What is up with kettle build quality? They all seem to be made of tinfoil and recycled sweetie wrappers. Even the supposedly posh makes. You can spend £100 and the thing still rattles like a Yugo. Where’s the money going? It’s a bloody heating element in a tin can. Not to mention most of them are ugly as sin. Jesus somebody help me.

I have a cheapo one that’s been going fine for about 10 years – I wish it would die as it’s hideous, but it seems strangely indestructible.

bosch is your friend.

You forgot to mention that most of them don’t even pour properly, let alone well – given that the main task is heating water and pouring it – the pouring tends to be bloody crap a lot of the time.

We had one that met an untimely end at my hands at 3am in the morning doing a bottle for the baby – it pour ed boiling water all over my feet for the last time, and I smashed it to bits on the slate floor.

Only saw one Bosch and it was lots of stupid swooping shiny plastic. I’m not looking for suggestions by the way. Bought a Kenwood. This is just a discussion about how kettles are rubbish and why that might be.

Yes pouring can be an issue. What is that about? The old kettle routinely dribbled water down the side of the cup.

I love my kettle! It boils in seconds if it’s only a cupfull, pours perfectly, looks nice, durable, non-rattly. I don’t get it? It’s a Russell Hobbs heritage one.

I love my kettle! It boils in seconds if it’s only a cupfull, pours perfectly, looks nice like a handbag, durable, non-rattly. I don’t get it? It’s a Russell Hobbs heritage one.

ftfy

I had one that would let steam out right by the handle, in such a way that if you held it at the top of the handle to pour it, you’d be scalded. Great design feature.

This is just a discussion about how kettles are rubbish

perhaps you haven’t found the right kettle yet 🙂

Ours is awesome not sure what make it is mrs rocket bought it 3kw thermonuclear boil pours/refills easily AND it has a blue light inside

our last Kenwood was appalling – it would leak steam from the on switch in the handle, the paint chipped really badly and fell into the water and it discoloured such that it turned pink from red – all after a few months of ownership.
“we” replaced it with another Kenwood with selection criteria being limited to ‘does it match the toaster?’. surprisingly it’s fairing a lot better and given that it gets used every hour during the day it’s fairing a lot better.
both were about £60 which is absolutely ridiculous.

My rattle free kettle:

Ours is awesome not sure what make it is mrs rocket bought it but it boils in minutes pours/refills easily AND it has a blue light inside

Mine’s got a red light, and everyone knows red ones go faster.

Bottom end of the product design food chain.
All the good guys work for Samsung and Apple – the bloke who got a 2:2 from a tin-pot Polytechnic now works at Russell Hobbs.

I don’t get hand driers that don’t work. There are good and bad examples of kettles – some might be unreliable, some might be a bit drippy, some might be ugly but at the point of design and manufacture they are still fundamentally a kettle and can boil a quantity of water. Apart from the dyson air blade thing (and seemingly in spite of it too) theres an entire industry making hand driers that aren’t hand driers. Even companies that only make one thing, and sell it all over the world and call themselves “world dryer” don’t make machines that dry your hands.

I can’t understand the mindset of being at the pre-production prototype – testing it, being well aware that it doesn’t really work – then instead of going back to the drawing board going into mass production instead. The distributors and retailer taking them even though they demonstrably don’t work, and people buying them, and they don’t work, and not just sending them back.

I love the ones that have a motion sensor that can’t sense your hands where the air is blowing – so you wave your hands under – its blows – you move your hands to the blower – it stops.

I love the rip-off of the dyson one with a blue light and digital countdown so that have a timer telling you it takes exactly twice as long to dry your hands as the dyson does.

I found myself impatiently waving my hands under a hand dryer a few weeks ago -under and around it like a David Copperfield magic trick, trying to trigger the sensor, before the guy behind me kindly pointed out it was a paper towel dispenser.

it has a blue light inside

Sounds like our Dualit one. Our last one had to be thrown out because the turning-off bit got unreliable. In the olden days you could take them apart to adjust this, but it seems that now they’re totally undisassemblable so you have to throw them out even thought they’re 99% ok.

agreed really, our shiny DualIt was, in fact, not well built; now on a John Lewis own brand one which is ‘OK’ but rattles and doesn’t pour well.

It’s possibly the cordless aspects of them that cause problems — my easiest kettle I’ve had for years and years, Russell Hobbs with plain on/off switch on rear, pours very easily in a smooth manner. It’s the one in my office, the kitchen has the wobbly cordless one..

Anything by Braun. They should know.

Or Russell Hobbs K5 or similar

Great minds, kcal

I’ve been boiling water in a pan on the stove for the last few weeks, suprisingly it makes better tea for some as yet unkown reason as the kettle is in the boot of the missus car (long story, involving lazyness). Tempted to get a camping/aga kettle and bin the electric one.

All the good guys work for Samsung and Apple – the bloke who got a 2:2 from a tin-pot Polytechnic now works at Russell Hobbs.

The guy who designed the iPhone went to a North East Poly (I can’t rememebr which, Sunderland?)

You know, I’ve very nearly started this thread myself several times recently.

I’ve been through all manner of ‘branded’ kettles that have turned out to be pants. They pack in, leak, or otherwise fall apart.

My current one is a Wahl one, celebrity endorsed by James Martin (for ages I wondered why a kettle would be endorsed by a hairdresser), and it’s been about the best I’ve ever had. But it too is on its last legs, the lid doesn’t snap shut any more, meaning the steam leaks and thus fails to trip the auto cut-off. Quite what I’m going to replace it with I’ve no idea.

Time was you could solve problems like this by throwing money at it to avoid buying crap, but it seems now that brand and price is no indication of quality.

Last cheap plastic one lasted six years and was fine.

Mrs S insisted we needed a new one.
We got one of these:

It was unstable and rattles.
Now on the third. 😐

Another cheap plastic one next time.

We’re currently ‘running’ this rather funky red number.
It’s well good, and boils much hotter than other kettles 😉

The base is dead stable and the button has a really satisfying clunk sound, which is very important.

You know you have a happy life when your biggest issue is a slightly shonky domestic appliance 🙂

The old kettle routinely dribbled water down the side of the cup.

How can this be the kettle’s fault and not yours?

I honestly have never had these kind of problems. I had one kettle fail once, it just stopped working. And rattly? What? You’re supposed to make tea with it not drive to London in it.

I get annoyed with the “min fill” mark on the side of our kettle – follow that and you ending up boiling enough water to fill a bath!

Stove top kettle, no elements, nothing to go wrong, it even whistles

No go faster red light though. 🙁

Great designers come from all backgrounds – the Motorola RAZR lead hardware designer went to Bradford as was taught by my Course Director – Nik Hills, a wonderful chap, gifted and intelligent, worked for Electrolux and then in Medical Design, finally left that to teach Design at Bradford.

Ives is talented, but less groundbreaking that many would believe.

Check this out:

1958 Braun Transistor Pocket radio VS iPod

Still love the iMac and the G3/G5 Towers though. The iPod Shuffle is a rare foray into design that is not dependant on sight. How do you use a radio or iPod based on a touchscreen if you’re blind? My DAB radio is useless if you can’t read the screen. Anyway, rant over 🙂

No idea what ours is (and CBA going to check – though it’s whatever was one of the cheapest at the time we bought it), but it works fine at boiling water, not rattling and not dribbling. To be fair it did stop working at one point when some bit of the contacts in the base stopped working, but I’d fixed that with a soldering iron by the time mrs aracer came home with a new one (from Argos, which made things easy). I don’t see the problem.

How can this be the kettle’s fault and not yours?

The reason it dribbled is because water stuck to the underside of the spout. Frankly the insinuation that I can’t pour a cup of tea is insulting to my manhood and I’ll see you outside right now.

I’ve been boiling water in a pan on the stove for the last few weeks, suprisingly it makes better tea for some as yet unkown reason

It’s a basic cognitive bias in humans which makes us think that things we have expounded more effort on are intrinsically better.

Got a Asda Smart Price white one 3 years ago, to replace Rowenta fancy one that refused to switch off when boiling, turning kitchen into a sauna .I have since got 2 others for mumsy and work,although they now cost £1 more than the first one I got (but on reflection £4.99,and the same for the Smart Price toaster seems more than reasonable).Recommended.(Keep your reciept and pay separately)

We’ve got a Philips one that we got as a toaster/kettle combo from Argos. It was fairly pricey but boils quickly, doesn’t dribble water, is quiet and looks OK (as far as kettle aesthetics go!). Only thing wrong is I stuck my finger through the removable filter thing trying to clean it. Not sure that’s the fault of the kettle though.

Funnily enough, the toaster that came with it is also pretty good. Consistent, with a decent gradation to the scale so you don’t go from anaemic to burnt in a 3 degree twiddle of the the dial and toasts quick enough that it doesn’t turn the bread into some kind of over-sized crisp-bread.
The LEDs on the buttons on one side stopped working after about 6 months, but it still works as it should.

It’s a basic cognitive bias in humans which makes us think that things we have expounded more effort on are intrinsically better.

Nope, its better, Ive trialed it. I think it’s hotter or maybe still contains more disolved air as the tea seems to brew much quicker.

Or it’s a plastic kettle. Can’t you get iffy flavours from plastic kettles sometimes?

On my original point, I accept that most kettles are broadly functional, but why, when spending £80 or £100 are you still getting crappy plastics and flimsy lids?

Does it just not factor into the buying decision for most people? Am I in the minority in looking for build quality and for want of a better term, ‘product design’ i.e. unobstructed lid, low footprint etc?

Ives is talented, but less groundbreaking that many would believe.
Check this out:

I wouldn’t say that’s conclusive proof he copied the design, he may never have seen the earlier one…

Double blind?

Nope, its better, Ive trialed it. I think it’s hotter or maybe still contains more disolved air as the tea seems to brew much quicker.

Double blind test? 🙂

IIRC tea is not meant to be made with boiling water – it should actually be slightly cooler.

I had a Breville cordless plastic one with a blue light, it was awesome, it boiled in seconds, and had a stay hot switch on it that periodically reboiled the water to keep it hot, great for tea marathons, and cooking.

Then the Mrs moved in, decided it didn’t match the toaster, and bought a matching kettle and toaster that look great but are awful, cheap tat. The kettle doesn’t pour well, and they’re made of stainless steel which always looks smeary.

Footflaps, Dieter Rams [Braun’s lead designer for a good long time] and Johnny Ives are total buddies:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/8555503/Dieter-Rams-Apple-has-achieved-something-I-never-did.html

I’m not saying he “copied” it, but I am saying he has taken the design language and fiddled/ran with it.

Further reading…

Expensive (£80) and louder than I’d like, but it’s well made (as far as kettles are concerned) looks nice (as far as kettles are concerned) and has 4 temperature settings…useful if you drink green/white/herbal tea, or real coffee. It has a ‘keep warm’ setting too, which gets used more than we initially thought it would!

Then the Mrs moved in, decided it didn’t match the toaster, and bought a matching kettle and toaster that look great but are awful, cheap tat. The kettle doesn’t pour well, and they’re made of stainless steel which always looks smeary.

Sounds like the toaster that Mrs. mogrim bought – lovely and shiny in the shop, but shows up every fingerprint. It’s also a two slot toaster, which means you can’t stick long bits of bread in it. And it’s too quiet, so you have to keep an eye on it to see when the toast has popped up. Bah. Had it for years now and the bloody thing won’t die, either 😡