How many years should be the life of a Washing Machine

meames_2

I have a candy washing machine which was £235 in 1998. The pump broke about 3 years ago that cost £60. It was used about 3 times a week and was probably is overloaded per wash when I used to house share.

jimi_man

We have a Miele, just under 15 years old. Dog chewed the control knob (£9 for a new one!) but that's it. Probably does around 8 washes a week.

cathy6

my ~AEG washing machine is now coming up to 25 years old, with 6 children of my own 8 grandchildren plus inlaws over the years it has ofen been on the go 7/8 times a week, and I decided to start looking at new machines, I cannot believe the negative reports on these machines now as I was going to buy a similar one, it is still going strong but feel any day it is going to die, certaily based on teh average comment I have done very well. I did hear many years ago that it is not advisable to buy a washer/drier combination, I must have got a great machine

CKdesigner

cathy6 wrote: »

my ~AEG washing machine is now coming up to 25 years old, with 6 children of my own 8 grandchildren plus inlaws over the years it has ofen been on the go 7/8 times a week, and I decided to start looking at new machines, I cannot believe the negative reports on these machines now as I was going to buy a similar one, it is still going strong but feel any day it is going to die, certaily based on teh average comment I have done very well. I did hear many years ago that it is not advisable to buy a washer/drier combination, I must have got a great machine

Hi Cathy6

Firstly welcome to the forum.

Quite simply you have an AEG machine from an era when they were built properly. Now AEG is just a brand owned by Electrolux. Although AEG is the best products from the Electrolux group they are still not built as well as your washing machine was.

25 Years ago you could choose Miele, AEG or Bosch, these were all built at the time very well, Miele was the best but all makes were built with similar values. Since then AEG was 'absorbed' by Electrolux and Bosch changed tack and went for the volume market, so now you get Bosch washing machines from under £250 but obviously their has to be serious compromises on quality to achieve this price point.

There is really only one choice today if you want the same build quality, or a modern day equivalent to your old AEG machine and that is Miele.

CK

aggypanthus

PLANNED OBSACLESENCE..Designed to fail..nowadays !

my first zanussi lasted 23 yrs, next one 4 ish but getting bit dodgy at spinning well enough, keep having to turn the spin on again.

aggypanthus

Ben84 wrote: »

The trouble is that all these really old machines are likely very different to the ones being made today with the same names on them. In general, with the exception of brands like Miele I think the newer ones are typically much poorer quality than before. Thankfully they tend to be cheaper, although not better value over time I suspect.

I'm sure the manufacturers know how many cycles they'll survive on average, although they'll probably never tell us. Around 500 for a cheap one sounds very likely however as that's a couple of years typical use in many households - about how long many budget machines last. I also suspect that lower quality machines are much less tolerant of being overloaded. I can usually hear them grinding when overfilled and I've seen fairly new ones broken from what seemed to be just a few excessively heavy loads. So I wouldn't cram them full or put in lots of highly absorbent items at once. Wet washing is very heavy and towels and jeans for example add up fast.

Planned obscalesnse, they build them to last a certain time!

CKdesigner

I'm no 'environmental warrior' but it doesn't take a genius to workout that we are affecting our planet with this never ending obsession to make things, use them, then throw them away.

Manufacturers certainly have their part to play in this but its really the consumer's fault. We all seriously need to change what we do and use the planets resources respectfully to build things, we must go back to our old values and build things to last.

What really gets me with appliances though is the energy 'efficiency' labelling its completely ridiculous, it only gives the consumer information about how much electricity a machine will possibly use in their home but if it only lasts a few years then surely the labelling should say how much energy and the planet's resources are used to produce that machine! Then when we can evaluate the whole of life and energy costs will we really see what the comparisons are.

CK

Rolandtheroadie

Our last one (candy go 8kg)lasted nearly 2 years before the bearing went and as the drum was sealed inside the machine, at £220 for the part alone, it was scrap.

The OH's uncle has the same machine, bought about the same time and used perhaps twice a week and has had no problems whatsoever. So 3 years + trouble free.

Now have a Hoover Dynamic and I've just replaced the brushes after 18 months.



Normally used twice a day every day, even more on occasion.

DrPressure

Thought I'd open this one up again due to recent events...

We bought a Bosch machine in 2012 for £500+ thinking "you get what you pay for" so we wouldn't have to worry about it for a good while. 5 years at least I was thinking before having to replace things like bushes/bearings/seals etc. (which is fair enough) We also bought it from John Lewis as their customer service has been exceptional (we had our wedding list there and were very impressed).

However, in June this year it stopped with a door lock fault after only 2.5 years of use. No drama, I thought, these things wear out so I bought a new lock. Fitted it and still the same fault. The cables from the control boards to the lock were also fine (no broken/high resistance connections). Paid £50 for a local engineer to come out and see what I'd done wrong but he came to same conclusion, the control boards had failed and he quoted £200. He did, however, advise to chase this up with the retailer as £200 is a lot to spend on a machine which is only 2.5 years old. Here the "fun" started...

John Lewis insisted that it was outside their 2 year warranty so not their concern. On being presented with my findings (I'm a professional mechanical engineer) and the findings of the domestic appliance engineer they said they would only accept the word of a Bosch engineer. Bosch insisted I would have to pay £95 for the call out as it was outside of the warranty. After much back and forth, John Lewis did eventually offer £100 which was able to cover the call out and when the repair was finally done Bosch did knock 50% off the cost of the boards but the repair still came to around £280 of which we've had to foot around £100 (plus the £50 we'd already spent on our own engineer)

After many further emails and phone calls, John Lewis have refused to pay any more unless Bosch admit it's an inherent fault and Bosch (surprise, surprise) refuse to admit it's an inherent fault. In their words "It's just unfortunate the control boards failed". They will not investigate the failure further without a costly factor inspection (at my expense) and refuse to admit that 2.5 years life for arguably some of the most expensive parts of the machine is unacceptable.

Left with a very bitter taste after being let down by two supposedly dependable companies. In fact, I can't even leave a review of this machine on the JL site as the link is mysteriously "broken".

Looking around I'm seeing more and more negative reviews for Bosch washing machines seeming to be for machines purchased 2-3 years ago and now scrapping out with little/no support from Bosch. Has anyone else had this issue?

poppellerant

Out of interest, DrPressure, what was the exact model of your Bosch machine? Going by the price, I'm guessing it was one of the higher end Excel models or a lower end Logixx.