My mom called me yesterday evening, telling me that when she opend the door on our built-in AEG fridge, she heared a crack and couldn't close the door afterwards. She somehow manged to close it again, but suspects one of the hinges has broken.
I'm in my university dorm during the week, so I'll be abled to check that out this afternoon.
Don't know which exact fridge we have (just that it's AEG), not even wheather it has a fixed or sliding door mount, but I'm pretty sure its a 88cm or 34,7" cabinet.
Hinges go for anywhere between 20€ to 120€ from what I've seen, depending on which hinge (upper or lower) and which model. Hoping its just a hinge and not the front, cabinet or fridge chasi that is damaged. It's located on face-height over our freezer, so removal and installation aren't quite as easy.
If it is just a hinge I can get relativley cheaply, I should be abled to replace that without removing the fridge, just the front and door.
Should we go and replace it it will probably be an IKEA model, the follow-up to the one my grandma has. They aren't anything special (A+, just standard shelfes), but 5 years warranty and only 179€.
Alternativley we could go A+++ with either a BSH (Siemens) or Grundig, or maybe AEG. If that makes a lot of sense is questionable; the price difference is about 220-280€, they use about 60kWh per year less, which at 30 cents per kWh takes anywhere from 12-18 years to make up for the extra spendings. The Grundig however would be amazingly quiet (only 26dB) and quite big.
But I first have to check the door mounts.
(If you never encountered that: Built-in fridges here either have the front of your kitchen hinged to the kitchen cabinet and conect the fridge door to the front with a sliding conection OR the front is directly mounted to the fridge. You can easily switch from the first to the second by just removing the hinges from the front, in reverse it's not that easy as you have to add hinges to your kitchen cabinet.)
The AEG and IKEA have the sliding system, Grundig and BSH the solid system.
The german consumer reports just today (I think, it's in the new release for May) released a new test of build in fridges and tested the BSH models (why they still test Bosch, Siemens and Neff each is still a mystery to me), as well as the Grundig and the IKEA.
The BSH won with a 1.6 grade, followed by the Grundig with 1.8 and the IKEA at 2.3.
HOWEVER these tests show 2 strange things I send a question about to the consumer report people:
First, they test actual usable space with all the shelfes in place, compared to the label which states just total space. And there, the BSH models suddenly drop from 144l (5.1ft³) label size down to just 99l (3.5ft³) usable space, compared to 105l (3.7ft³) on the IKEA with the same label size or 120l (4.25ft³) on the 150l (5.3ft³) label Grundig. But no mention where all this space is lost, especially as the interior on all is of comparable structure.
Second, the Grundig is labled at A+++ with a usage of 64kWh/year. The BSH models are in the same range, the IKEA one is at 122kWh with A+.
The BSH did score a somewhat close to label usage with 56kWh/year.
The Grundig however supposedly used 117kWh/year in their tests, which would be even more then the IKEA at 113kWh/year. So it would be class A+, not A+++. They even make a little footnote about it, and give it the same grade in terms of usage as the IKEA model, but that its real usage is twice as much as advertised is neither emphasized nor explained.
I find that not only extremly weired, but am a little shocked that they do nothing about this blatent lie made to the customer and still grade it that good at just 0.2 grades below the winner. People sometimes spend twice as much to get better efficency and possibly end up using more than with a cheaper model.
Just incredibly unfair!
We will have decided by evening, so I'll keep you updated. If anybody got anything (tips, thoughts, recomendations), I'll be happy to hear them!
Hope you have a nice spring day!
I'm in my university dorm during the week, so I'll be abled to check that out this afternoon.
Don't know which exact fridge we have (just that it's AEG), not even wheather it has a fixed or sliding door mount, but I'm pretty sure its a 88cm or 34,7" cabinet.
Hinges go for anywhere between 20€ to 120€ from what I've seen, depending on which hinge (upper or lower) and which model. Hoping its just a hinge and not the front, cabinet or fridge chasi that is damaged. It's located on face-height over our freezer, so removal and installation aren't quite as easy.
If it is just a hinge I can get relativley cheaply, I should be abled to replace that without removing the fridge, just the front and door.
Should we go and replace it it will probably be an IKEA model, the follow-up to the one my grandma has. They aren't anything special (A+, just standard shelfes), but 5 years warranty and only 179€.
Alternativley we could go A+++ with either a BSH (Siemens) or Grundig, or maybe AEG. If that makes a lot of sense is questionable; the price difference is about 220-280€, they use about 60kWh per year less, which at 30 cents per kWh takes anywhere from 12-18 years to make up for the extra spendings. The Grundig however would be amazingly quiet (only 26dB) and quite big.
But I first have to check the door mounts.
(If you never encountered that: Built-in fridges here either have the front of your kitchen hinged to the kitchen cabinet and conect the fridge door to the front with a sliding conection OR the front is directly mounted to the fridge. You can easily switch from the first to the second by just removing the hinges from the front, in reverse it's not that easy as you have to add hinges to your kitchen cabinet.)
The AEG and IKEA have the sliding system, Grundig and BSH the solid system.
The german consumer reports just today (I think, it's in the new release for May) released a new test of build in fridges and tested the BSH models (why they still test Bosch, Siemens and Neff each is still a mystery to me), as well as the Grundig and the IKEA.
The BSH won with a 1.6 grade, followed by the Grundig with 1.8 and the IKEA at 2.3.
HOWEVER these tests show 2 strange things I send a question about to the consumer report people:
First, they test actual usable space with all the shelfes in place, compared to the label which states just total space. And there, the BSH models suddenly drop from 144l (5.1ft³) label size down to just 99l (3.5ft³) usable space, compared to 105l (3.7ft³) on the IKEA with the same label size or 120l (4.25ft³) on the 150l (5.3ft³) label Grundig. But no mention where all this space is lost, especially as the interior on all is of comparable structure.
Second, the Grundig is labled at A+++ with a usage of 64kWh/year. The BSH models are in the same range, the IKEA one is at 122kWh with A+.
The BSH did score a somewhat close to label usage with 56kWh/year.
The Grundig however supposedly used 117kWh/year in their tests, which would be even more then the IKEA at 113kWh/year. So it would be class A+, not A+++. They even make a little footnote about it, and give it the same grade in terms of usage as the IKEA model, but that its real usage is twice as much as advertised is neither emphasized nor explained.
I find that not only extremly weired, but am a little shocked that they do nothing about this blatent lie made to the customer and still grade it that good at just 0.2 grades below the winner. People sometimes spend twice as much to get better efficency and possibly end up using more than with a cheaper model.
Just incredibly unfair!
We will have decided by evening, so I'll keep you updated. If anybody got anything (tips, thoughts, recomendations), I'll be happy to hear them!
Hope you have a nice spring day!
