So I was shopping at Lowes for some kitchen counter ideas when I stumbled on a clearance section in the far back corner of the store where there's almost no foot traffic. I saw this enticing deal for a full stainless steel kitchen aid unit: I took it home, hooked it up in the garage to a garden hose, and it worked!!!!! . Partially. It performed all functions except the actual wash cycle (kinda' important). A little more research and troubleshooting later, I determined the main pump was dead. Check prices and most were in the $200 range but....... I found a new unit on ebay for only $75 shipped. A few days later, the pump arrives, I installed it and it works perfectly. So I was $100 in on this but then I sold my old, well used Whirlpool unit for $35 on CL in less than 3 hours so $65 net!
To keep the story short, I omitted that it was $50 the night before but I got busy at home with another kitchen project and couldn't return to get it. So I went back first thing the next morning fully expecting it to be gone but found it was still there and had been marked down to $25! LOL
My very first thought on seeing the headline: the new dishwasher may have been only $65, but its dogfood and vet bills will be much more. This reclaimed mechanical dishwasher may be less loving and lack a wagging tail, but at least it will be cheaper.
Ah, a dogwash fan. Dog does the first pass removal of leftovers. A quick rinse in some soapy water and the dog cooties are gone.
the main control board was why we dropped $800. on a new bosch, after spending 3 or 4 hundred fixing the 8 year old bosch.
We turfed a kitchen range, because replacing the touch screen electronics was over $400. A couple of times I've resurrected our microwave: it has a "clever" door latch, with a little plastic hinge that fails, turning the whole thing into a brick. Some pipe hanger strap, bits of wood, steel rod, and a LOT of fussy work, and it rises from the dead. And every few years I'm replacing the #@$*! door latch on our dishwasher, because a little plastic hinge keeps breaking. The new latch is over $40 a pop. The latest casualty, from about 8 months back:
The microwave's a Panasonic. They seem to have two levels, the lower priced have a simple door that is direct, and the pricier one: you push a button, which pushed an internal latch through a series of fragile plastic interfaces. The dishwasher's a Maytag Quiet Series 200. Quiet my eye... The old range was WhirlPool. The only thing wrong with it was the electronics: the burners worked, could be turned on, adjusted, but the oven controls involved push buttons, and that was toast, about $450 required for some little black box, so no thanks: off it all goes to the recyclers. The new one we got, the sheet metal seems half as thick, flexy, the bottom drawer barely holds a pot, one 110 volt outlet (vs two on the old one), and so on.
we purchased all nw appliances in 2008 and bought the 5 year warranty. the amana refrigerator broke 5 or 6 times, 3 of those the ice maker. when the compressor quit out of warranty, off she went. the bosch dishwasher (with toyota like reputation) must have been a lemon. i hope so, we bought another one. the kitchenaid electric stove was defective from the day it was installed and almost burned the house down. replaced that and the fridge with frigidaire. it's probably like whack a mole with prius batteries though. the only thing that has lasted 10 years is the amana microwave with the cheap door. (probably just jinxed it)
I just remembered our washer/dryer combo. The salesman explained how this brand was used in laundromats, was bullet-proof, industrial, and so on. When they came the washer was DOA, something completely broken internally, between the motor and the basin, it was flopping around. They proposed to send it out for repair, but now way, so they replaced it. That one has had several house calls, and at least once was taken to the shop, where it lingered for multiple weeks. The dryers had just housecalls. Just the guy coming to the door is close to (or past now) $100, to assess the problem. Then it's wait for the parts, and a second visit, usually another $100~ plus part cost. It's funny: for a decade or three we had an old beater Kenmore washer, with a mismatched dryer. That washer we bought used from our landlord in '83, took it with us to another rental, to the house we bought in '89, and it endure till something finally failed I'd guesstimate around 2004. That thing was the bluesmobile of washers.
good point about the house calls. it gets a little aggravating that they have to do the diagnosis, part order, reschedule, repair. 7-10 days without an appliance, especially the refrigerator. we still have the old school washer and dryer, fingers crossed.
I bet the wash board and clothes line get pretty interesting in the winter . Or weren’t you going back that far?
We had a hand operated wringer in the 70's, the kind you'd mount on the centre wall of a concrete double laundry sink
