Bohus 50 Washing Machine + Spin Drier Bohus C48

[fredriksam]

I come to the conclusion it was good idea starting a thread about this washing machine. I mentioned one such machine in another thread in Super called "Really old house in Sweden Karlskrona (LOTS of pics)". They had such machine in the house but because time limits i never took any good pictures of it. But anyway.

These machine began producing already around 1950. They were a part of Electrolux laundry program. The machines from 1950 to 1964 were manually used, which meant you had to fill the water, start a thermostat, checking temperature, start the motor, empty the water, fill up again etc. They were really simple but worked very good despite that. Also they were rather quite too. The later models had some automatics inside but never spun.

These machine took up to 12 kg washload and weighed about 130 kg. They had no spin inside to they were almost always sold with a separate spin dryer named Bohus C48. The earliest model of the spin dryer only spun at about 1400 RPM. Later models did up to 2000 rpm but never above that.

Sadly theres no videos aviable from the Bohus washing machines. It doesh however exist some ok pictures of them and i show some pictures. The first two pictures is the first edition of this machine. They are from a swedish museum in Stockholm.

 

[repairguy]

That’s definitely a heavy duty machine.

 

[fredriksam]

In the next picture we see a slight newer version of the machine. It has the temperature checking on a better wiewing place than the first versions of the machine. Forgot to add that the spin drier also was known as Bohus C40 but it was the C48 that came first.

We see such spin drier beside the washer too. This picture was from a selling at Tradera (similar to ebay)

 

[fredriksam]

One cool feature with these machines was that you could easily remove the drum if like a coin got stuck under the element. The drum had two metallic clips that you pressed them to the right you could just remove the drum. It was important to close these of course when you put back the drum. Then you slided the clips at left instead to close them so the drum wouldnt get loose.

Last picture with a such machine is from a laundry room and its still working fine. Its from a old house in Karlskrona. I had an friend living in this house but sadly he passed away in Corona early 2021.

 

[fredriksam]

Then we move to pictures of the spin drier C40 and C48. Not much difference between the two models. C48 were made approx 1950 while C40 from 1957 approx. They had the same speed. The C48 was only aviable in blue colour while C40 had some different colours aviable. The blue one was however the most common.

These spin driers were effective but had a bad problem. With time they had the habit of unscrewing themselfs from the foundation. This could create big problems. There were reports of said spin driers had come loose and destroying the laundry room before being stopped. These problems however were often noticed after over 20 years of use

Also. The stop pedal had a habit on the very early models of this spin drier to be stuck in stop position. The repair man had to come and fix the problem then because otherwise you would burn the motor if trying to use it.

The picture below is from an old laundry room in Malmö.

 

[fredriksam]

The second picture below is from a sell site like Ebay.

 

[fredriksam]

The third picture is from a place in Karlskrona where i lived. This spin drier was broken and i couldnt use it. It had come off its foundation and had slightly damaged the wall a litle. This had happened before i moved to the place

 

[fredriksam]

Then we have a picture of a C40 with an open door. We can see the drum quite good here. Notice it has a diffrent colour from the other pictures. I took this picture at another place in Karlskrona. They tear down this house around 2012 and now its a complete new house there instead so picture were taken shortly before they tear it down.

 

[fredriksam]

And finally last picture and a video. The picture is from a sell site like ebay. I,m quite sad they had tear down this spin drier into parts but it shows the different stuff it has so ok picture because of that.

The video below is really loud so turn your volume down first.

 

[foraloysius]

Thank you Fredrik for posting these pictures. That was quite a big capacity for those days. Was this. a commercial machine? It must have been expensive for that time, I assume only the happy few could afford this?

 

[fredriksam]

foraloysius:Both the washer and spin drier was made for commersial use. You could however buy them as regular person. They were very expensive to person buyers than for landlords because the regular person had to pay some tax for them as well which the landlors didnt need to do.

As for the capacity it was normal. The biggest commerial machine at the time took 18 kg laundry. It was a top loaded machine as well but it wasnt sold as much as the Bohus one.