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David David is offline
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Default (household) appliances

"nesesu" wrote in message
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On Oct 17, 1:55 pm, D Yuniskis wrote:
Hi,

We're in the process of some significant
remodeling/updating, here. Among the items we're
looking to purchase are all/most of the major home
appliances: frig, dishwasher, oven/stove/range,
washer, dryer (hmmm... why isn't that "drier"? : ),
water softener, hot water heater, etc.

I have been disappointed in the choices available
for most of these items. "Too much electronic
content" :-/

E.g., we are in a good market (DSW) for solar water
heating. Ignoring the exhorbitant prices these
folks want to charge for these things (hint: you can
buy 10 conventional water heaters -- INSTALLED -- for
the price of one solar unit!), I am leary of the
electronic content in some of the units we've examined
(we have also looked at "on demand" heaters -- same
issue applies).

I can just see the inevitable service call: "Yup,
you're gonna need a new computer board. That'll be
$400...". Of course, expecting anyone to actually
*repair* (instead of swap out) these things -- least
of all a PLUMBER -- is ridiculous. Despite the fact
that, I imagine, most repairs would be trivial.

The same holds true of all the other appliances I
mentioned.

And, even with the right skillset, I suspect *I* would
be screwed as the manufacturers wouldn't make available
any detailed documentation to let me do a component
level repair ("Does refrigerator cool? If yes, proceed
to step 3; if no, REPLACE assembly 107X-3")

This is further complicated by some of the numbers
salesgrunts tout regarding life expectancy of many
of these appliances (7 years for a $3000 refrigerator??
Jeez! The one we have now is 20 years old; the one
in my folks' basement is over 50...)

Anyone have any firsthand insights into this stuff?
I've just started poking around to see what sorts of
parts *are* available (to get a clue for what can be
repaired/replaced) but my research is in its infancy...

Maybe a cave in the hills is a better option??

Thx,
--don


I agree, but with a caveat. First the caveat: The electronically
controlled appliances can really work a lot better and provide
more features than the older mechanical switch and relay designs.
Now the agree part: I have a fairly new washing machine that I
really like. Six months after the one year warranty expired on
the washing machine, it died one day. It would not respond to any
buttons and appeared completely dead except the front plate was
quite warm in one place. A quick check on the manufacturers web
site said the control board assembly was $450 (list price). I
took the machine apart and this control board assembly has three
separate circuit boards that have soldered jumpers connecting
them. Two of the boards contain only push button switches and
lights. The third fairly large board has the processor, other
control and interfacing logic, some more user controls and
lights, and the alphanumeric display. The power supply and
variable speed motor control electronics were elsewhere. The heat
was coming from an onboard 5 volt regulator operating into a dead
short on the 5 volt line feeding all of the circuitry. To make a
long story short, I started trouble shooting the main board and
eventually found a very small shorted surface mount capacitor
between the 5 volt line and ground. After replacing that,
everything returned to normal. If the assembly was priced at $50
I might have replaced it, but $450 provided a lot of motivation
to do a component level repair. I hate to think what the final
price would have been if I had called a service company.

David