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Hi there,
I’m just moving into my first place and will have an open plan kitchen area. I’d like to get the quietest washing machine I can.
My budget is around £600 although I’m happy to spend more if I can see that it will be worth it.
I’m having difficultly actually finding out the db output of machines. It doesn’t seem to be that well advertised which surprises me.
Any advise would be most appreciated.
Re: Quiet washing machine
From experience Miele and Bosch are amongst the quietest there is. Neither quote decibel figures but quote quiet, very quiet etc. Apart from that it much depends on how the machine is installed ie a solid floor is much much better than a suspended floor. Have a read of this article on the Which online site and scroll down to “My machine is noisy, is there anything I can do about it?” for a bit more info on noise levels.
HTH
Don
Re: Quiet washing machine
Unfortunately that link points me to a page not found message. Is it because I need a subscription for the which site?
Re: Quiet washing machine
Thanks the link works now.
Really I’m after model information so I can compare different machines based on noise level.
You don’t happen to know of any sites that have done comparisons of different washing machines that include noise levels? Or even somewhere that just allows you to filter washing machines by their noise level?
It just seems crazy to me that this information is not easily available as it would be such a good selling point.
Re: Quiet washing machine
timberford wrote:It just seems crazy to me that this information is not easily available as it would be such a good selling point.
Noise levels are not generally a much sought after criteria to be honest. Some manufacturers do state the Db levels on just some of their products but not very often as you have discovered.
However, one of THE quietest machines on the market is the Bosch WAS28466GB at just 53dB. So maybe you could start there? 😉
Re: Quiet washing machine
Thanks for the pointer Martin that model does look like a good starting point for comparison.
Looking on the Bosch site they don’t actually quote the 53db in the specification, but it is quoted on KitchenScience and Comet amongst others.
I’m guessing that 53db is not during the spin cycle?
Re: Quiet washing machine
To give you an idea how noisy 53db is. Human converstional speech is about 70db. Which makes that machine very quiet.
HTH
Don
Re: Quiet washing machine
timberford wrote:I’m guessing that 53db is not during the spin cycle?
It may well be in fact but under ideal conditions (i.e solid floor, even unbalanced load etc)?
Anything under 65dB is pretty quiet for an open planned kitchen you will find. By way of comparison, a Dyson vacuum cleaner running at full tilt will hit the meter at around 85dB….. 😯
Re: Quiet washing machine
Noise from appliances is subjective though and the actual amount of noise depends on the environment in which it is placed. I suspect that’s why there’s not too much information around.
There’s been a few posts about this before.
K.
Re: Quiet washing machine
I did do a search but it didn’t turn up much I’m afraid. It’s obviously representative of the demand for this kind of information 😉
I wonder if perhaps manufacturers don’t place much of an emphasis on noise levels because quite often washing machines find themselves in the garage or utility room, out of earshot.
Re: Quiet washing machine
I suspect they don’t freely proffer that information as noise is such a subjective thing…one man’s squeak is another man’s whistle 😆
Besides, as has been previously stated, the actual noise level when the machine is running depends greatly on other factors than the design of the machine. We have all seen what are generally regarded as noisy machines installed in such a way that makes them fairly quiet, and vice versa.
My advice would be to buy a decent make, probably a miele, make sure it’s installed on a solid floor, then ensure the units either side are not actually touching it but are well fitted around it.
Finally, accept that whatever machine you buy, there will be some noise coming from it. By all means get the quoted db levels where you can but only use it as a general guide…a difference of a db or two will be negated by the installation!
Re: Quiet washing machine
You could also look at the WA65205 and WA74163 both of which has super silent facilities from Gorenje
Re: Quiet washing machine
Partly.
But also if it sits outside of kitchen units and is truly freestanding then you’d think that would be quieter. In reality it doesn’t quite work that way I’m afraid, as when on spin particularly, there can be resonate noise from the cabinets, things on the worktop rattle and so on. In effect this means that comparison made solely on the db rating is unfair as stability also comes into the equation.
Then consider, as Martin pointed out, the flooring. If it’s on a wooden flotation floor which is common in the UK, then the noise is far greater than on a solid concrete floor on which most appliances are tested. In fact I am not aware of any that are tested on a wooden floor as that seems only to be common in Northern Europe. Again, this makes the comparison unfair.
These are the reasons that many manufacturers don’t publish the figure as it’s all very well saying that your machine has a db rating of XX but someone will just improve on that for less money. The fact that the cheaper machine may bounce about like Tigger on a wooden floor doesn’t matter when you use a shopping comparison search engine as they won’t (and can’t) tell you that.
You could consider the ISE machine (http://www.iseappliances.co.uk) as, whilst Which commented that it wasn’t the quietest that’s not the feedback that we get from customers. I should hope not too, we had a whole load of sound deadening fitted for that very reason as well as using air-shocks to dampen unwanted vibrations.
Hope that helps.
K.
Re: Quiet washing machine
Cheers for the all the info guys.
I appreciate the actual noise db value will be different in my kitchen. However, whatever machine I buy will be placed in the same kitchen, in the same spot. So surely the variation in DB will be the same for each machine?
Unless there are particular characteristics that I should be looking out for?
Obviously the comparisons of different machines and their levels would only prove useful if the environment remained consistent. I guess it doesn’t look like anyone is doing this kind of evaluation at the moment.
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