EASY Combomatic from the mid 50s
No domestic combo other than Bendix could have a suspension system, i.e. using springs or shock absorbers to isolate the mechanism's movement within the cabinet because of AVCO (Bendix) patents. Also, because AVCO invented the product, any domestic combo manufacturer had to pay AVCO a royalty fee for each machine made. So "no springs" was just the reality under which all combos were made. Yes, it saved space, but at quite a price. It was also the reason that they were so wretched at extracting water. They could not spin fast enough because they had no way of dealing with the dynamic forces of a cylinder on a horizontal axis which is a lot different than a top loader on a vertical axis. It was not until Whirlpool, in the early 60s, introduced their redesigned combo with the water-balancing mechanism that any combo could approach the water extraction rate of the Bendix-design combos. There was a hitch, however. There is always a hitch. The Bendix-design combos could spin at full speed between the water changes while the WP-made combos only spun at high speed after the last rinse so the rinsing was somewhat compromised with heavy fabrics because of the amount of water retained in them by the slower, intermittent speed spins after each water change. Many combos did not spin at all during the rinses or only spun once before the final spin. I don't know of any bolt-down combos. That was pretty primitive construction technology and would not have been good for most of the cramped installations since the main way to gain access to the mechanism to work on a bolt-down machine is to be able to take off the cabinet panels. I know from personal experience that to do some of the work on the later 29" WP-built combos you need to remove a side panel and that means you have to be able to pull the machine out and away from anything that is beside it. Because combos were sold mainly for the space-saving factor, they were not usually seen in spaces where there there was lot of room around them which made wrestling them out for service a pain even when they could slide on the floor. The other thing about bolt-down machines is that after the bolts are prepared in the floor, the machine is lifted up and onto the bolts. Combos weighed a lot more than the first Bendix machines so you didn't want to be lifting them.
As for the vented or condensing option, EASY offered the widest range of drying options among combos, offering gas or electric vented drying in almost identical models through the line as well as non-vented condensing drying. The condensing combos used either a condensation chamber where air was blown past a spray or a curtain of cold water to condense the steam or the condensing process relied on the air currents of the turning cylinder to move the steamy air past a curtain of cold water that either flowed down one side of the outer tub or down a wall at the rear of the outer tub. Improved air circulation was one reason GE gave for going from a 4 vane tub to a 6 vane tub. Obviously the fan-forced machines were more expensive to build, but they usually dried faster.
