CR's take on Speed Queen TLs

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I wonder how rinsing compares between the old mechanical timer Queens and the new electronic models.
AFAIK the new ones only use the slow spin speed for the spin right after the wash in all cycles. I wonder why ?
Maybe the theory behind is that the spray rinse works better this way, but why on earth doesn`t it ramp up to regular speed after the spray has finished ?
The slow interim spin would be a total dealbreaker for me.
 
I think the slow wash spin speed is silly myself, but watching my machine many times over my best guess is it's to keep the water from the fill flume from breaking up Into droplets as the tub picks up in speed. In low it's just starting to pick up speed when the water kicks on for its 50 second duration and the clothes are well covered by the fill flume usually. If one uses Normal Eco it'll do the entire spray rinse cycle in low, stop, and kick over to high speed for the final spin.

As far as rinsing goes I find it to be quite acceptable and better than our old AmanaQueen which had the waterfall fill flume. I only ever need the extra rinse when bleach is being used.
 
Yes I think you're right.  The new ones spin at 473 RPM for the post-wash spin, whereas the older ones used to spin 50% faster at 710 RPM.  Having said that, the spray rinse on the new ones appears to be 50 seconds (at least on the heavy duty cycle) whereas on the old ones it was 30 seconds.  I don't know if the flow rate has been altered.  So with the new fill flume, it could be that the new longer spray rinse is actually more effective overall despite the slower spin speed.  I wonder what difference all this makes to the overall rinsing effectiveness after the deep rinse. 
 
The slow interim spin would be a total dealbreaker for me."

Don't. Whatever it's doing, however it goes about it's job I am in absolutely ecstatic on how the towles have come out smelling like natural cotton again. Not mildew or excessive detergents. Awesome rinses. After shaving I can't help but enjoy the clean scent of properly washed towel. Again. It's been a long time.
 
Thanks, Mark.....

You never really know about things like large appliances until you've lived with them for awhile. That's why we want CR to be right. Large appliances are difficult to return.

Anyways......we don't have that much to offer, but enjoy the banter just the same.

Nick
 
In my opinion, CR might be able to predict the reliability of something. But that would only be by previous years of usage. If the design of a machine changes, the reliability would probably change too.They can test things to see if they in fact do what they are supposed to do. But a lot of that has to do with HOW you use the product in question. So the test results they come up are really not that useful as far as how well something works. Considering how they used to always report that Norge washing machines were the very best for washability results and recommended them above all others is a good example. Norge were very trouble prone and did not last very long at all without many problems and repairs for the owner. Yet Frigidaire along with a few others, would last 20 years or more without problems in servicing. As is obvious, there are still many old Kenmore & Whirlpool and Maytag machines still around that are in use even today. You can scarcely find an old Norge anywhere now, yet they were top rated back in the day.
 
I prescribed (sic) to CR for decades. But I don't any more (early 00s). IMO they editorially forewent any pretense of global objectivity in favor of marketing buzz du jour, mostly water use.

Water is the LEAST expensive element of laundering while arguably MOST critical. While in the home, toilets use no less than 10x what washers do and you don't have to WEAR the finished product of toilets.

IOW, who cares about water other than CR editorial board and the goobermint? IOOW, why are they publishing irrelevancies?
 
I -- and many left coast millions -- care about water

. . . because we've gone through three periods when it was scarce around here over the past 40 years, and consciousness about water usage has been ingrained since the mid '70s.

 

Due to Dave's issues with incontinence after his stroke, and the fact that adult briefs are lousy at overnight containment, I find myself doing a lot of king size laundry.  If we had a huge capacity SQ TL, we'd have exceeded our water allotment on a consistent basis over the past year of rationing.   And as my nine year experience with an Amana SQ clone taught me, the rinsing would be, pardon the pun, piss poor. 

 

The Affinity FL pair we have now aren't perfect, but the washer gets the job done better than the Amana/SQ old-school system, and uses a fraction of the water to do it.   Even on occasions when I use the extra long spray hose from the adjacent laundry sink faucet to add water, I'm still using far less than with a TL machine.  

 

I will never again own a TL machine for my daily driver.  It's irresponsible when one's water supply is not only finite, but unpredictable.
 
A couple of the earlier posters mentioned something about CR not measuring or rating rinse performance. Some others weren't sure how effective the SQ Eco spray rinse would be on the top loader.

Skeptical about the Eco spray rinse, ourselves, we thought a weekend experiment might be in order. Washed a load of cotton t-shirts & sweat pants using the Eco cycle.

After that, we performed a rinse & spin cycle expecting to see evidence of soap or suds. We really couldn't see anything. Kind of surprised, actually.

Nick
 
Over the last 12 months I have washed about 6 loads in hotel commercial top loaders (including Speed Queen) with only a spray rinse.  I really didn't notice any difference whatsoever.  The clothes felt the same, looked the same and my partner and I didn't have any sensitivity when wearing them. 

 

However there was probably more residue in the clothes that would be detected by "Which?" testing.  I would have thought CR subscribers would be interested in this.  After all, a washing machine is supposed to wash, rinse and spin the clothes.  So wouldn't you think CR would test those three things along with the other tests?
 
"Skeptical about the Eco spray rinse, ourselves, we thought a weekend experiment might be in order. Washed a load of cotton t-shirts & sweat pants using the Eco cycle.

After that, we performed a rinse & spin cycle expecting to see evidence of soap or suds. We really couldn't see anything."

Thinking off the top of my head, if I were to devise a way to test this would be to use a clear xx gallon glass type fish tank. After each particular comolete wash cycle one would then place the clothes in said glass tank filled with clear water and then agitate the clothes vigorously for whatever minutes you deem sufficient. Then take measurement of the water in the glass tank. Is it cloudy, less so, no change etc.
Don't know why CR couldn't take this simple test. I think I know why though. The "new & improved" washers would fail miserably.
 
"Which?" says that they test rinsing by taking laundry out after the rinse cycle and spinning it in a separate spin dryer at 2800 RPM.  The alkalinity of the water spun out of the clothes is tested and compared to the tap water used to wash them.  As detergent is alkaline, the greater the increase, the poorer the washing machine was at rinsing.

To measure how well each washing machine removes detergent during the rinse cycle, we take freshly rinsed washing from the machine, just before the spin cycle, and spin it in a super-fast spin dryer. This dryer spins at 2800rpm, roughly twice as fast as a typical washing machine.

Read more: http://www.which.co.uk/reviews/washing-machines/article/how-we-test-washing-machines - Which?

To measure how well each washing machine removes detergent during the rinse cycle, we take freshly rinsed washing from the machine, just before the spin cycle, and spin it in a super-fast spin dryer. This dryer spins at 2800rpm, roughly twice as fast as a typical washing machine.

Read more: http://www.which.co.uk/reviews/washing-machines/article/how-we-test-washing-machines - Which?

To measure how well each washing machine removes detergent during the rinse cycle, we take freshly rinsed washing from the machine, just before the spin cycle, and spin it in a super-fast spin dryer. This dryer spins at 2800rpm, roughly twice as fast as a typical washing machine.

Read more: http://www.which.co.uk/reviews/washing-machines/article/how-we-test-washing-machines - Which?

 
^^^Yeah! What he said! :D

2800 rpm washer! Drool....we need a "Tim Allen" tool guy to test one to....10,000 rpm!! Muwhaha! Out in a field way, way away from anything.
 
For us, CR is a sort of novelty read while waiting for our drugs at Walgreens. They've been off the mark too many times for them to be taken too seriously.

Over 60, now, our experimenting days are over. Wanted to try a FL, but couldn't pull the trigger due to the conflicting feedback. At our age, a series of thousand dollar mistakes really add up.

So, it's the tried & true SQ TL, with its 120 degree agitation arc. The machine cleans & rinses to our liking. Will be easier on our clothes than the 90 degree corkscrew.

Wanted to add we have an effective water softening system. An extra-large load gets on ounce of 6X-HE liquid Tide detergent.

Who knows? Maybe that's too much.

Nick
 

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