Why was Frigidaires Agitator Design Abandoned?

[qualin]

I'm afraid I'm a little ignorant here, but it seems to me that Frigidaires up/down agitator design seemed like a good idea. They used it for what.. nearly 30 years?

I can see why commercials like this killed the idea.. (Included in link below)
(Then again, the Frigidaire washer looks like it's overloaded in that video.)

So, why, after GM sold off Frigidaire, was this design abandoned? Why didn't anyone else adopt it?

I guess more to the point, if someone still sold a machine with this agitator design today, why wouldn't you buy one? (Overlooking water consumption.)

What sucked about it? What are your thoughts?

Of course, that's one agitator design.. It seemed to me that everyone back in the 1950's/1960's had their own idea on how to design an agitator system...

 

[norgeway]

I figure..

It was because WCI could build that junk they replaced it with for about half what it cost to build a 1-18.

 

[lordkenmore]

I'm not the expert some are here. But my guess is that WCI (Frigidaire buyer) did it to cut costs. I have had the opportunity to use a ca. 1990 WCI Frigidaire washer twice (two different washers), and they certainly struck me as being cheap. Even the second of the two which had upgraded features that clearly made it better than bottom of the line. In comparison, a Whirlpool direct drive washer--even one of today, let alone 1990--seems like Miele quality.

I think others avoided taking over the design because they'd already invested so much in whatever design they already had. It's easier to stick with what you know, and just refine it. Plus some might have looked at Frigidaire's system, and decided for whatever reason it wasn't a great idea for the future. For example: possibly too expensive to make in an increasingly competitive market.

 

[peteski50]

Frigidaire to WCI!

The origional plan was that when WCI bought Frigidaire they were supposed to have production moved to a site of their own. They bought it to actually improve on their own products. Production continued at GM for nearly 2 years after the sale. WCI wanted to sell back frigidaire to GM during that time realizing it would be a cost factor to move the factories. In fact the relationship between the two companies was not good. WCI than made the decision to pull out and utilize their own garbage and continue the frigidaire name. They were the loosers in the long run because the name became trash. They had Gold in their hand and flushed it down the toilet. They should have moved some of the factories and at least kept the laundry and refrigation / AC going. If you think about it they had 3 other companies white westinghouse, kelvinator and gibson. Now what did they need a 4th name to do the same thing. It would have even been worth it to have dropped one of these other companies to save frigidaire. Their stupidy made them big loosers in the long run. Its to bad Electrolux didnt come along sooner because they never would have bought the company in the first place unless they were going to do something good with it.
Peter

 

[jetcone]

At the time in 1979

I spoke with an engineer at Frigidaire because I wanted to buy my Mom a new 1-18 machine and there weren't any left. He told me GM decided to sell to WCI because the plant that produced appliances had to be complelely refitted. All the manufacturing machinery was 40 years old at the time and worn out. GM decided not to reinvest so the name was sold to WCI, the physical plant stayed with GM , was cleaned out and refitted to build the Chevy LUV trucks at the time. All that molding, stamping machinery was scrapped! WCI wasn't going to take on remaking it, so they rebadged their current Westinghouse line as Frigidaire. 

 

When he told me this I remarked how well the Jet Action agitator worked, he said take a look at the new Frigidaire with the indexing tub, "it has the same turbidity rate" as our old Jet Action machine" direct quote.

 

[peteski50]

Frigidaire to WCI!

Jon the GM frigidaire line was continued until the end of 1980. Production contunied at the plants under a contract WCI had with GM when the purchase was made. The plans were actually put in place to have the factories moved. And new equipment was Supposed to be made to continue production. Under the contract WCI paid GM to continue to make tha appliances until the move could be made. WCI paid 120 million to buy the company and than flush it. Unfourtinatly WCI just decided to pull out when the contract was up.

 

[tomturbomatic]

GM's auto sales largely subsidized the appliance division. Where do you think all of that money for design changes and big styling changes each year came from? After the gas crisis and the US auto induatry took such a big hit, GM started throwing excess stuff over the side to save a sinking ship. Remember all of the Hondas, Toyotas and Datsuns that everyone started driving by the mid 70s? IF research and development had not been stifled by the auto industry and the petroleum industry through the whores they bought in congress, we would not be dependent on petroleum like we are today, pollution would be less and our national economy would be better because not only would we not be paying so much at the pump, we would not need to have our military ensuring stability in petroleum producing countries which costs untold billions. When gas got to $4.00 plus a gallon, T. Boone Pickens, no great environmentalist, came out with a plan to convert fleets of trucks and buses to natural gas, but that scared the oil industry so they arranged for the price of gas and diesel to go down and his plan withered on the vine.

Frigidaire appliances were a casualty of the "Energy Crises" of the 1970s. President Carter established the Cabinet level position of Secretary of Energy and what's a Cabinet Secretary without a bureaucracy, I mean agency, so we got the Department of Energy whose mission was to make America less dependent on foreign oil, but when your domestic petroleum corporations suck up oil from all over the world, it just became a way to funnel money to oil corporations and a place to test the cleaning ability of clothes washers and dishwashers using clean clothes and dishes. I am afraid I see some of the merit in Gov. Perry's desire to eliminate it. It never did what it was supposed to do and at great cost.

 

[revvinkevin]

Correction on the Chevy LUV truck info..........

 

 

Jon said  "...the Frigidaire plant stayed with GM.... was cleaned out and refitted to build the Chevy LUV trucks...." <span style="color: #000000;"> </span>

<span style="color: #000000;"> </span>

<span style="color: #000000;">Unless GM was building their appliances in Japan, that is not correct.   The Chevy LUV truck was a re-badged ("<span style="font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">badge engineered")  Isuzu pickup (called the "Faster" in Japan) and was ALWAYS built in Japan and imported to the US (from 1972 to 1982).   It was never built here in the US.</span></span>

<span style="color: #000000;"> </span>

<span style="color: #000000;">Kevin</span>

Chevrolet LUV - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[mrb627]

F&P

I imagine the Fisher and Paykel would be the best company to take on the old jetcone design. They already have the rapid-dry ability. I expect they would get it right early on without too much trouble.

Malcolm

 

[d-jones]

Hey qualin. I've seen that video before and as you say, it looks like the Frigidaire is hopelessly overloaded if not otherwise tampered with. Anyone familiar with the product would quickly recognize that, which is almost certainly the reason that comments weren't allowed. The guy that made it knew he would get called on it so he simply disabled them. I remember the old "Theirs work hard, ours work harder" add campaign of the 70's very well, and as a kid after seeing that commercial one time I walked onto our back porch where the Frigidaire was in the midst of doing a load, lifted the lid and watched it work for a while. What I saw was identical to what was shown in that commercial, not this guys cheesy video, and having never really given any thought to the different types of washing machine agitators before, I left the back porch thoroughly impressed. If those machines were still available I'd buy one today.

 

[jetcone]

Thank you Kevin

for the correction, the guy who told me that was obviously wrong in 1979. So I don't know what they built in that plant after 1980. Are you sure Peter, I tried to buy a Frigidaire washer in 1979 towards the end and no one had any of the 1-18's left! Maybe it was a regional thing, NE got stiffed again. Like with Speed Queen.

 

[jetcone]

Tom I LUV THAT!

" IF research and development had not been stifled by the auto industry and the petroleum industry through the whores they bought in congress, we would not be dependent on petroleum like we are today, pollution would be less and our national economy would be better because not only would we not be paying so much at the pump, we would not need to have our military ensuring stability in petroleum producing countries which costs untold billions."

 

[gansky1]

Frigidaire appliances - sold and closed up by August 1979

Link is to a thread in 2009 and the research I found then. We need to plan a pilgrimage to the Frigidaire Collection Archives but it appears the last entry into those records was early 1980.

help in age dating a Frigidaire 1-18

Purchased this at a thrift store, last night. Please see the attached string of pictures, that the store had posted on Craigslist. This is an unusual control panel I havae never seen on a Frigidaire. The model is WS. Anyone know approximately when it may have been manufactured? (It is actually...

www.automaticwasher.org

 

[revvinkevin]

 

 

Thanks for posting this Greg!

 

Kevin

 

[arbilab]

Apparently it was an era of mismanagement coming to harvest. According to Pittsburgh Gazette, Westinghouse lost their appliance division to White similarly. The plants were allowed to age without putting anything back into them, until they were not competitive. Fixing them all at once would cost too much for sales volume to pay it back.

GE kicked Westinghouse's butt in appliance volume all along. AFAIK, W'house never sold to builders like GE/Hotpoint did. I don't even remember a W'house line of build-ins, definitely never saw one in any neighbor's house. Our last family house was F'daire all around, the two before that Hotpoint.

 

[norgeway]

WCI..

Destroyed everything they touched, Westinghouse Kelvinator and Frigidaire all made great products before WCI, I remember Pearl Bailey advertising WCI Westinghouse in the 70s, Saying they "Build them like they used to" I thought then, she must have never seen a real Westinghouse range!!

 

[sudsmaster]

I believe the video in the link is by our own Jason... who must be something of a Kenmore advocate... as I recall... I think he made it tongue-in-cheek, in response to the popularity of the GM Frigidaire design. Which I think is a great design, but not without its flaws, like any complex manufactured product.

Regarding GM's handling of their appliance division. That the auto division was subsidizing the appliance division sort of makes sense. Back in the day, the husband could go out and buy a new GM car, and at the same time get his wife a kitchen full of GM appliances. Thereby avoiding some antagonism in the marriage ("He only gets the things HE wants" turning into "Look at the fabulous GM kitchen he got me!").

 

[supersuds]

The NYT article confirms something I remember hearing at the time, that GM-Frigidaire's wage rates were higher than the rest of the appliance industry.

That doesn't explain why White Consolidated wouldn't want to continue the design elsewhere. Perhaps it was more expensive to make even with equivalent wages.

Re Westinghouse plants being outmoded, wasn't the generic WCI toploader a Westy design originally? Did they move the production from Mansfield, Ohio immediately? From what you hear about WCI they wouldn't spend a nickel on development in those days. It would be surprising if they laid out the money for new tooling for an existing design.

 

[goatfarmer]

The up and down action of the Frigidaire washer might have given a better wash, but it was also more trouble prone. This is from someone who worked on probably a  hundred of these machines under warranty in the 70's. The bellows seal was a weak spot, saw many punctured by a nail, or a paper clip left in a pocket. Or they simply failed, and leaked water on the bearings. We never had less than 2 or 3 in the shop at any one time. That's a lot of warranty claims GM was paying out.

 

They were inexpensive to buy, compared to a similar Maytag, or Whirlpool built machine. So there should be a lot of them out there. But how many do you see, compared to the other machines? Not near as many, which means they met their demise early, while the others churned on.