American Style Washing Machines?

Mark_Ice

Hey people, was wondering do any of you lot own or have used one of these washing machine?

Ive been mulling over a ADMIRAL AAV8000 which I think is a re-branded Maytag..... it has a monster 10KG load space, large I know but its something that will wash a duvet without to many problems....

My biggest concern is wash performance, can fully submerged laundry agitated only by a large paddle wash better than a conventional drum?

So many questions............. one good thing is the manufacturers warranty is 10 years!

Please post if you have any thought on these type of washing machines..!

Thanks

kwatt

Hi Mark,

As a general rule front loaders are more efficient in terms of detergent use, spin efficiency and, most certainly, energy use.

Funnily enough we had the same debate on UKW recently and that's still ongoing.

The short of it is that the maximum load capacity I'd recommend is 6kg in a front loader as, beyond that, the tanks are too close to the cabinet sides in a standard 600x600mm box. In effect what this means is that you have to limit the vibration more so the sides of the tub don't slap the sides of the cabinet. I wrote whole piece on this a while back, here, that explains it in depth with a good example of the compromises. That Servis there was little under 18 months old and scrap, wrecked due to high use basically that the machine wasn't built for and yet was a 7kg load machine, go figure.

It could be argued that you could stiffen the suspension but that doesn't work in two ways. The first is that the budget isn't there to engineer a solution until you really climb in price and that if you stiffen the suspension too much then you have to have even harsher out of balance controls and/or you get vibration issues through the flooring. This is especially a problem in Northern Europe and particularly the UK where "floating" wooden flooring is the norm.

So what happens on large capacity machines is that you will find the spin speed limited, there are very few high spin models and also that the out of balance control is very sensitive. Where this is the case doing small loads is nigh on impossible as the OOB will kick in and stop the machine from spinning. This happens also on many machines above about 12-1300 rpm spin normally, so the problem is made worse on a larger capacity.

Also bear in mind the sheer grunt that's needed to achieve a decent spin with that much laundry in the drum! The weight alone is a killer let alone the stress that you place on the bearings.

The big toploaders are the best recommendation for large capacity as they are far more stable for that kind of use, hence their use in commercial and semi-commercial premises. Also note that large capacity washers in a commercial environment are way bigger than the machines you have at home.

The compromise being that you suffer the performance and energy use issues if you decide to go to a large capacity machine. Also bear in mind that on these large machines your detergent use* will increase on every load making them far, far more expensive to run. This is why I normally recommend that, for all the time that people actually need a large load to do a duvet, it's simply not worth the cost of running one of these things. You're cheaper to have the duvet's professionally cleaned every six months than buy a large capacity washer just to do that and suffer the running costs.

For most people, if they do the laundry correctly, a 5kg or 6Kg load capacity is perfectly adequate about 95% of the time in my experience.

K.

(*All detergent manufacturers, all the big ones, I have spoken to recommends 1.5x normal dosage in a machine over 6kg load capacity for EVERY wash)

Mark_Ice

kwatt thanks for the info!!

Much appreciated.....

Mark_Ice

Well I thought id give one a go and got it for £400 + £50 delivery from ebay, thats atleast £150 off the RRP!!!!!

Canucklehead

Hi

Full size machines also consume large amounts of water.

Corgi Guy,

Bear_family

Just to confirm Admiral is Maytag.

Bf

kwatt

Yes Canucklehead, they certainly do. If you're on a water meter just watch it spin.

Admiral is the budget Maytag brand, basically they pare it to the bone to compete on price so there are compromises.

K.

Mark_Ice

Ah well, I'll give it a go!

If it costs too much or turns out to be rubbish ill flog it on.....

MATH

I've used one of these machines for years and providing you are not on a water meter I would recomend you give one a go.

Advantages IMO
Wash a huge load in under 30 minutes
Able to add items and take things out mid wash
Able to wash bulky duvets etc at home
Built like a tank with few 'bells and whistles' to go wrong

Dissadvantages
Use lots of water (do not consider it if you are metered)
Slow spin speeds

Wash performance
For darks and lite-soil loads you will notice no difference. Linting is more common with top-loading machines because those seams and pockets get a good flush out. This settles down though after most of your clothes have been washed a couple of times.

I've found colour bleed to be a thing of the past because the clothes do not rub together as much when more water is used for washing.

For whites and stains you will notice on a standard wash that they are not cleaned as well. You cannot expect a machine that completes a cycle in 30 mins to do the same as a machine that takes 2 hours! Get round this by turning the machine off once it has aggitated for a few minutes and letting the clothes soak for an hour or so to soften the stains and allow the biological action in the detergent to do its stuff. Regualr household bleach is routinely used by Americans for laundry. If you decide to use it for your whites (I do) only add it after your biological powder has had time to work add it too early and the bleach kills all the enzymes, rendering the detergent useless.

Some will tell you that the aggitator will beat your fabrics to death and shread them. I've not found this to be the case and have noticed that my 15 year old towels are just begining to frey at the edges despite always being washed in a top-loader with extended soak and bleach. After 15 years I would expect them to be showing their age whatever machine I washed them in.

HTH

Mark_Ice

MATH wrote: »

I've used one of these machines for years and providing you are not on a water meter I would recommend you give one a go.

Advantages IMO
Wash a huge load in under 30 minutes
Able to add items and take things out mid wash
Able to wash bulky duvets etc at home
Built like a tank with few 'bells and whistles' to go wrong

Disadvantages
Use lots of water (do not consider it if you are metered)
Slow spin speeds

Wash performance
For darks and lite-soil loads you will notice no difference. Linting is more common with top-loading machines because those seams and pockets get a good flush out. This settles down though after most of your clothes have been washed a couple of times.

I've found colour bleed to be a thing of the past because the clothes do not rub together as much when more water is used for washing.

For whites and stains you will notice on a standard wash that they are not cleaned as well. You cannot expect a machine that completes a cycle in 30 mins to do the same as a machine that takes 2 hours! Get round this by turning the machine off once it has agitated for a few minutes and letting the clothes soak for an hour or so to soften the stains and allow the biological action in the detergent to do its stuff. Regular household bleach is routinely used by Americans for laundry. If you decide to use it for your whites (I do) only add it after your biological powder has had time to work add it too early and the bleach kills all the enzymes, rendering the detergent useless.

Some will tell you that the agitator will beat your fabrics to death and spread them. I've not found this to be the case and have noticed that my 15 year old towels are just beginning to Frey at the edges despite always being washed in a top-loader with extended soak and bleach. After 15 years I would expect them to be showing their age whatever machine I washed them in.

HTH

Thanks for the info MATH!!

Gives me some faith in these machines. To be honest its all about wash load for me, if I can do 1 wash in the top loader as opposed to 3 washes in a standard auto then that's gotta be a winner!

Not sure what the longest programme is on the machine I've bought, but should it lack cleaning ability compared to an auto then I'll just run the programme again for good measure and use a good quality washing powder/liquid.....

christine154

im not on a water meter but i have the whirpool american gold top loader and even if i was on a water meter i would never change back to a front loader it the best machine i have ever had with out a shadow of a doubt
you will not regret it