Repair or Replace

[panthera]

An interesting look at what we here all know - vintage appliances rock!

Back when I was selling new and used appliances here in Munich, I would get one or two repair requests on the sales floor a week. Never, ever would I let the customer leave without a guaranteed repair time and I personally held the repair department to it - I was the only guy of a group of 20 who knew how to make good coffee and run what passed for computers in those days. Blow my customer off and you were in deepest database do-do...entkaffiniert.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/28/garden/28repair.html?hpw

 

[ronhic]

How true....

...but it comes back to the age old question of how much we are prepared to pay for longevity.

If you want 1960's build quality, you have to pay the equivalent of 1960's prices.....and that means top dollar/pound/euro.

Many of us are prepared to buy Miele or Speedqueen as two examples. The rest of us don't and many of us have had a moan about things not working correctly (or as we think they should) or breaking or have heard from people we know how short the lifespan of appliance 'X' was....

 

[panthera]

Part of it

of course, is the pricing.
Which, to my mind, is directly related to the true decline in the purchasing power of the middle class.

A big part of it, tho', is just plain a conscious decision on the part of the manufacturers to limit appliance useful life.

I'm not the world's biggest öko-freak, but we really need to rethink our approach to this planet and living well.

Especially in an area on which we are all agreed - vintage appliances wash better, dry faster, cook and bake more evenly, mix far stiffer doughs without burning up...

Our technology today gives us a choice - it doesn't have to be a Miele vacuum to last longer than two years.

 

[ronhic]

I'd suggest that the purchasing power of the so called middle classes hasn't really declined at all, more what we choose to purchase with that power.

If we want to purchase 'hewn from steel' appliances we can and we will pay top money for them too...just as our parents did. On the other hand, manufacturers now give us more options. We can have a basic, but cheap appliance that will 'do the job' and may last 5-10yrs....

OR

...we can pay top dollar for a better quality appliance (an I use Miele, V-Zug, Speed Queen as reasonable examples) that should do the 20+ years that we want from them....

 

[panthera]

Ron,

I'd be happy to provide hundreds of pages of the statistics aND data showing that real incomes for the middle and lower classes have declined.

I'm not looking for an argument just curious - except for the Republicans here, no one has ever said they haven't. Is there a basis for your belief?

http://www.epi.org/economic_snapshots/entry/webfeatures_snapshots_20070905/

 

[ronhic]

ahhh......

We are at cross purposes....

....and talking about different countries.

Generally speaking, Australians have more money in their pockets now (well before the economic crisis) than 20,30 or 40yrs ago expecially if you take into account the cost of living.

The one BIG exception is that mortgages are larger now. But then houses are being built much larger (nearly double) with everything that opens and shuts. No longer are people content with a 3bedroom single storey brick veneer or weatherboard home as they may have been 20-40yrs ago....no...they have to have a 2 storey, 4-5 bedroom McMansion...so they have to pay for it.

More Australians than ever before have newer cars or are multicar households.

We are higher educated (and pay for it either up front or post education through the HECS). Nobody has to be wealthy to go to uni here...

We travel more and further....

We have more holiday time....minimum 4 weeks

...and are entitiled to long service leave - an additional 10 weeks leave after 10yrs service...fully paid

Overseas travel is the cheapest it has EVER been

We can afford everything that comes out...plasma/LCD Tv, BluRay etc...not an issue for many (especially if they don't have a McMansion)

We have universal access to hospital health care, doctors and some ancillaries via medicare which we pay for out of tax (a little like the NHS..not as comprehensive) and can pay for private cover if we elect to...or pay more tax if we don't

We eat out more often...

We buy more 'treats' such as chocolate more regularly...(there was a time I remember when it was a treat...not a whim)

We have multiple modes of communication...that all cost us, but we have them...mobiles, computers etc

Cable TV...only arrived here in the 1990's....but many have it too

Whole house central heating wasn't common either until about 1990....and living in Canberra it is needed...

Now, the lower end of the pay spectrum also are better off, but I can't speak for how much better off....but I can say that there are more benefits for low and middle income earners than ever before

...including getting paid $5000 for every child born (and you can earn up to $150k per year and still get it!)

then there is family tax A and B rebates

School clothing and book payments at the beginning of the year...

the lists go on and on and on....

Overall, I'd say we're doing ok here....sure, the global recession that was brought on by greed (and may those banks and hedgefunds blush bright RED), but we have suffered very very little in Oz compared to the rest of the world....

None of our banks have folded....or needed bailing out. They are financially strong and heavily regulated financially

Our interest rates have gone down to stimulate the economy...but unlike other countries, we still have some meat left to cut if we need to

Petrol prices have stabilised and while we bleated when it hit AUD$1.45 litre (US$4.35 Gal), we got used to it and the world didn't end and now it has fallen too.

We kept buying cars...just not kick-arse SUV's...but then our manufacturers here don't make anything that large...the Ford Territory is about the size of a BMW X5

...and to top it all off we are eligible for a bonus from the government....if last years taxable income was less than $100000 we can get up to $900.00 just for filing a return (depending on how much you did earn)...

So all in all, the middle classes here may have to work a little harder for the next couple of years, but the vast majority have it pretty good...and certainly better than the 1960's when you bought a house with a minimum 20% deposit (regulated banking) and had cheap carpet in the lounge and dining areas only until you could afford to cover the polished floor boards room by room...may have had a telephone, probably had some new inexpensive furniture (which we would think was expensive now) and were desperate to get a new automatic washer....

Taxes were lower, so were wages and the cost of living was higher....well, it was here and probably in the UK and Europe too.

People will tell you they were the 'good old days'. They were in some ways. We were probably happier with what we had and time was less important to us...but from an affordability perspective, i'll have now thanks.

 

[yogitunes]

you have many decisions to make in this case....do you buy a frigidaire set for 1000.00 that may last 10 years or 2000.00 for a speed queen that will last 20 years...all the same...I prefer FL for the energy efficiency of water, heating it, detergent, and dry time....but the expense of many FL compared to TL, manufacturers claim it will take 10 years to reap the savings over the added cost....I would like to see savings sooner...

I want and can afford a FL Speed Queen...but do I really need it at the moment and "is" it really gonna last that long...probably much better than samsung or lg....but like they said in another thread...this years model is last years with a new face...and I have to wonder, are they improved and better than before?...SQ may be backinto the home laundry business...but I think I want to see how these new prototypes workout in the long run...only time tells the story of how Maytag became built to last....all manufacturers at that time claimed to have the "best" built, sturdy, trouble free, machines...too soon to tell at this time....

sometimes you have to ask yourself...is it the machine or the operator?....I have a sister in law, who is "hard" on furniture, cars, and appliances...she is buying new every two years...and she'll complain that the stuff is no good or not built well... I can remember my mother bought new furniture in 1970 and lasted till she moved in with me in 1993...she had the same appliances, I can only remember having about four different cars...It could be that she bought really good stuff, or that she really took care of it, which can't be easy with 7 kids...I have another sister who got her SQ in 1969 and made it last until 1990 and only got rid of it because she wanted a new one...from what I last heard its still running by the guy she gave it to..

you have a combination of many factors, buy well built products, at a nominal cost, take care and not abuse them, and maybe they would last a lot longer than one would expect..

When was the last time anyone of us have found a machine along the road or junk pile and brought it home...was it super clean or stain splattered all over, detergent crud around the opening, fabric softner caked and gooed up in the dispenser, can you wonder...Was it a poorly built machine, OR an operator who didn't care and wants to blame the machine rather than themselves....don't get me wrong, I have had a few things that just didn't last, and that will happen, for many reasons, I just don't think the blame should be put into one area...

sorry to ramble on...but you just have to wonder?

 

[panthera]

Ron,

My error. I was thinking of the situation for the middle class here in the US.

Although, it can be argued that since it was precisely those who had the most to lose by voting for the Republicans who are now suffering the most, it is only fair and just.

Still, living in Europe, I can buy solid, durable goods at only slightly higher prices than the junk from China and they will last far longer than their mandatory 2-year warranty (and, fellow, Europeans, let's not get into the discussion of that one.)

In the US, it seems like you are either stuck with cheap stuff or overpriced Italian and German goods.

 

[qsd-dan]

"Still, few products will last as long as those made during the 1960s and 1970s. “The old Maytag washer your grandmother had, she bought that thing and used it for 35, 40 years,” Mr. Sawyer said. “It held up like nothing was ever going to go wrong with it. Today, you just don’t get that quality."

....and that's why I'll never buy new!!!

 

[favorit]

Keven, which Italian goods ?

I'm very curious about the way our image is seen abroad.
Here we feel german cars & appliances as reliable

Find very funny that Miele feels the need to use italian words to "enhance" its products on american markets (La Perla, Incognito ....)

Here it's all served with turbothermic, spuelstop, variomatic, AquaSpar and any other "dressing" that tastes german

Go figure that here in IT the WW Golf ads say "Das Auto" ...

 

[favorit]

maybe now "America" is here in EU

Our public welfare systems cause a big difference in people's wallets.

Health insurances do help to "clean" US wallets, so people have less money available than here in EU.
Maybe that's why we have some more options between "el cheapo" and luxury goods

Sounds rather odd that in the Land of freedom & rights there isn't equal public/free health assistance for everyone

Hope things will change soon with Obama.

 

[ronhic]

I find it appaulling that....

....people don't really have good access to health care in the US...well if TV news is to be believed.

2 years ago my mother slipped and shattered her ankle...at 66yrs of age, it really shook her confidence.

She was taken by ambulance to the local hospital that does both private and public surgery. She has had top health cover all her life but decided to go as a public patient mainly because the same surgeon would be operating.

There was a lot of swelling which had to be reduced before they could operate so she had to wait a week for that to go down and then got 'bumped' 3 times due to major accidents that tied the theartres up....she was fine with it, though we wanted her to get transfered to a 'proper' private hospital but her comment that it would be the same surgeon and she was 'happy with her treatment and critical accident victims come first' disuaded us...

She stayed a public patient and it cost her nothing for the surgery and only the follow-up visits to the clinic has she had to pay for. These she has claimed back through her private fund.

Yep, we're pretty lucky here

 

[panthera]

favorit

SMEG, Alessi, Dolce & Gabbana (accessories)

To name just three.

It is not that German quality is so much higher as that German production tolerances are much better than in Italy.

The design and engineering of Italian products is what really sells -

Always been that way, I think.

Personally, I'd rather have a new Fiat than a Chrysler any day - the Fiat won't rust, the electronics won't fail and the safety tests weren't bought.

 

[mattl]

If I can't repair it myself I usually replace the item. I'm intelligent and experienced enough to handle most problems and have a great resource here for info. Not having to deal with service calls when I hear about one I'm surprised.

Example. I helped redo a cousin's kitchen a few years back. It was about 2AM when we wrapped up resetting the kitchen sink and hooking up the dishwasher. At that point I opted to just use the connection on the garbage disposal for the DW drain, I usually run a separate drain line. Fast forward to last week. My cousin calls and says their dishwasher wont fill. She said the sink had backed up and they had to use a plunger on it. Doing this forced the garbage laden water into the dishwasher, and they did not notice until the next day when they opened the DW and were stunned by the smell.

My suggestion was to rinse out the DW really well, my thought is that the float got stuck in the raised position with all the garbage on it and it would not trigger the fill valve. She called around and found a repair person who would come out for $75 for the first hour, that was the cheapest others were well over $100. But luckily before he came out she tried it again and it worked --odds are I was right.

I could easily see her ending up with close to a $200 bill to fix this. That would stun me, a simple thing like plunging the kitchen sink could end up costing that much.