[HN Gopher] Declining quality of consumer-grade products - 2009 ...
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Declining quality of consumer-grade products - 2009 fridge
compressor autopsy
Author : userbinator
Score : 142 points
Date : 2022-08-14 21:09 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.automaticwasher.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.automaticwasher.org)
| f38zf5vdt wrote:
| Hugged to death, go here.
|
| https://archive.ph/hOrqv
| slowmovintarget wrote:
| From the notes: "These marginal design choices are not the only
| way to get an efficient unit, since the fridge compressors from
| the 1940's and 1950's era were very efficient, while having
| consistently longer lives. This failed unit is purely an example
| of doing just enough to get by until it is someone else's
| problem."
|
| I've been seeing this as a common issue throughout most of the
| household appliances we've tried to buy in the last ten years.
| They just don't last.
| PontifexMinimus wrote:
| > I've been seeing this as a common issue throughout most of
| the household appliances we've tried to buy in the last ten
| years. They just don't last.
|
| I've had the same experience. E.g. I bought a kettle 2 years
| ago and it lasted for 6 months. Previous kettles have lasted
| many years (as they should).
| sydd wrote:
| Yep, some are so shitty that the whole product category becomes
| garbage. We went on an adventure with blenders:
|
| 1. We bought a Bosch hand blender (maxomixx) because it looked
| sturdy and was priced near the top at the mall -- thought that
| the brand and the price tag would guarantee that it would last.
| It broke after 8 months, turns out that the coupling between
| the mixer and the body is made of plastic that wore off. I
| called the Bosch service hotline, they told me that the whole
| body is one "part" that I can buy for ~80% of the original
| price.
|
| 2. Went back to the mall looking for one with metal coupling,
| turns out there is NONE. All of them are garbage with the same
| fault point. But luckily there is a wide selection of standing
| blenders, where some of them had much more massively looking,
| metal gears. Bought one from Electrolux. It broke after 3
| months, this time the bearing on the bottom of the blender cup
| started leaking the grease into our food...
|
| 3. Gave up trying to get a blender from the mall, bought a
| Vitamix for 7x the price, which we're happy with for the last 3
| years.
|
| Yes, there is plenty of planned obsolence out there, and one of
| the greenest things you can do is buy premium stuff that will
| last you a lifetime (if you can afford it :/ )
| jibe wrote:
| _planned obsolence out there_
|
| I don't think it is planned obsolescence, it is just a race
| to the bottom on price. At $30, an immersion blender can't
| have metal gears. Most people value cheapness more than
| quality, so we get cheap junky products. Nylon gears are a
| travesty, but most people prefer replacing crap to paying 7x
| for the Vitamix.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| This isn't true of me.
|
| I value quality and price. Unfortunately, while price is
| clearly stated, poor quality is often hidden.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| thats fine, but then why do I get the same problems when i
| pay $200?
| ygra wrote:
| Interestingly, the Bosch food processor we have has a plastic
| coupling between the motor and the meat grinder attachment on
| purpose, so if anything gets stuck, it's a 5 EUR plastic part
| that's broken, instead of a more expensive and less
| accessible one. So a plastic coupling alone doesn't sound
| _that_ alarming in general.
| s0rce wrote:
| I think Kitchenaid's have that too, I remember repairing
| one years ago with my dad.
| azza2110 wrote:
| I'd happily pay 5x the price of the cheapest product
| available, if I knew I was getting a higher quality product
| with a longer lifetime.
|
| However, I can never tell if this 5x premium actually gets me
| a better core product, or just gets me better branding,
| advertising, aesthetics, and/or superfluous features.
|
| So I usually just buy the cheapest and hope for the best.
| cudgy wrote:
| Get a Vitamix. 5x the price and seems to last forever. In
| fact, there are even very old (decades old) used Vitamix's
| on eBay that are still running and usually just need a new
| canister.
| rlaabs wrote:
| Modern Vitamix benders (roughly within the last 8 years)
| have the same declining quality issues.
|
| Newer models are typically much lighter. This means they
| now have far less internal material to reduce noise. I
| can't use mine without ear protection since it's about
| chainsaw level of noise. The reduced weight means I also
| need to hold onto it during use otherwise it will vibrate
| itself off the counter.
|
| The company seems to be most interested in selling
| smoothie recipe subscriptions for their blender companion
| phone app. Aside from subscription selling the app is
| pretty much useless -- who wants a phone app to remotely
| control a blender?
| xahrepap wrote:
| For Christmas we replaced my moms vitamix. She had her
| last one for well over 20 years.
|
| We've had ours for 8 years and it works like new and
| doesn't smell like the motor is burning out like so many
| cheap blenders do.
| hansvm wrote:
| I can second this motion. I've used a lot of blender-like
| products of various advertised levels of quality, and
| Vitamix is the only thing I've seen that can take massive
| levels of abuse for ages.
| Ma8ee wrote:
| But that only says anything about the units that were
| sold decades ago. It's very common that quality brands
| with very good reputation are bought by some investors,
| and then they start selling the same crap as everyone
| else, but to the premium price that their brand and
| reputation allow them to. And it works surprisingly long
| before the new crap they sell destroys their reputation.
| (I know nothing about Vitamix, they may still be great.)
| ygra wrote:
| In Germany there's an independent organisation, Stiftung
| Warentest [-4], that anonymously buys various products in
| stores and tests them quite rigorously. Some may say
| perhaps a bit too well (including things like the manual,
| how easy it is to set up a large appliance, or whether
| toxic chemicals are used in parts that are handled), but
| overall they seem to do a very good job. Testing and
| scoring methodology is published as well. I trust them a
| lot more than Amazon or YouTube reviews or some random blog
| that got the product sent by its manufacturer.
|
| [-4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stiftung_Warentest - the
| article also has a few pointers to international, similar
| organisations near the bottom.
| floydnoel wrote:
| Thanks for sharing, this is great information. I
| definitely think that independent testing organizations
| are important for quality so it's always great to hear of
| more of them
| bombcar wrote:
| For food-service you can often find commercial-grade stuff
| which still has some durability to it - but it will NOT have
| things like "be quiet" or "small portion size" or "cheap"
| usually.
| seb1204 wrote:
| Commercial range of devices often are better as they need to
| endure much more uses.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| Commercial grade devices are often not suitable for home
| use - for example commercial dishwashers are a totally
| different beast, their cycles are like 10 minutes and they
| are meant for disinfection nore than cleaning. They need
| frequent maintenance, dont come with a pump, dont tolerate
| long periods of non use, etc.
| 14 wrote:
| Same issue with a Dremel. Stopped spinning so opened it up
| and found it had a plastic coupler. Junk. Luckily I was able
| to find a 3d file and print a new coupler with my printer.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| I had a higher end Dremel that would intermittently die
| because the brushes got stuck in their channels once the
| motor warmed up. I was so happy when the speed controller
| died and I replaced that garbage with a $20 Menard's unit
| that's been bulletproof.
| Gordonjcp wrote:
| > I called the Bosch service hotline, they told me that the
| whole body is one "part" that I can buy for ~80% of the
| original price.
|
| It's eight months old. They *have* to replace it under
| warranty.
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| To save everyone a lot of time: he finds that a sintered bronze
| bearing has worn and allowed metal-on-metal contact elsewhere
| in the unit. He theorizes it's the oil, which he demonstrates
| is very thin at room temperature. Which is meaningless - film
| strength doesn't have to be high if there isn't high pressure
| between sliding surfaces.
|
| The claim that fridges from the 40s and 50s were very efficient
| is nonsense. Even a 10-20 year old fridge is very inefficient
| compared to a modern fridge. It's as easy as looking at energy
| star ratings.
|
| > When it becomes a problem, it goes to the dump where all the
| foamed-together plastic parts will not be feasible to separate
| nor recycle.
|
| It's never been economical / feasible to manually take apart an
| appliance for recycling. They're shredded and the plastic/metal
| chunks separated mechanically for the raw materials.
| userbinator wrote:
| _Even a 10-20 year old fridge is very inefficient compared to
| a modern fridge. It 's as easy as looking at energy star
| ratings._
|
| Do you think the manufacturers aren't gaming those ratings
| either?
|
| The energy efficiency of fridges over time has definitely not
| been monotonic either. The ones that use the most were the
| late 60s-80s models that sacrificed insulation thickness for
| more interior volume.
| cudgy wrote:
| Old refrigerators may not be as efficient, but they were
| built better internally and last longer. The savings from an
| efficient refrigerator that only lasts a few years is
| meaningless.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| You'd have to stick an ammeter on it, but I bet a 50s fridge
| is pretty efficient because they are manual defrost only.
| Most modern full-size fridges are auto defrost - essentially
| they suck down electricity to heat up the cooling system. The
| efficiency gains over a couple decades ago are due to moving
| from fixed, mechanical timers to computer controlled adaptive
| defrosters.
| userbinator wrote:
| They are designed to die just slightly past the warranty, so
| they can sell you another. Of course, the statistics means that
| quite a few units won't even last until then.
|
| Before manufacturing tolerances were as tight, they'd error on
| the side of caution and overbuild, resulting in a wider MTBF
| curve. There were both many early failures as well as ones
| which far exceeded their expected life. Now, the standard
| deviation is much smaller so the end-of-life has become more
| well-defined both at the cost of nothing much lasting longer
| nor shorter than expected.
| markus_zhang wrote:
| So I guess the best strategy is to use them as much as
| possible and make sure they break in the first year...
| [deleted]
| bombcar wrote:
| There's a small subset that avoid it - but the only one I know
| of is the Speed Queen machines that are identical to their
| commercial offerings - and have remained basically the same for
| decades.
|
| One way to gauge it is see how available repair parts are (all
| systems eventually wear out) and what the costs look like.
| geoffeg wrote:
| The quality and warranty are the primary reasons I bought a
| Speed Queen washer and dryer a few years ago. Most reviews
| say the washer isn't the best at actually cleaning clothes
| but 99% of the time I don't need to remove stains or dirt, I
| just need to wash clothes from daily use. In addition to the
| reliability I really like the controls. Nothing fancy, very
| easy and obvious with a 7-segment LED display that will
| likely last forever.
| jackmott wrote:
| Could it be because the information age causes companies to
| compete on price much more aggressively? You can't easily prove
| that your fridge really will last longer, but easy to price the
| price is low.
| Skunkleton wrote:
| Sounds right to me. When you look at markets where
| reliability is important, you see appliances that are the
| same. You can get good quality commercial washing machines.
| moooo99 wrote:
| > You can't easily prove that your fridge really will last
| longer, but easy to price the price is low.
|
| I'm not so sure about that. In my experience people tend to
| be less price sensitive with household appliances (big one
| time purchases that are supposed to last long) than they are
| with other more expensive items. Most people I know tend to
| be lifelong customers if they have good experiences with a
| specific brand and are very willing to share that brand as a
| recommendation.
|
| The problem is, those good experiences don't seem to hold
| true anymore. Price hasn't been a good indicator for product
| quality and life expectancy for a while. I've seen this first
| hand with my family. My parents were very willing to spend
| significant amounts on stuff like dishwashers, fridges, or
| washing machines. Despite sticking to the brands they had
| good experiences with, the product lifetime decreased with
| every new product purchase. It has come to the point that
| they don't care for the brand they used to trust, they are
| just buying the stuff thats cheap and checks all the boxes.
|
| These companies seem to have traded high customer loyalty
| (and possibly a very efficient organic marketing channel) for
| more frequent sales but higher price competition. I have no
| insights into those companies, but I'm not sure if that was
| an intelligent long term play.
| bombcar wrote:
| It's _worse_ now - the cheaper product often lasts longer
| (as it 's simpler) - I have a fridge/freezer thing that has
| basically no controls and no computers, and it chugs along.
|
| Newer refridgerators with fancy water faucets and computers
| and locks have failed in the time I've had it.
|
| Had a washer blow out on a computer control board; $750 for
| the board.
|
| A similar washer blew out on the dial, $35 for the dial.
| cudgy wrote:
| Similar story with old Honda's. Simple cars that just
| worked with few problems, but they were simple cars with
| few electrical motors and digital features. Automatic,
| heated, air conditioned seats? No. Automatic climate
| control? No. Speed adjusted suspension? No. Speed
| adjusted stereo volume? No. Etc.
|
| However, some manufacturers like Saab actually delivered
| all this with excellent reliability only to be rejected
| by the US market and driven into the ground by General
| Motors. What is a quality manufacturer to do?
| oezi wrote:
| The manufacturers are all gaming the system by releasing new
| models so quickly (and in so many varieties) that any design
| flaw of a model cannot be used to make a purchasing decision
| because the comparable old devices are no longer available.
| npteljes wrote:
| 100%. Information asymmetry, and also the glut of options
| make informed consumer decisions much harder than they need
| to be.
| bombcar wrote:
| Or there is one or two manufacturers for all the various
| brands.
|
| "Whirlpool brands include Whirlpool, Maytag, KitchenAid,
| Jenn-Air, Amana, Magic Chef, Admiral, Norge, Roper, and
| others. See all items in Dishwasher Dishrack. Whirlpool
| also makes various appliance models for Sears / Kenmore."
|
| And once you start looking up part numbers you realize it
| goes even further.
| vidarh wrote:
| Could be.
|
| E.g. the majority of consumer grade ice machines on Amazon
| (at least in the UK) uses a mechanism that is near identical.
| This extends to mostly copying a design flaw: Most of them a
| compartment used to immerse cooled metal rods in water, which
| then rotates out of the way to let the ice cubes fall into
| the ice compartment when done. Most of these are made out of
| plastic, with a motor rotating only one side. Problem is when
| it's stopped mechanically by simply hitting the end of the
| range of motion, which means the motor effectively ends up
| trying to twist the compartment. This works fine for casual
| use - the plastics holds for a while. But use it enough, and
| you get cracks developing. It's trivial to fix - some of the
| designs have an optical diode to stop rotation in one
| direction, but weirdly not in the other, and doing that in
| both directions would solve it
|
| But I'm thinking that apart from not just coming up in
| testing (it takes _a lot_ of cycles before it breaks), a lot
| of these problems spread because of cost cutting in the
| _product development_ phase. It 's a pretty obvious flaw if
| you observe the above mechanisms, and while you can cut a few
| cents of the bill of materials, without extensive testing you
| won't know for sure that it won't fail within the warranty
| window (they _do_ if you use them as heavily as I use mine)
| and it doesn 't take a very high failure rate to make an
| extra optical diode and wiring worth it. If people did
| product dev from scratch you'd expect at least some of them
| to decide it'd be worth it, but almost all of these are
| clearly just blindly copied designs (I'm sure multiple models
| must also be manufactured on spec by the same manufacturer).
|
| As a result there's little real competition, and few
| customers will be aware there are better alternatives,
| especially because it takes quite a bit of wear and tear and
| so most people don't shop for these types of products often
| enough to realistically compare, and as you point out it's
| hard to prove (and takes a _long_ time to develop a
| reputation).
| willis936 wrote:
| I have the internet at my fingertips. I _know_ a
| thermostatically controlled toaster is feasible to make into
| a cheap product because it existed in the 1960s and we now
| have transistors. Every single toaster is exactly the same
| with cosmetic differences. They 're priced from $10 to $500
| with no distinguishing features in the first $200.
|
| The market is not working, we just have the tools to realize
| how badly it's broken.
| AmericanChopper wrote:
| The market works fine. For any category of good you can
| think of there will be producers that make a high quality
| version of it. Consumers who care about that quality
| (according to however you're measuring it) will make their
| decisions accordingly. Consumers who reveal a preference
| for caring less about that quality will make decisions
| based on other criteria.
|
| If your complaint is that this requires effort from the
| consumer, then that's not something any market could fix.
| The consumer will always have to consider what their
| preferences are and how the offerings in the market align
| with them, if the want to end up purchasing goods/services
| that align with their preferences.
| npteljes wrote:
| No it's doesn't work "fine". One of the failings is the
| artificial information asymmetry imposed by the
| companies' constant churn of products. By the time we get
| some non-seo actual reviews of the model A1000, it's out
| of stock and you can only buy A1000b and A2000, both made
| from different components. The market _can 't_ work as
| intended under these circumstances, because there's no
| way for the consumer to make an informed decision.
|
| Consumers signal their preference for quality all the
| time. By buying the pricier stuff. But sometimes,
| somehow, there's no option anymore to buy X stuff - try
| buying a desktop CPU without Intel ME or AMD PSP for
| example. They just put it in every one of the CPUs at one
| point and that was that. People are not going to not buy
| newer CPUs.
| jbay808 wrote:
| > For any category of good you can think of there will be
| producers that make a high quality version of it.
| Consumers who care about that quality (according to
| however you're measuring it) will make their decisions
| accordingly.
|
| I've been a consumer my whole life, and I still struggle
| to "make my decisions accordingly" because it's so
| difficult to find trustworthy information about quality,
| especially the qualities that matter to me. It can take
| an exhaustingly long time to gather this information,
| there are no shortcuts, and price and quality are often
| only loosely correlated.
|
| Worse, after putting in the effort, I frequently find
| that those high-quality products and their makers
| disappear from the market, being outcompeted by junk.
| tialaramex wrote:
| Yeah, no.
|
| Nobody makes high quality cassette tape mechanisms. It
| doesn't make sense to make ten of a custom cassette tape
| mechanism, only at least tens of thousands, so, they
| don't. But the market for thousands of these mechanisms
| is for the _cheapest possible_ not good quality. So you
| simply can 't buy good quality.
|
| It was possible in the 1980s, at great expense, for the
| humble cassette tape to sound pretty good, the Nakamichi
| Dragon is the most famous high end tape deck.
|
| But you can't do that today. There are a handful of
| Chinese manufacturers, spitting out variations on the
| same basic cheapest possible "eh, it's good enough"
| mechanism and that's the entire market.
| est31 wrote:
| The complaint is that one could manufacture those more
| expensive high quality products at a larger quantity and,
| through scaling effects, one would achieve a lower price,
| which would make them accessible to larger segments of
| the market. I suppose that would be the market "working".
| Instead you have manufacturers churning out tons of cheap
| shit that breaks quickly. I guess most customers don't
| know how quickly different household appliances break, so
| they also can't compare that together with price. They
| have to assume that the more expensive appliances are
| also higher quality, but how can you judge that as a non-
| expert?
|
| Household appliances are textbook examples of adoption
| s-curves, and in different phases, different rules apply
| for the market. Especially in the last phase of the
| s-curve, those manufacturers are hurt the most which
| build lasting products, because their own past customers,
| usually the best source for new purchases from their
| brand, don't buy from them any more because the need is
| still met by the still working product. So they either go
| bankrupt or get bought by one of the manufacturers that
| put in planned obsolescence and got tons of money from
| that, or they change their strategy before that happens.
| AmericanChopper wrote:
| > The complaint is that one could manufacture those more
| expensive high quality products at a larger quantity and,
| through scaling effects, one would achieve a lower price,
| which would make them accessible to larger segments of
| the market.
|
| That complaint is immature and entirely self-interested.
| It's almost always beneficial (except when there's
| production shortages) to have a preference that is shared
| by large segments of the market. It's not the systems
| fault if few people share your preferences.
| yojo wrote:
| FWIW I love this Panasonic toaster, which is some
| substantially different toaster tech:
| https://www.amazon.com/Panasonic-NB-G110P-FlashXpress-
| Infrar...
|
| No thermostatic control, but the defaults are fine for my
| uses.
|
| Currently on year 10. The power button got a little finicky
| so I have to wedge it with a piece of cardboard to make
| contact, but otherwise as good as the day I bought it.
| tuatoru wrote:
| > I know a thermostatically controlled toaster is feasible
| to make into a cheap product because it existed in the
| 1960s
|
| Having bought a toaster and electric kettle recently, I
| completely agree with your main point: buy the cheapest one
| you can bear to look at, because they're all the same in
| the essentials.
|
| But this anecdote about your aside might be diverting. One
| of my earliest extended memories (in the 1960s) is watching
| my dad repair our toaster. winding new resistance wire
| around the mica central divider. (The toaster was a manual
| model with flip-open sides, toasting one side of the bread
| at a time.)
|
| I don't think automatic toasters were all that cheap in the
| 1960s. Not everywhere, anyway, if repair of a manual
| toaster was worthwhile to do.
| jiggawatts wrote:
| This video makes this point very well:
| https://youtu.be/1OfxlSG6q5Y
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| > The market is not working, we just have the tools to
| realize how badly it's broken.
|
| "The market" is not a single thing. It's an idea(ology)
| from economics, and a cultural mythology, that vaguely
| intersect at some point.
|
| We all think we know what "The Market" is, supply, demand,
| competition and so on. It's existence and operation
| underwrites many a political argument.
|
| Then there is the reality:
|
| Walk in to a supermarket and "choose" from 20 different
| brands of tinned vegetable, grown in the same region,
| processed in a handful of factories ultimately owned by the
| same parent company.
|
| "Own" a movie, on a device that you don't actually control
| in any way, that you were effectively forced to purchase,
| with money you don't have.
|
| And so on....
|
| So, in respectful mockery of Thatcher I say "There's no
| such thing as The Market" - not because I don't believe in
| the values of property, choice, competition, innovation....
| but because we don't have these, and haven't for some time.
| The myth of "The Market" lives on the place of early (real)
| capitalism as we head toward "consumer communism".
| Gordonjcp wrote:
| > respectful mockery of Thatcher
|
| There is no need to do anything "respectfully" of
| Thatcher. She should have been hanged.
|
| I wouldn't piss on her grave for fear the warmth would
| comfort her.
| mbesto wrote:
| > They just don't last.
|
| Two words: planned obsolescence.
| nly wrote:
| It's very similar phenomenon to shrinkflation. Instead of
| getting more expensive, items are just getting lower quality
| RichardCNormos wrote:
| People value low prices more than they value longevity.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| this is just your opinion.
|
| People have no way to know longevity of the product they are
| buying
| cudgy wrote:
| This is the root of the problem. Quality machinery costs more
| and most people think they are getting a good deal when they
| buy junk at cheap prices.
|
| However, sometimes you get lucky buying cheap stuff that
| lasts and that is the experience we like to remember and try
| to repeat.
| randallsquared wrote:
| It's the root of the general problem, but as noted
| elsewhere by another commenter, paying a lot more doesn't
| actually provide much signal that the product isn't junk.
| goodpoint wrote:
| Planned obsolescence went so far that often appliances has a
| higher TCO than 10 years ago.
|
| The cheap ones by lasting very little. The reliable ones by
| being very expensive.
| swayvil wrote:
| If the quality of things goes down. And your wealth remains
| consistently such that you can just afford to pay your bills
| (that is, keep yourself supplied with all the necessary things).
| Then poverty is happening. And it is being masked.
|
| Food and shitty food are both called food but they are not the
| same thing. Their sameness is a trick of language.
| replygirl wrote:
| pipe and representation of pipe are both called pipe but they
| are not the same thing. their sameness is a trick of language
| nimbius wrote:
| sounds like a lack of proper QC and insufficient or the wrong
| grade of oil was added...but, home compressors are this weird
| sealed monstrosity that can never be properly serviced without a
| byzantine amount of hacky gizmos anyhow so...
|
| -\\_ (tsu) _/-
| jjcm wrote:
| The server seems to be having some issues. Here's the video the
| article discusses: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpnnLQNgUiQ
| matwood wrote:
| I recently replaced a basic washer and dryer that had lasted 20
| years. I went to buy new ones and asked the person for basic
| models that would last 20 years again. He laughed and said
| nothing he sold would last that long anymore. I'm glad he was
| honest, but it made me sad.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| As I'm in the middle of replacing a one-year-old LG fridge I've
| been doing a bit of reading. Apparently rotary compressors like
| this require exceptionally precise tolerances to achieve any
| manner of reliability.
|
| Thirteen years doesn't strike me as particularly bad. Not great,
| but not bad. That 80-year-old fridge the repair shop guy is
| bragging about is almost certainly not an auto defrost unit. So,
| sure, it's probably on close to a modern fridge in power
| consumption but the tradeoff is you'll have to scrape ice out of
| it periodically.
|
| https://hbr.org/1989/03/cold-competition-ge-wages-the-refrig...
| bombcar wrote:
| Auto-defrost is nice for the first X years, until it starts to
| ... not defrost as much or as well. Sometimes the simpler ones
| are nicer, even if they require a bit more thought/work to use.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| Most full sized residential fridges are auto defrost these
| days. I think it's been that way since the 80s or so.
|
| I've a 2003 build Whirlpool fridge that's been just fine. In
| that era the defrost logic is usually mechanical and if/when
| the defrost timer fails it's a $30 part that's fairly easy to
| replace.
|
| The LG that I just junked uses electronics to control the
| defrosting. That gets expensive to fix but that's also not
| what failed in that piece of crap.
| kube-system wrote:
| It was a premium product at the time and it was priced
| accordingly. Only 85% of Americans could afford one at that time.
| Appliances today are dirt cheap for a reason.
|
| The reasons everyone has a fridge today isn't because everyone is
| rich, it's because fridges are cheap.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| It would be pretty cool if we made decisions that led both to
| better pay for most Americans and for higher quality projects.
| We've destroyed the labor movement so most workers have no
| bargaining power. Real wages have barely risen since 1980,
| despite huge gains in productivity. Then in order to make
| products cheap enough for impoverished workers to afford, we
| cut every corner we can.
| est31 wrote:
| It's not a "too bad we can't make it more durable because that
| would increase the parts cost" situation, at least not solely.
| It's also a "how can we make this product break quickly and
| make it badly repairable so that you have to buy a new one"
| situation, aka planned obsolescence.
| kube-system wrote:
| In monopolistic industries, this happens. But in other
| consumer markets, value manufacturing _still_ win, because of
| significant information disparities and /or consumer
| preferences.
|
| If your competition makes a shitty fridge for $1000 with
| bearing that will fail at 15 years on average, and you make
| the exact same thing with bearings that will last 30 years
| for $1010, most people will look at the exterior, say "these
| look the same", and buy the competitors model.
|
| And you can advertise that all you want, and next week your
| competition will put $3 of extra steel in the door handle to
| make it feel more solid than yours and write the word
| "professional" on the door. Now your product looks like a bad
| deal.
|
| Now you might say that people are making bad decisions. But
| are they really? Most Americans don't keep their house for 30
| years, so why do they care if the fridge fails before then?
| It's someone else's problem.
|
| This is why market positioning is a complicated discipline.
| It isn't just "make a good thing for a good price"
| kingTug wrote:
| What if I'm rich and just want reliable appliances? It's a wild
| goose chase.
| canadaduane wrote:
| I've been using looria.com lately, and it seems to be
| tracking a pretty good "signal" using Reddit and other
| sources of consumer feedback that are currently more reliable
| than Amazon ratings.
| kube-system wrote:
| Premium/commercial brands exist.
| hardolaf wrote:
| Heck even without going "premium", you can pretty much just
| buy LG or low-end Bosch models of most things and be fine.
| But if you buy Samsung, you might as well budget for a
| replacement ASAP.
| kube-system wrote:
| Agreed. Bought all new appliances 10 years ago, and the
| only ones that have given me trouble have been Samsungs.
| tekno45 wrote:
| i wonder if samsung products in Korea are better? How did
| they get so big outside of phones?
| seb1204 wrote:
| Continuing gp train of thought you would need to search for a
| supplier that 85% of people can't afford anymore.
| hollywood_court wrote:
| We have completely remodeled both the exterior and interior of
| our last 70's home. But we haven't replaced a single appliance. I
| have made far too much money repairing newer appliances for
| clients and friends.
| nabakin wrote:
| Looks like the website is down. Here.
|
| https://archive.ph/hOrqv
|
| https://youtube.com/watch?v=DpnnLQNgUiQ
|
| Maybe we can switch links? @dang
| cwillu wrote:
| cgi-bin: haven't seen you in a long time.
| legitster wrote:
| For newer appliances, I've weirdly found that spending _less_
| money is key to achieving longevity.
|
| Smaller, fewer features, less moving parts. Avoid gimmicky
| features that your grandparents never needed.
|
| I'm a real cheapskate when it comes to appliances and have yet to
| have one crap out on me.
| yojo wrote:
| PCBs, sensors, and switches seem to cover most failure modes of
| modern appliances. I try to minimize the number of each in
| every purchase.
|
| My favorite recent buy was a Victory range hood with mechanical
| switches and no PCB. More like this please.
| bombcar wrote:
| It's triply annoying as the computers in these devices
| absolutely pale in comparison to a Raspberry Pi - it would be
| nice if all appliances used one general purpose board that
| could be easily sourced; as it is nobody will pay $750 for a
| control board to fix a washer when a brand new one is less.
| CatWChainsaw wrote:
| Recently read "The Waste Makers" (published in 1960, I believe).
| Nothing too mind-blowing since the advertising tricks used in
| that era are quaint compared to today's, but it definitely opened
| my eyes to how long the decreased quality/planned obsolescence
| phenomenon has been going on.
| mc32 wrote:
| One thing I've noticed compared to childhood appliances is
| plastic mechanisms (gears, actuators, brackets, etc). These tend
| to become brittle or soft with age or exposure to chemicals and
| lead to early failure. Of course metal also suffered from fatigue
| and there are quite strong and durable thermoplastics but today I
| see cheap plastic used liberally.
| [deleted]
| MontyCarloHall wrote:
| These studies never account for survivorship bias. There were
| plenty of crappy appliances decades ago, but they've all long
| since broken, so we only have the very best old appliances to
| compare against today.
|
| Also, the inflation adjusted cost of a fridge in the 50s was
| something like $10k. A $10k fridge today (e.g. Sub Zero) will
| easily last for many decades. A $1k Wal-Mart special will not.
| e40 wrote:
| Sub Zero fridges are terrible. The people I've known that had
| them rued the day they bought them.
|
| They are a status symbols, that's why they cost so much, not
| because they are top quality.
| verisimi wrote:
| Why make a good product, when you can make a good advert or
| public relations campaign instead and gain repeat customers in a
| shorter timescale? (As your product will need replacing sooner.)
| If all the corporations collude in this way, everyone is a
| winner.
|
| But of course the customer is at fault for this environmental
| misuse of resources.... right? We should shoulder the expense of
| cleaning up the mess that corporations and governments create.
|
| ^ That is the corporate/governmental plan - spin the problem as
| an environmental issue that the consumer pays for! (Again.) And
| extract even more money from the customer in the process as they
| get rid of servicable products in favour of echo-friendly ones.
| Make laws to force them to do this too! It's a win win for the
| corporations!
| verisimi wrote:
| Mass production is only profitable if its rhythm can be
| maintained.. that is, if it can continue to sell its product in
| steady or increasing quantity. The result is that while, under
| the handicraft or small-unit system of production that was
| typical a century ago, demand created the supply, today supply
| must actively seek to create its corresponding demand.
|
| Edward Bernays, 1930
|
| I believe that competition in the future will not be only an
| advertising competition between individual products or between
| big associations, but that it will in addition be a competition
| of propaganda.
|
| Edward Bernays, 1930
| rglover wrote:
| What you're attributing to "evil corporations" is really just
| mimetic theory playing out. Most people want (in general, but
| specifically here, those working in corporations) to play it
| safe and in turn, end up copying "the other guy" in the form of
| product focus, strategy, and culture.
|
| The sad truth is most people in most companies are just
| lemmings which creates the illusion of collusion, when really,
| it's just a whole lot of unoriginality.
| tejohnso wrote:
| > an example of doing just enough to get by until it is someone
| else's problem
|
| Sounds like what I've been noticing in grade school education.
| Perfect grades for everybody! Just please move on and don't check
| for any actual knowledge acquisition.
| ProfessorLayton wrote:
| Without numbers it's really hard to say how good or bad these
| engineering choices were in regards to the consumer to come out
| on top or not.
|
| In my experience appliances are _a lot_ more efficient _and
| cheaper_ than they used to be. My new stainless steel fridge has
| much more capacity while using the same amount of power than the
| 20yo one it replaced (Which didn 't actually fail, but the white
| coating was rusting all over the place).
|
| My HE washer doesn't fill the entire tub compared to the old
| upright ones, so my water heater is used less, and spins at
| ~1,200rpm, greatly reducing dry times for my electric dryer. The
| recessed lighting in my house went from 90 watts _per bulb_ to 12
| watts for LED, and saves me $$ on cooling when needed. My
| tankless water heater heats up only the water being used, no
| more, no less.
|
| I'm paying roughly 32C//KW all-in (after taxes, fees etc.) for
| electricity in the Bay Area, so efficiency gains build up quickly
| over time.
|
| Anecdotally, the only issues I've had so far have been with
| poorly engineered Samsung refrigerators, where the fans would
| seize due to ice buildup, not mechanical wear.
| nabakin wrote:
| > In my experience appliances are a lot more efficient and
| cheaper than they used to be.
|
| turbokinetic agrees modern refrigerators are more energy
| efficient but at the expense of longevity and not worth it
|
| > I am saying that this compressor, and its application, show
| clear engineering choices made, which sacrificed its life span
| in the name of some modicum of energy savings.
| ProfessorLayton wrote:
| >turbokinetic agrees modern refrigerators are more energy
| efficient but at the expense of longevity and not worth it
|
| Without numbers to back up that claim, that's just their
| opinion, as is mine. I _my_ experience the energy savings
| have been significant enough for that to not be a big
| concern.
|
| There may be an environmental argument here of course, but
| that's a separate argument than what consumers feel in their
| pocketbook.
| andrewstuart wrote:
| Yeah my stupid Hisense fridge that I bought only four years ago
| is already flaking out.
|
| I has Whirlpool washing machine that lasted more than 20 years.
| When it finally gave up the ghost I bought a Fisher and Paykel
| that literally within 2 months of the 2 year warranty expiring.
| To their credit, Fisher and Paykel replaced it but even so.....
| mianos wrote:
| A washing machine should last more than two years in home use.
| We have some laws here in Australia that makes them repair
| things even outside their warranty if their expected life is
| longer.
|
| The guide for fridges here is in between 6 and 13 years. Under
| 6 you should not have any issues arguing with them (they will),
| over 6 it might take some more effort.
| replygirl wrote:
| re: fridge, hisense is a tv company
|
| re: laundry, did you ever consider getting a second whirlpool?
| either way, what about the paykel outweighed 20 years of
| reliability?
| cwillu wrote:
| https://www.hisense-usa.com/home-appliance/explore-home-
| appl...
| leashless wrote:
| My company is working on changing the economic incentives for
| manufacturers, so that they will make high quality durable goods.
|
| Here's how it works:
|
| 1) Each item has a unique serial number, and a database for
| storing maintenance records about the item.
|
| 2) When the item is going to be resold, third parties _including
| the original manufacturer_ sell warranties on the item to protect
| the new owner. A manufacturer would inspect, refurb, and re-
| warranty on each iteration.
|
| 3) The new buyer pays more for the item, and the warranties on
| top of that, because they're getting goods closer to new goods in
| performance.
|
| 4) The manufacturers are profiting every time the goods are
| resold, possibly as much or more than selling a new one.
|
| We think this model of the circular economy is a lot more likely
| to succeed than the current model which involves ripping things
| down to their raw materials then reusing those materials to
| manufacture new things.
|
| https://mattereum.com/circular-economy/ <--- more here
| matrix_overload wrote:
| Yeah, sure, buying "physical asset NFTs" from you will suddenly
| convince major appliance manufacturers to change their ways and
| part with millions of dollars in profit.
|
| Sorry, the problem you mentioned is 100% valid, but the NFT-
| based solution you are offering is a pure grift.
| tehwebguy wrote:
| Anyone know if Allstate (seems to be the primary warranty
| parter on eBay) or Asurion (Amazon) sell their add-on
| warranty data to third parties?
|
| Someone could beat Consumer Reports by just purchasing &
| publishing the raw data (warranties sold, claims made, claims
| paid).
| vermilingua wrote:
| If I'm understanding correctly, you're asking the manufacturers
| (and/or other warranty writers) to take on liability for
| unknown damage that may have been accrued over the lifetime of
| the item. The only way to make this damage known would be to
| return the item to the factory to be inspected, which would be
| considerably more expensive than "ripping things down to their
| raw materials".
|
| How do you solve this problem in a way that consumers aren't
| paying for all these externalities?
|
| EDIT: didn't even see the crypto connection, that answers that
| question.
| workingon wrote:
| why dont you just try to do something good instead of grifting
| schlipity wrote:
| It has been my experience for a very long time that most
| warranties aren't worth the paper they're printed on. They
| either take too long to replace the item so that you end up
| buying a new one, or simply do nothing at all. The warranty
| service that Amazon tries to add on to every "device" purchase
| is famous for this.
| 1270018080 wrote:
| Why can't a new competitor come in, make non-shitty products, and
| make billions? Is there really a grand planned-obsolescence
| conspiracy, or is this a mixture of survivorship bias, recency
| bias, and a strong imagination?
| bombcar wrote:
| Because it's hard to make non-shitty products _and_ be known
| for it.
|
| By the time you have a reputation for quality products, you're
| often acquired or out of business. There are actually cases of
| this in some specialty equipment.
| booleandilemma wrote:
| I expect nothing less from a culture of people who buy a new
| cellphone every 2 years. Longevity in consumer products is not
| something we optimize for anymore.
| jollybean wrote:
| They didn't necessarily think about lifetimes back then.
|
| LEGO bricks used to be made to withstand nuclear holocaust
| because, well, the Engineers though they should be 'durable'.
|
| It was hard to convince them to scale back a bit.
|
| They are still 'durable' as anyone walking with bare feet near
| children can attest, but just not quite as invulnerable as
| before.
|
| They saved a lot without compromise.
|
| Fridges may not need to last 30 years, it costs a lot to do so,
| so let consumers decide.
|
| What _should_ happen is something about 'lifetime and warranty'.
|
| Some people might want 'long lasting things' in which case we
| should be able to clearly differentiate.
| ricardobeat wrote:
| "let consumers decide" is a dark joke. In practice, the market
| will race to the bottom, and the only quality items left will
| be at the other end of the spectrum, unaffordable for 99% of
| consumers.
|
| You see this everyday, it has become very hard to find great
| manufacturing quality on every kind of product, from appliances
| to phones, cars, even mundane stuff like a lemon juicer or a
| light fixture. Everything at market prices is not built to last
| more than a handful of years.
| newaccount2021 wrote:
| There aren't even good options anymore. An appliance repair guy I
| know says even venerable Bosch dishwashers are a shadow of their
| past reputation.
|
| Expensive appliances share most guts with cheaper
| models...spending more doesn't mean higher quality anymore
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