Our washing machine appears to be contemplating dying. When I protested to the OH that we haven’t had it that long I was told that 6 years is “old” for a washing machine. I was a bit surprised as I know for a fact that Mr & Mrs Mule Senior’s washing machine is at least twenty years old.

So

It it\;

a) Consumer products now have much shorter lifespans than they used to,

b) I’m just getting old and grumpy, or

c) both of the above?

Its a question of how repair/servicable something is

You’re ready to condemn your machine but do you think it can be repaired?

Theres a general trend though away from items that require maintenance but are repairable towards items that are maintenance free but aren’t feasible to repair. There are exceptions though – Dyson do fixed price servicing and repair.

Generally though we’re becoming a culture that hates paying people and would rather buy things, so most people would rather junk an item and buy a new one than do something stomach churning like pay a bloke to look at it.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAGlUUAmjxk[/video]

d) Regular maintenance

I suppose I better say that vid is VNSFW.

Almost everything is built with planned obsolescence. Especially the junk that most people buy from China.

But it’s all so cheap we can just bury it in the ground and buy a new one.

It’s not planned obselecence, don’t be silly. It’s very simple economics.

Cost of living is really low in China so people can be paid peanuts to make these things. However, repair persons must be local so they need to be paid much more.

IF things are less reliable these days (which I don’t think they are) then it’s because people want to buy the cheapest things, so manufacturers are trying to make stuff as cheaply as possible.

Remember many consumer goods used to be hugely expensive major items. Now you can get a washing machine for the price of two weekly shops. You could still go out and buy a machine for as much as they used to cost in the 60s. Go right ahead and spend a grand on a Miele. Put your money where your mouth is.

All depends; I’ve had two tv’s last fifteen-twenty years, I’ve got audio equipment that’s twenty years or so old, and still works, apart from my turntable, which needs the speed control board sorted out. Even my old Aiwa AD-F220 cassette deck still works.
I’ve had to throw out high price computer monitors in the past that were a bit over five years old, because the manufacturers would not support anything older than five years. One of those was a 21″ monitor that cost, at the time, around £2000! Fortunately, I wasn’t paying for them. I couldn’t even find anyone to take them for recycling; this was twelve-fifteen years ago, mind.

Try repaircare.co.UK as they were pretty good for us.

There are guidance notes somewhere it is covered by law, either sale of goods or consumer goods. Things have the requirement of a reasonable life. We got a refund of 50% on our three year old fridge when it died. So it is not just warranty of 12 months.

I’ve had to throw out high price computer monitors in the past that were a bit over five years old, because the manufacturers would not support anything older than five years

What do you mean by support? If you mean fix, well.. electronics is phenomenally complicated. It might take years to design, and manufacturing is now so advanced they can knock them out cheap enough for us to buy. However if some tiny component develops a fault, it’s probably not even possible to figure it out in half of cases.

And because new stuff keeps coming out, people keep buying it (cos it’s new and better) – you can hardly blame companies for dropping support for stuff that few people are using.

If you are mechanically/electrically minded and are pretty handy wi the spanners then try and fix it yourself, there’s loads of how-to’s on the net these days. I’ve still got my original washing machine from when i moved out’a my folks house in 1992, to be fair i have replaced the door seal, brushes in the motor, bearings in the drum, fitted new pump seals and i currently use a bit of gorilla tape to hold the drawer shut as the plastic clip has broke but i’m not buying a new one, not until this one spews it guts over the floor – i’m firmly of the opinion that make do and mend is far better than spending cash on a new and often unnecessary machine or white goods of any description as they give me no pleasure whatsover and on my wages a new machine is more than a weeks work so bugger that idea.

I wish mrs tr thought like that kenny

Im make do and mend , mrs tr complains as soon as somethings not exactly as its expected to conventionally be 🙁

I think a lot of it comes down to the user. My OH’s sister must have been through 3/4 computers, 3 tumble driers, 2/3 washing machines, 3 stereos, 3 teles, numerous kettles & toasters in the 10 yrs i’ve known her.

She’s one of those people who has stuff that ‘just breaks’.
We lent her an iron as hers was broken. I’d had it since graduating, it had survived 3 house moved and was about 6 yrs old. She borrowed it for a weekend & when she returned it, “a button just fell off”. She failed to mention the fact that on it’s return it it also leaked water, had a seriously wobble sole plate & a quick look to see what was going on with it revealed a crack running around almost the whole thing. She must have dropped it (at the very least) for it to be so damaged.

Us on the other hand.. only consumer goods I can think of that has broken have been an old Sony trinitron that must have been 15 yrs old at least. And the replacement iron for the above one that had an electronics widget for adjusting the temp rather than a dial. It still works but the controller is tempremental.

It’s not planned obselecence, don’t be silly. It’s very simple economics.

😆

About 10 years ago we bought an Indesit washing machine. Said machine broke 3 times in the first 6 months. Each time, the repair process took 2 visits – 1 to find the fault, 1 to return with the part to carry out the repair. That lot cost me me 7 working days (one of the fixers failed to show up on the agreed date). Once it was fixed the 3rd time, I donated it to the local sally army furniture project and bough a new Bosch machine.

Yes it could be fixed, but life is too short to have to rearrange my time to wait in for someone to come and repair a £250 washing machine.

Simples!

I wish mrs tr thought like that kenny

Im make do and mend , mrs tr complains as soon as somethings not exactly as its expected to conventionally be

I can sympathise wi you trail rat, To be honest i’ve had gf’s that have tried to “influence/argue with/nag” me we shall say to change my white (more a kind of dirty grey now) goods as most of them have some part or another missing, still got same tricity bendix- aries hotplate cooker i bought 20 years ago, replaced the oven element once, two hotplates replaced and one cracked 3years ago that is still cracked but as it’s just me in the house so i see no need to replace it, and the grill element went 5 odd years ago but i have a combi oven/grill/microwave from aldi so see no need to buy a new grill element, all the markings have worn off the white knobs so i’ve used a sharpie marker pen to draw on the numbers “1 through to 6 “on the hotplate knobs, had the same fridge and freezer now for what must be at least 14 years, had to clean the compressor unit out a few times and i remove the fluff/hoover out the motor area every so often but it still works, but the fridge door bottle holder broke so i’ve doubled up some gorilla tape to hold bottles in the door and that works fine.

I’m amazed at my mates who allow ther partners to change everyone after a few years because they want a change of appliance?, why?…..if the old one worked fine then why change it?. It’s probably down to this reasoning which explains why i am still single 😀

Have a look at my recent toy purchase thread, as it’s vaguely connected to the topic at hand.

Reading articles on such sites as UKwhitegoods indicate that there’s definitely a shift towards ‘value’ when it comes to equipment longevity and comments like ‘my parents are still using a machine they brought when I was a kid’, we’re still using a machine from the 80/90’s bear this out in my mind.

We had the heating element go in our oven before Christmas, almost 10 years to the day it was brought. There’s no reason to suppose that we won’t get another 5 or more years out of that.

I guess I’m fortunate in that I can afford to spunk a silly amount of money on the above dishwasher but I’ve always taken the view of buying the best you can afford so that it a) lasts and b) is nice to use.

You only have to look at the trend for non-replaceable batteries on phones, mp3 players, tablets and even laptops now to see the planned obsolescence.

We all know these batteries are only good for 3 years or so of regular use before the battery loses capacity. Then you’re expected to chuck the entire device away and buy a new one.

Many manufacturers will offer a battery replacement service but it’s always so prohibitively expensive that again you may as well buy a new device.

Fair enough in some cases the device probably will be way out of date at that time and for many people will have lived its useful life but I have an HP laptop that is ~10 years old which I still use regularly and wouldn’t be doing so if I hadn’t been able to buy a new battery cheaply. I was considering a new HP envy X2 tablet/laptop device recently but it has not one, but two non user-replaceable batteries. Sorry, that’s a deal breaker.

Consumer goods are designed for a consumer society. The business model for the manufacturer is ‘make, sell’ and that is it. They have no interest in ‘make, sell, support’. It is cheaper to design for assembly than it is to design for assembly and disassembly (maintenance), so they make stuff that is cheap and easy to put together, because that is where they make their money.

If you manufacture for maintenance, it costs more. Few businesses are interested in through-life support of products, so very few people make things in that way. Some businesses have and are changing their business profile to provide through-life support and accept more responsibility for the product in life. This sort of change is needed to change to a society that values through-life and reducing resources. Unfortunately, most of the world gives not a toss about this and will exacerbate the mess we’re already well in to.

I take you lot all buy Hope bike stuff rather than Shimano then?

Why buy Hope? Their range of front and rear mechs is, frankly, quite poor, to say nothing of their chains, cassettes and cranks.

the Which? website has a washing machine diagnosis tool.

Washing machines are normally pretty easy to fix yourself

Some folks are just blissfully unawares things can be fixed and also have tool kits that comprise of a hammer a broken old screw driver.

My mates a dab hand at fixing broken flat screens , normally a capacitor or a. Resistor has died as oppose to the whole telly.

None user replacable batterys are usually replacable with some dismantling. Did my iphone 4 recently and have done a 3g in the past.

Have fixed washing machines , tumble driers , pcs , laptops etc etc. im not going to part with my hard earned until ive declared it fult dead 🙂

You dont see many appliance repair shops these days do you…… There were 3 in the small 25k people town i grew up in.

Plenty of bit warehouses selling stuff though.

Many manufacturers will offer a battery replacement service but it’s always so prohibitively expensive that again you may as well buy a new device.

I paid £29.99 for a new battery to be fitted to my iPhone 4S including return postage.

What are these devices where a replacement battery cost more than buying a new device ?

My issue is with the cost of spare parts. My 11 year old Neff dishwasher broke down recently and I either had to fork out a charge of £90 plus parts for a guy to repair it, or do it myself. I’m averagely handy so did a bit of poking around with a multi meter and found that the PCB was knackered. A new one cost something like £130, which isn’t far off the price of a bottom range dishwasher in the sales.

I ended up finding a second hand one off ebay for £40 which I fitted myself, which brought it back to life. Unfortunately there must have been a related problem somewhere in the guts of the machine because it stayed in the drain cycle and eventually burnt out the new PCB. So even with my best efforts I was forced to buy a new dishwasher.

Went for Bosch as its the same manufacturer as Neff, and I do consider 11 years a decent run for a dishwasher. Funnily enough, there is really no major difference between the old one and the new one.

How about 9km for a Rocket Ron circa £8 a mile.

On the plus side I have an Dyson washing machine. I bought it in 2000 and its still going strong in 2013.

I recently dismantled a 100 y/o Threashing Drum (that had sat unused for over 60 years), every single part still worked including axles that needed 2 to carry out, yet could be turned in-situ with a finger. None of the bearings had a mark on them.

But I’d hate to imagine what it cost.

There are a lot of factors in play here. To my mind, plenty of consumer products have got cheaper and more complex as time goes by. This would make them more difficult to fix whilst reducing the incentive for repair.

WRT simple electronics (like the controller PCB for washing machines) there’s not much that couldn’t be diagnosed given time and opportunity. I suspect that the margins on washing machines are so tight that there simply isn’t enough business to support many service engineers, which in turn makes the repair more expensive.

The issue in the UK is simply the cost of labour imo.

I just “fixed” a 3 year old £700 bosch washing machine that was “beyond economical repair”. It cost me 4 hrs of my time and £18 in parts.

Modern machines are designed for manufacture as much as designed for purpose. The use many more non dissemblable assemblies and much more plastic parts etc that are much more difficult to “fix”.

My last washing machine (which the bosch replaces) was 19 years old and working fine. However, it had needed a set of replacement brushes (£4.99!) and the stainless drum to be welded (i have a Tig welder to that was simple too))

So, you can fix anything, but if you’re also paying that persons wages, it is typically non economically viable to do so, which is a pity……..

so one of my areas…
washing machine last 2 yr if lucky often used 2+ times a day, last waranty’engineer’to visit claimed they are not designed for more than 1 wash per day BS?
OTOH fridge is about 20 yo freezer about the same. Dishwasher 3yo just been apart to remove blockage on drain pump now not washing well. TV went just before Xmas at 6-8 yo. cooker was 20 & just been replaced. we dont buy extended warantees on stuff and mend/make do then suck it up and get new 😥 Its designed to be built not fixed same as cars really ever tried changing headlamp bulb in a clio? how do they get away with it? makes my bikes seem well designed in comparison.

Depends what you buy. Spotted a washing machine for 169 in the shops today, would not expect that to last. We have a Miele, been going strong for 9 years so far with just 1 new door seal. 10-15 washes per week.

Had a bosh before that, which was rubbish, apparently some are made in Germany and some in Spain (or were at the time). I must have had a Spanish one. Control panel went several times and the door fell off! Lasted only about 3 years before I got fed up.

Considered the buy cheap and bin method, just could not justify this as its such a waste! Bought a Miele and would do again….

Still don’t think even top of the range Miele stuff is made like is used to, my mums washing machine did 20 years. We did know how the repairman took his tea towards the end though…..

“the more stitches the less riches”

There definitely is a designed life cycle on things. After so many rotations drive belt likely to fail etc. When it comes to style changes and incremental “improvements” its designed obsolescence. Did a whole module on it back in my product design uni days. Cars are one of the best examples. Mountain bikes another.

Washing machine used two or more times a day! I do 3 or 4 loads a week!

As for the Miele stuff, doesn’t the advert say it is tested to represent 10 years of use or something similar. Then they sell it with a two year warranty… If they bundled it with a 5 or 10 year warranty I’d buy one! As it was I bought a Beko for half the price, if it blows up in 3-4 years then ill buy a new one, by which time the price for condenser driers should have come down substantially.

Miele washers come with a 5 year warranty. Ours had been working a treat for 7 1/2 years no dramas until something we washed killed the door glass 🙁