Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Re: Repeated door seals damaged on Candy DQ120
There are two very strong springs fitted, but only on the sides. With this type of suspension I can’t see it twisting and allowing leaning like the old rubber based suspension. The tub leans back about half, to three quarters of an inch which allows it to knock against the back panel.
Re: Local Trading Standards Authority
Looks like a good idea. My first thoughts though are that if this takes off, it’s maybe the end for DASA or general trade associations promoting quality unless they can offer much more. Traders joining this free scheme seem likely to get more kudos, publicity and potential extra work than being a DASA member.
Speaking of which, is anyone in charge of the DASA web site? I’ve emailed the site twice now to report 2 broken links on their members page and other errors. Despite taking the time to report on several errors I’ve never once even had a reply. The errors are still there. It’s possibly 4 or 5 months since the first email, and about a month since the second one. This is pretty poor indeed for any web site. Has it just been put up and abandoned?
I suppose the question is, is it just me they are ignoring, or is no one seeing any emails from consumers or potential members either.
Re: What is the most useful tool in your toolbox?
I saw it came from there but was still puzzled Martin 🙂 I couldn’t see where you’d been kind lol
Have you had the snow yet btw? It’s cold but sunny here.
Re: What would you recommend?
eastlmark wrote:
Andy, you say about the old hoover being a good machine but did you think that at the time? No way, looking back at those days the Hoover was junk compared to the Zanussi sl and washcrafts, Philco Bendix and AEG’s Even Indesit L5’s and 6’s. The Hoover and Hotpoint failure rate was what most of us built their business on. In Hindsite, compared to today’s machines they were well made and durable and usually lasted 10 -15 years but reliable? No way.In all honesty, I did. My perspective may have been somewhat blinkered because in the late 80’s, I had spent 15 years dealing soley in Hoover. I was aware of the higher quality AEG etc, but they were a fair bit more expensive and hardly anyone repaired them. Maybe Sheffield (with its highest percentage of council houses in the country) is slightly different to most other parts of the UK. It was the time of the miners strikes too and the Steelworks shutting down. The whole area was devastated and skint. The type of customer I’d been used to dealing with all had the mainstream washing machines and few places even seemed to sell the quality ones. I always believed that they were the best value for money bearing in mind the purchase price and the fact they were the cheapest spares in the business (as far as I could tell) and everyone and their dog repaired them which meant prices were kept very competitive.
I remember signing up to be an Asko dealer and bought 4 Asko washing machines. We were astounded at the quality of them compared to the Hoover’s we’d always dealt with. They were in our shop 9 months and customers were equally impressed with their quality – especially when I demonstrated by dropping the outer door and standing on it. However, not one person could aford one, or would stump up the investment to buy one. We sold them all off at trade prices and ceased dealing with them ;-(
Re: What would you recommend?
I think people generally try to promote and sell the machines they think they can make money out of on future repairs. To many, it’s a conflict of interests to sell stuff that’s too good.
Me, I advise people if they want the best to get a Miele, but be prepared to pay higher (but fewer) repair charges. They should last over 20 years easily. When I was a Hoover sales dealer, it was great because the logics and ecologics at that time were excellent machines for the money and seemed to have just the right balance of potential future repairs and people happily bought another Hoover when it was finished with. The old ones often got reconditioned.
The most influential salesmen possible are repairmen. Even if they don’t sell themselves, they always have a great influence on what machines people go for in the multiples. Maybe they are greatly underestimated by manufacturers. If an engineer says don’t buy a Hoptoint, people listen. If he says buy a Miele, people listen. As far as a layman is concerned, you cannot get a better recommendation that from someone who repairs them.
Maybe if Miele made parts and technical information more available to engineers, and they could make profit repairing them, and reconditioning them, they would recommend and sell them. Who knows, Miele could even take market share in the end because they are so good.
However, I suspect they want to retain their exclusive image.
Re: What would you recommend?
I do Martin 🙂 My first post on this thread said, “I always say that Miele are the best you can buy in the UK, real class..”
You are right, we should promote them as they are exactly the type of washing machine we should all respect. However, Miele’s problem is that they give us the cold shoulder and therefore alienate most white goods repairers. They seem to deliberately price their spare parts (trade prices) so that we can’t make any profit on them. They appear to give so little discount to the wholesalers that supply us, that there’s no money in it for them so they don’t stock them or just carry a token amount. This has always struck me as a deliberate ploy to restrict trade and they get away with it. However, the price they pay is that few of us sell or recommend them because there’s no money on future repairs. Maybe they are content with the status quo. They aren’t the only German manufacturers to do this either as we all know.
Re: What would you recommend?
I agree that something simply doesn’t add up. Maybe they don’t want to stock spares? I can’t believe they are stupid enough to want people to buy a new washing machine because of the point I raised previously, there’s no guarantee (and in fact logic says it’s pretty unlikely) that the customer will buy another of “their” washing machine, so all they do is drive people to buy a competitor’s product.
Maybe they don’t want to stock spares for every model they make for 10 years (as per the agreement or law) so they simply price them in such a way that they can confidently stock very low levels? Maybe the fact that they don’t stick with the same parts for long enough places an enormous financial burden on stocking all the thousands of spares for the plethora of different parts that they used for one range only and then moved on?
Maybe it’s partially because they want to sell their own maintenance contracts too?
The New Wave machines? They had major problems initially (a common event – look at the recent WMA Hotpoints and the even the Hoover A3060 A3110 1100 drum splitting problems in the early 80s) There was a complete rewire and conversion kit made available but it was just a short lived thing and the New Waves settled into being a reasonable machine. There’s still loads of them about as we speak.
As you say, they had lots pf problems initially and several modifications so yes, they were garbage compared to previous Hoovers, and show the folly in ditching tried and tested evolved machines for complete back-to-the-drawing-board models. You can’t produce anything brilliant without it evolving over many incarnations IMHO.
If appliances are designed to last any more than a few years then why is a motor, normally, over half the cost of a replacement appliance? Or a PCB quite often 25{e5d1b7155a01ef1f3b9c9968eaba33524ee81600d00d4be2b4d93ac2e58cec2d} or so of a replacement? Prices such as these force the customer into a replacement and does the brand name no favours either.
I could be wrong, but I suspect it could be to do with simple economies of scale. In the old days, manufacturers used to have small ranges of washing machines. They had a tried and tested product, which they evolved slowly. New ranges came out far less frequently and when they did, they were usually the same shell, same tub, same motor, same valves and pump etc. They mostly just had new facia and trimmings and a few minor modifications, option buttons and so on. If they had a different timer, it was still sourced at the same manufacturer who just modified it a bit. This would have resulted in the washing machine manufacturer sourcing parts on vast scales and at good mass produced prices.
These days, it seems they start from scratch every few years. Starting again with new shells, different tubs, different motors and pumps etc. Usually this is price and production cost driven. It means that someone like Hoover for example, will source a tub or a motor from a manufacturer, buy X100 thousands of them and then ditch the design and use a dfferent tub on their next model. This means as they no longer produce the models with these tubs, they have to source spares for it on a far smaller scale which costs much more.The same would apply to all parts. Each new machine seems to use a different PCB but they get them cheap enough when ordering 200,000 to fit in their new machines but then when they need to source just 200 of them a year (out of production) in order to supply spares (and they are relatively slow moving too) it costs thenm considerably more.
This would also explain why washer dryer timers were always a lot more than washing machine only timers, and particularly why dishwasher timers were considerably higher than washing machine timers.
It’s only my own theory, feel free to shoot it down J
Re: What would you recommend?
The Hoover washing machines dropped in quality a fair bit when Candy started badging them up K. Plus overnight all the Hoover specialists who survived on nothing but Hoover were faced with a totally different (Candy) washing machine. This altered Hoover’s position and value for money. I know that rumours spread slowly-but-surely (by salesmen and repairman accross the country) not to buy Hoover as they were only Candy machines badged up.
I’ve always had a problem with the theory that people produce products deliberately not to last long. Anyone with any sense knows that the vast majority of people, who buy a product and it doesn’t give good value for money – although “forced” into replacing it – will never buy that make again. I think it’s more to do with fighting for business on price alone – which is daft.
Re: What is the most useful tool in your toolbox?
I’m puzzled now Martin. It’s too early on a Sun morn for cryptics.
Re: What would you recommend?
It’s a very good question K, and I’ve thought long and hard about it for the last year or so now. I can honestly say I can’t recommend a single really good washing machine to buy any more that costs in the sub £400 range. I always say that Miele are the best you can buy in the UK, real class, but repairs wont be cheap (although rare in theory)
For 20 years I recomended only Hoover. To me they were the best value for money as they were so easy to get repaired in the UK and parts ubiquitous and cheap. Then Candy got them 🙁
All the budget to mid range machines are manufactured in such a way that they wont last anywhere near as long as they physically should – and could – because you can’t fit armatures, field coils, drum bearings (new tubs needed mostly) and timers and modules tend to cost over half the purchasing price fitted.
Frankly, modern washing machines are rubbish, and there’s no need. It’s just crazy price wars making manufacturers afraid to charge a proper price and having to constantly cut costs. I admire Miele for their arrogance in producing the best they can, and stuff the fact that it will be expensive.
Re: When Adam was a lad!
I’ve still got the little tool for adjusting the distribution speed on the old Hoover modules. COme to think of it I’ve still got a module for the old A3006.
Remember the days when if a fault occurred, the timer just stopped, and you could tell what was wrong just by where it had stopped and whether water inside etc? You could just pull the knob back out and observe and diagnose in seconds.
Now the buggers just turn themselves off or do stupid things like whiz round pointlessly and give a stupid error code (as if we need one) which half of the time turns out to be erroneous or so ambiguous as to be virtually useless.
Re: Another Indesit timer clicking round
I’ve had quite a few armatures do this. Mostly Hoover. A short in the windings usually. However, that was a good few years back. Who know with these new excuses for washing machines.
Re: Whats the most annoying thing customers do?
Let their kids mess with yer tools?
I always remember a customer whose little kid kept rummaging in me tool box. He kept taking tools and disappearing then coming back and taking another. All the while, she kept saying (in a voice that clearly indicated she didn’t even remotely mean it) “Put that down. No … Stop playing with the mester’s tools”. She eventually changed it to, “If you touch them again I’ll smack you” but several incidents later and the kids meddling continued.
Then something happened that gives credence to the old saying that “the Lord works in mysterious ways.” He picked up me big whacking hammer and twatted the fridge with it leaving a big dint. 🙂
