Dishwasher recommendations? Black Friday coming up!

[FlyerInHi]

It costs a lot less in water and energy (heating) to use an efficient dishwasher than washing by hand, unless you don’t let the water run. Water is a finite resource, electricity less so.

There is also the time savings involved, and the benefit of a clutter free kitchen that you enjoy more, and the human benefit of using technology to improve the human condition.
In fact, I now have 2 dishwashers, and I move my daily stuff from one machine to another. Always a nice and neat kitchen without the tedious labor of putting dishes away.

Being eco did not mean doing without and living in a commune. Just like being progressive does not mean giving everything away and being poor. Do not make the fallacy of composition.

[ltsddd]

When it comes home appliances, I stick with the traditional “American” brands – Kenmore, Whirlpool, Maytag, GE, Fridgidaire, etc…My purchase decision is pretty simple, buy the least expensive model with the style that I want and so far I have pretty good luck with them.

Maytag refrigerator: Still going after 12+ years
Kenmore Dryer: 17+ years (replaced the belt once)
GE Washing Machine: 12+ years (getting noisy during the spin cycle)

All those were bought for around $550-$600.

The Whirlpool dishwasher and stove/micrwave that came with the house are still going strong after almost 20 years.

Would like hear from others about the brands of your appliances and their lifespan.

[Coronita]

[quote=ltsdd]When it comes home appliances, I stick with the traditional “American” brands – Kenmore, Whirlpool, Maytag, GE, Fridgidaire, etc…My purchase decision is pretty simple, buy the least expensive model with the style that I want and so far I have pretty good luck with them.

Maytag refrigerator: Still going after 12+ years
Kenmore Dryer: 17+ years (replaced the belt once)
GE Washing Machine: 12+ years (getting noisy during the spin cycle)

All those were bought for around $550-$600.

The Whirlpool dishwasher and stove/micrwave that came with the house are still going strong after almost 20 years.

Would like hear from others about the brands of your appliances and their lifespan.[/quote]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Home_appliance_manufacturers_of_the_United_States

Whirpool/Maytag is the only low/mid-tier company that is still Made in the USA.

Amana is owned by Whirpool, but they are heavily foreign sourced with cheaper parts.
KitchenAid is also owned by Whirpool, but I haven’t heard many good or bad things about them, and they aren’t cheap and aren’t cheap to repair.

GE technically still makes appliances in the US, but they are now owned by Haier and more of their products have the cheaper parts.

Frigidaire is now owned by the same European company that owns Electrolux. Not that great anymore too.

Dacor is now owned by Samsung. I have ovens made by them in the current house, and I dread the repair costs when it breaks.

For garbage disposals, stick with ISE and get one with a larger motor, like a 3/4 hp. It costs a lot more, but they do last a lot longer, especially in a rental.. I had one replaced by by a home warranty, I forget what brand, and it was completely junk and broke after 1 year of use.

[FlyerInHi]

Seems irrational and jingoistic to focus on “made in”.
Adam Smith said export what you make well, and import what others make better. Win-win. England used to export finished clothing. Not anymore because times change.

Just focus on price/quality and buy what you like.

[Coronita]

Brian,

Ok, Boomer. If you say so.

[treehugger]

I currently have a Kenmore elite dishwasher, about 8 years old? We have hated it since we bought it….takes like 4 hours to run and if you try to run it on short wash or eco doesn’t clean anything, have to prewash everything or doesn’t work. In the last 2 years things have started to break on it and we have been jury rigging it cause it is a stupid appliance. Was almost ready to pull the trigger and have been looking at online reviews and price points. Lowes and best buy have the best consumer resources (reviews and descriptions) but when possible I buy from Costco during a sale, due to their white glove service and extended warranty if you use the Costco visa. Almost took the plunge last week and was going to get the Samsung from Costco, but decided to keep limping along and now sale over….

[bibsoconner]

UPDATE

So, I went ahead and shelled out $155 to have a Bosch certified repairman come out and look at it. My reasoning was that there is a life time warranty on the tub itself for “rust through”, and my own amateur efforts indicated it might be leaking from the tub. Also, I’d spent enough time looking at it, that I wanted to see what the problem was and it was worth $155 to the engineer in me. I kid you not, he came and spent about 10 minutes looking at it and declared, “it’s leaking from the tub” and on the bill wrote “tub leaking / welding problem”.

I’ve called Bosch and they are dragging their feet replacing it saying, “we acknowledge the weld is bad but how do we know it is because of rust?”. I pointed out that they could have spent more time looking at it and they are being nit picking. It’s been about 2 weeks since the repair guy came and I’m about to buy another unit. I’ll consider reporting them to BBB. There “lifetime warranty” does not cover the $155 nor does it cover installing a replacement. Given that it only last 3.5 years, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to take delivery of a replacement if it’s going to cost close to $400. That’s assuming they offer a replacement.

Needless to say, I don’t advocate buying Bosch. I thought what you got with a higher end unit is something that lasts AND that comes with better service. Lesson learned 🙂

Dave

[Coronita]

I’m am not surprised at all by Bosch’s response.

[ltsddd]

[quote=bibsoconner]UPDATE

So, I went ahead and shelled out $155 to have a Bosch certified repairman come out and look at it. My reasoning was that there is a life time warranty on the tub itself for “rust through”, and my own amateur efforts indicated it might be leaking from the tub. Also, I’d spent enough time looking at it, that I wanted to see what the problem was and it was worth $155 to the engineer in me. I kid you not, he came and spent about 10 minutes looking at it and declared, “it’s leaking from the tub” and on the bill wrote “tub leaking / welding problem”.

I’ve called Bosch and they are dragging their feet replacing it saying, “we acknowledge the weld is bad but how do we know it is because of rust?”. I pointed out that they could have spent more time looking at it and they are being nit picking. It’s been about 2 weeks since the repair guy came and I’m about to buy another unit. I’ll consider reporting them to BBB. There “lifetime warranty” does not cover the $155 nor does it cover installing a replacement. Given that it only last 3.5 years, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to take delivery of a replacement if it’s going to cost close to $400. That’s assuming they offer a replacement.

Needless to say, I don’t advocate buying Bosch. I thought what you got with a higher end unit is something that lasts AND that comes with better service. Lesson learned 🙂

Dave[/quote]

I say spend another $50 or so and file a breach-of-contract in small claims court. You’ll be surprised how quickly they’ll want to pay up.

[Coronita]

My friend did the following when his subzero fridge broke and neither subzero or Pacific sales helped him resolve it.

He took his SUV and parked it right in front Pacific Sales entrance, and put a very large sign on his windshield and rear windows that said something like “Ask me how I really feel about the warranty for my broken SubZero fridge I bought from Pacific Sales” with a phone number… Pacific Sales called SubZero,.and SubZero got back to my friend really really quickly.

More expensive appliances don’t necessarily perform better or last longer than cheaper tried and true appliances. Buying a Bosch is like buying a BMW. They start out nice looking and perform nice. But eventually they will break down due to their complexity and unless you know how to fix them yourself, be prepared to pay an arm and leg for repairs.

[svelte]

Wow.

Maybe we’ve just been lucky, but we’ve had a Bosch dishwasher for over 12 years now and loved it. No problems and super quiet…can’t even tell its running.

Model SHE55M05UC

Our 2007 Bosch double oven, on the other hand, is not to my liking. The clock has consistently lost time since new, and the touch-controls are confusing and not intuitive at all. On Thanksgiving, the bottom oven apparently was turned off by folks in the kitchen by accident – twice! – causing a hours-long delay in our finished turkey. We didn’t eat until about 6 PM. It was an odd day.

Model HBL8650UC (and it wasn’t cheap!)

[temeculaguy]

FLU is right! I ran my serial number of my kenmore elite HE3T front loader that has 16 years of dedicated service and low and behold, it was built by whirlpool. I wish I could run my Bosch dishwasher and find out it was made by someone other than Bosch, but we can’t have everything. As an owner of a BMW and a Bosch, the analogy is accurate in my experience. I’m not sure I will purchase either brand ever again.

[Coronita]

Lol..Speaking of BMW. I am done with BMWs after mine stops running. Don’t get me wrong. Mechanically, mine has been more or less trouble free for the past 8 years (wow that much time has passed). I intentionally try to get the most stripped BMWs as possible so that it has the fewest electronics possible, as there’s less things to break.

But after 8 years and 60k miles, yes I know my mileage is low since I spread my usage across 5 cars, so while mechanically things are great, the plastic shit BMW profusely uses just crumbles and breaks all over the engine. I have had to replace numerous hoses, fittings that BMW decided to make our of cheap plastic that couldn’t withstand the heat of the engine bay. And while the parts were cheaply made with plastic, they sure were not cheap to buy.Whenever I could, i substituted a metal or harden line component and since I did the work myself, not much in labor costs. But yes, BMWs are turds as they get old, and unless you have the means and willpower to fix all these stupid things that crumbles, stay away from BMW, or for that matter, anything else German. It’s just ridiculous. There’s this rubber gasket that sits between the oil cooler and starts leaking around 50k and a stealership, while there for a recall, wants $1200 to replace the $12 gasket, saying it’s a 50k interval normal service item..I was like, are you freaking kidding me. I’ll do it myself. Then there’s the plastic firewall support that cracked and I had to plastic weld myself back together. There’s a crack on a carbon fiber stabilizer bar
Replacing the battery was a big deal because unless you have the bmw scanner tool like I do, the stealer has recalibrate/reprogram the damn thing after a battery replacement because of the way the alternator works….stealerships wanted $800 for a stupid battery change. And now, there’s an errant fuel gauge which pinpointed to a bad fuel sender unit…which is part of the high pressure fuel pump and fuel filter as one unit, and that’s like $500. Really, only 60k life? just really stupid things . I haven’t even gotten to the point when the turbo dies, a common problem, or if the high pressure fuel pump grenades or other common major issues.

i am done with BMW for a long long time. don’t know when it dies, what I’ll replace it with. Maybe a 2020 Toyota Supra….. I’m kidding that was a joke. I test drove the new Supra. Nice car. Too bad it is basically a BMW Z4. It drives like a BMW, sounds like a BMW , the cockpit even looks like a BMW. it has a new car smell like a BMW. If it quacks like a BMW, smells like a BMW, drives like a BMW …It’s a unreliable turd BMW..with an automatic….. I’ll pass. Toyota, what the hell were you thinking?

And thank god I stopped shopping German… Back a few years ago, I almost went through with a 991 911s with part of my vested RSUs. Instead, sdr found a $130k short sales. Thank God I backed out of the 991 and bought the condo instead. I probably would be cursing about the 991 now too, as with any other German car.Coincidentally, I sold that condo last year for around $305k..Now I can get 2 911s….ha ha…uh no, thank you….

In contrast, for shits and giggles, I bought a $2000 piece of shit miata from a nice lady, spend roughly $8000 in suspension.and engine, mods, AND general consumables like tires and brakes over the course of 5-6 years of racing the fuck out of it. I went through 7 sets of tires and each set were around $400, whereas my friends in their BMWs replaced their tires around $1200-1400/set each time and generally went through more sets. Replaced brakes and rotors god knows how many times, at a fraction of what my peers did. My clutch went, easy to fix. The radiator cracked, dirt cheap and easy to fix, the motor crankshaft key cracked, easy to replace, and the damn car caught on fire when I ran into something and the fuel line bursted and I couldn’t put out the fire quick enough because a corner worker handes me an extinguisher with a pull pin that was ziptied with a super thick zip tie that I couldnt break. Yeah, the ac fan melted, a few hoses and belts melted, the wires to the alternator melted, and the paint on the hood flaked off from all that heat undeeneath. But $200 later, it was running again, and with less weight!!! Removed the damn AC and stripped out all the AC components. And drove that car for another 2 years hard and it still runs now and passes smog, even with all my borderline mods. It’s a 25 year old car with almost 200k miles, still on the original engine and transmission. And it was one the best damn decision ever. Years of fun, no worrying about hitting shit,easy and.and cheap to reapair, consumables are dirt cheap, and the write-off is digestible if I accidentally total it.

And the best part is. I don’t care where I park it. If someone opens the door and dings it oh well. If someone opens their door and dings it when I’m in the car, and doesn’t even say sorry after seeing me thinking it’s a piece of shit car anyway, that ok too. Since it’s a two door that swings very wide, I’ll make sure after they leave, to open my door very very fast and wide when I get out.. so fast, that the door literally bangs and bounces off their almost brand new luxury car in Carmel Valley that they probably care more about than my piece of shit car…oops. did I do that?

Hello BMW, you listening? Bring back a simple e30 M3 inspired car please, and stop badging engineering and slapping that M badge on every car. What the fuck are M550i M340i??.. THEY ARE NOT M REAL CARS!!!! ….

No more german cars, dishwashers, appliances etc for me.

BMW = Big Money Waste

[FlyerInHi]

Flu, does American car quality relate to American appliance quality?

[Coronita]

Scotty pretty much sums it up.

I hate getting to the back cylinders…

And Mini’s are worse

That’s why they are so cheap used. I hated helping out my friend when his broke down.

Real world experience says it all.

Brian, quit pulling shit out of your ass. Its getting old and your credibility is hitting an all time low.

[Author]

Posts