American Style Fridge Freezer – bad idea?

[Scoobs72]

Hello all, I’ve been looking at American style fridge freezers for a while now (wife wants one) and have to say that they appear to be a bit of an ownership headache – poor reliability, high energy use, insufficient freezer storage space etc.

Nonetheless, what the wife wants, the wife will get, unless I can come up with a better alternative to fill the 90cm gap we have. If it has to be an American style, are there any ‘good’ brands out there. I note that Maytag is recommended by some, but also that Maytag is next to bottom of the U.S Consumer Reports reliability index for fridge freezers.

Any suggestions appreciated. Thanks

[kwatt]

Re: American Style Fridge Freezer – bad idea?

Hi Scoobs,

Yep, there’s always a compromise somewhere with any product. 😉

Poor reliability I don’t find an issue unless you buy a cheap one, then you are asking for trouble and, with something that you’re investing a lot of money into and is such a huge upheaval to change, you don’t want trouble.

High energy use, well it’s a big space to chill, it’s gonna cost more to cool and that’s it I’m afraid. Either you accept that or you abandon the notion as you can’t beat the physics of it.

In sufficient freezer space? Sorry I don’t get that as there’s usually at least 10-13 cu ft of space in one of these brutes so unless you store stuff in the freezer for ages it shouldn’t be an issue. If you do store stuff for ages then a better bet for that is a chest freezer as it’s much more efficient and temperature stable as a general rule.

(One with an ice bucket at the top is good as you’d be amazed at how fast you can chill a bottle of wine or a few cans of beer in that. ;))

My Maytag I could probably squeeze in most of a cow into the freezer, but it certainly holds enough for a family of four extremely easily.

Maytag I’ve not had any issue with and generally not a lot of problems appear in general.

GE is a reasonable alternative.

However…

Liebherr have just released (FINALLY) a US style fridge freezer that looks the absolute you know what. That said, as with most things Liebherr it’s not exactly cheap but it will be, I’d imagine, up to the usual Liebherr standards and meticulously engineered to virtual perfection. They may be slower to release products but they rarely get it wrong, even on the first pass.

I’ve yet to test the new Liebherr, I’m trying to get one to have a look at it in detail for review, but I don’t expect anything less than brilliance from them these days.

Anything under £1000 these days, nowhere close to the level of engineering beyond that point. They may look nice, the price may be tempting but really, it’s not a real one, it’s a fake.

Over £2000 you’re pretty much guaranteed something that will see out 20 years of family abuse, often with ease.

In between, it’s a compromise and the choice often more confusing as the choice of finish, especially stainless steel, will massively ramp up the price.

HTH

K.

[Scoobs72]

Re: American Style Fridge Freezer – bad idea?

That does help a lot Kwatt, thanks very much.

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