubt,
A chaise breaks down, but doesn't wear out.

But the Deacon swore (as Deacons do,
With an "I dew vum," or an "I tell yeou")
He would build one shay to beat the taown
'N' the keounty 'n' all the kentry raoun';
It should be so built that it could n' break daown:
"Fur," said the Deacon, "'t 's mighty plain
Thut the weakes' place mus' stan' the strain;
'N' the way t' fix it, uz I maintain,
Is only jest
T' make that place uz strong uz the rest."

So the Deacon inquired of the village folk
Where he could find the strongest oak,
That could n't be split nor bent nor broke, —
That was for spokes and floor and sills;
He sent for lancewood to make the thills;
The crossbars were ash, from the straightest trees,
The panels of white-wood, that cuts like cheese,
But lasts like iron for things like these;
The hubs of logs from the "Settler's ellum," —
Last of its timber, — they could n't sell 'em,
Never an axe had seen their chips,
And the wedges flew from between their lips,
Their blunt ends frizzled like celery-tips;
Step and prop-iron, bolt and screw,
Spring, tire, axle, and linchpin too,
Steel of the finest, bright and blue;
Thoroughbrace bison-skin, thick and wide;
Boot, top, dasher, from tough old hide
Found in the pit when the tanner died.
That was the way he "put her through."
"There!" said the Deacon, "naow she'll dew!"

Do! I tell you, I rather guess
She was a wonder, and nothing less!
Colts grew horses, beards turned gray,
Deacon and deaconess dropped away,
Children and grandchildren — where were they?
But there stood the stout old one-hoss shay
As fresh as on Lisbon-earthquake-day!

EIGHTEEN HUNDRED; — it came and found
The Deacon's masterpiece strong and sound.
Eighteen hundred increased by ten; —
"Hahnsum kerridge" they called it then.
Eighteen hundred and twenty came; —
Running as usual; much the same.
Thirty and forty at last arrive,
And then come fifty, and FIFTY-FIVE.

Little of all we value here
Wakes on the morn of its hundreth year
Without both feeling and looking queer.
In fact, there's nothing that keeps its youth,
So far as I know, but a tree and truth.
(This is a moral that runs at large;
Take it. — You're welcome. — No extra charge.)

FIRST OF NOVEMBER, — the Earthquake-day, —
There are traces of age in the one-hoss shay,
A general flavor of mild decay,
But nothing local, as one may say.
There could n't be, — for the Deacon's art
Had made it so like in every part
That there was n't a chance for one to start.
For the wheels were just as strong as the thills,
And the floor was just as strong as the sills,
And the panels just as strong as the floor,
And the whipple-tree neither less nor more,
And the back crossbar as strong as the fore,
And spring and axle and hub encore.
And yet, as a whole, it is past a doubt
In another hour it will be worn out!

First of November, 'Fifty-five!
This morning the parson takes a drive.
Now, small boys, get out of the way!
Here comes the wonderful one-hoss shay,
Drawn by a rat-tailed, ewe-necked bay.
"Huddup!" said the parson. — Off went they.
The parson was working his Sunday's text, —
Had got to fifthly, and stopped perplexed
At what the — Moses — was coming next.
All at once the horse stood still,
Close by the meet'n'-house on the hill.
First a shiver, and then a thrill,
Then something decidedly like a spill, —
And the parson was sitting upon a rock,
At half past nine by the meet'n-house clock, —
Just the hour of the Earthquake shock!
What do you think the parson found,
When he got up and stared around?
The poor old chaise in a heap or mound,
As if it had been to the mill and ground!
You see, of course, if you're not a dunce,
How it went to pieces all at once, —
All at once, and nothing first, —
Just as bubbles do when they burst.

End of the wonderful one-hoss shay.
Logic is logic. That's all I say.

:thumb:

On the other hand, if you build the damn thing so the parts can be replaced, if they wear out at spaced intervals you can afford the parts as they come due for replacement.