Kitchen Appliance opinions

[CPanther95]

Another vote for the Bosch 800 series.

 

[bluezy]

I have Kitchenaid appliances and I love them. I have a duel fuel stove - gas cooktop and double electric ovens, an over the range microwave and a dishwasher. Still waiting to replace my refrigerator, which is over 20 years old and still going strong. My nephew does appliance repairs and has told us to stay away from Samsung refrigerators.

I'll second that. Actually, we've been told to stay away from *all* Samsung appliances. We used to have a Samsung dishwasher that I loved. But it required so many repairs (both under warranty and then by my husband) that we ended up getting rid of it and replacing it with the Bosch after a year and a half. And it wasn't a cheap dishwasher. Then, because we didn't learn our lesson, we bought a Samsung refrigerator. It took 6 weeks to be delivered....but we were told it would be a week. Within a week of it finally being delivered, the freezer stopped working. Service crew came out 2 days later (thankfully we have other refrigerators and freezers in the house) and replaced all the working parts for both the freezer and refrigerator cooling systems. Knock wood, it's been running great for two years now. I don't want it to die because it's the only French Door refrigerator with a freezer on the bottom that fits through the external doors on our house. If we have to get a new french door refrigerator, we're probably going to have to remove the sliding glass doors to get it in the house.

 

[tcufrog]

When we moved into my first house in 2003 we splurged on a Kenmore Elite french door top and drawer bottom. It was one of the first one of those available. We've never had to have it serviced even with one move. We love it. When we did a minor remodeling of the kitchen we replaced everything with Kenmore Elite too. I loved those appliances much better than what we have in our current home. One nice thing about Kenmore is that sometimes they have sales where the more appliances you buy at once the more you save. If you get a Sears card you save even more.

 

[skuttle]

I thought I read that Kenmore is LG appliances. My washer and dryer are about 4 years old and they are Kenmore Elite.

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

I don't need them to, but though maybe I should try to match them. Does that matter in the long run? I did notice the rebates for buying more, so that is an incentive.

Since the new dishwasher, my appliances don't match anymore. I have a Jenn Air Pro Style downdraft stove with a grill/griddle, an Amana cabinet paneled refrigerator and had a cabinet paneled Kitchenaid dishwasher. The dishwasher died after 14 years (pretty good!). The house is 18 years old, so I can no longer get new matching cabinet panels. The old panels don't fit the new dishwashers, so I went with stainless. The only thing is that now none of the appliance handles match. Each has a different style handle. I think it would look nicer if all the appliances and their handles matched, but it was not to be. I also valued function and Consumer Report ratings above matching handle styles

 

[CPanther95]

I thought I read that Kenmore is LG appliances. My washer and dryer are about 4 years old and they are Kenmore Elite.

Sears negotiates with a variety of manufacturers for their Kenmore appliances. Sometimes they are identical to the manufacturer's branded appliances, sometimes they get exclusive appliances for a year before the manufacturer sells them under their own brand.

The latter is what they did when the Whirlpool Duet washer & dryers first came out. Whirlpool made them a Kenmore exclusive for the first year before they began selling them under the Whirlpool nameplate.

 

[cabanafrau]

In the last three months we have had to replace the stove and the dishwasher, luckily the dryer was a quick fix by DH. I found appliance shopping annoying because it seemed there weren't a lot of options when you really dug into them, particularly the dishwasher.

We went from smoothtop electric to a gas range. The pans on your smoothtop are important. The bottoms of the pans need to be perfectly smooth or flat, no embossed brand name or it will affect the burners on your range over time because they will develop hot spots.

Take a good look at your plates or take one with you when you shop for your dishwasher. DH saw that recommended by Consumer Reports and thought it was nuts until we got into the store and I realized I could not buy the Bosch I planned on because our plates will not fit in their racks, which are the same throughout their entire line. Their racks will only accommodate very flat plates, not those with a curved rim like ours. Not sure when Bosch changed their racks to this design, but IMO it is dumb. We went back to a Kitchenaid Dishwasher and are happy with it two months in.

 

[brooke789]

My nephew does appliance repairs and has told us to stay away from Samsung refrigerators.

My stepfather is an appliance repairman. His business recently celebrating 40 years in the industry. I find that his advice is always the opposite of what we do...he also does not recommend Samsung (or any non-'US' brands). (For the record we have a 6 year old Samsung WAsher, that he told us not to get, and a few month old matching Samsung Dryer). We usually ask his advice but about 99% of the time do what he says not to...He only recommends the brands he works on and his advice never lines up with what Consumer reports recommends. His advice that I do follow is: purchase the warranty if less than 25% cost of the appliance and don't purchase anything with unneeded extras. Those extras (like the TV in the refrigerator) are going to be where you are most likely to have issues.

 

[cajunmommy]

Glad to hear damage was limited! Timing is never good, but you should still be able to take advantage of decent 4th of July sales happening at the big box stores. We just replaced both a 21yr old fridge & 15 yr old dishwasher this weekend!

We bounced between a local appliance store & Lowe's/ HD / Best Buy to locate the models we wanted & get questions answered. I also read lots of comments on the Garden Web appliance forums.

A couple of suggestions....
1 - Don't get hung up on matching suites. Shop for features that are important to you. I'd rather have reliability than a set of appliances that have matching handles.

2- I was cautioned by a local store person to stay away from LG & Samsung due to poor service & local parts availability.

3 - Know that Amana / Whirlpool / Maytag / KitchenAid / Jenn-Air are all the same manufacturer with increasing levels of "luxury" features depending on badging. Kind of a Chevy - Buick - GMC progression.

4 - Talk to the locals. They were willing to price match and gave us what I felt was solid advice vs. a sales pitch.

 

[Patience]

We just purchased new appliances for our kitchen but they haven't been delivered yet. Our old stuff has been wonderfully reliable. Our current side by side refrigerator is nearly 20 years old and we have never had a repair on it. Our other appliances (dishwasher, stove, microwave) are 12 and a half years old and we've never had a repair on them either. After much research, our new appliances are all mid-level LG appliances. The new refrigerator is a french door refrigerator. I hope they will last like our old ones but I'm not optimistic. Someone mentioned new appliances being designed to last only 4-5 years? Oy.

 

[cabanafrau]

We just purchased new appliances for our kitchen but they haven't been delivered yet. Our old stuff has been wonderfully reliable. Our current side by side refrigerator is nearly 20 years old and we have never had a repair on it. Our other appliances (dishwasher, stove, microwave) are 12 and a half years old and we've never had a repair on them either. After much research, our new appliances are all mid-level LG appliances. The new refrigerator is a french door refrigerator. I hope they will last like our old ones but I'm not optimistic. Someone mentioned new appliances being designed to last only 4-5 years? Oy.

I think 4-5 years is a bit low, but I do believe planned obsolescence is real. We just purchased a new dishwasher in May and everything I read said to expect a dishwasher to last 7-8 years, which horrified me. Our previous one lasted 15 and a half years, which I was moaning about but now am hoping for with my new one. This house and our previous house had dishwashers in them that dated back to the late sixties, early seventies when we moved in -- so those ran 30 plus years.

 

[tvguy]

We just purchased new appliances for our kitchen but they haven't been delivered yet. Our old stuff has been wonderfully reliable. Our current side by side refrigerator is nearly 20 years old and we have never had a repair on it. Our other appliances (dishwasher, stove, microwave) are 12 and a half years old and we've never had a repair on them either. After much research, our new appliances are all mid-level LG appliances. The new refrigerator is a french door refrigerator. I hope they will last like our old ones but I'm not optimistic. Someone mentioned new appliances being designed to last only 4-5 years? Oy.

We replaced our fridge because it was 27 years old, a Montgomery Ward made by Fridgidaire. It worked, but we figured 27 years was a good life. Our stove/microwave/oven were all one unit made my Litton and we replaced them after 26 years because we couidn't get parts to fix minor problems. Our Bosch dishwasher, the timer was sticking, and it too many plastic parts kept breaking off the racks in side, and the racks were rusting. But yes, it was quiet.
Our GE Microwave died after only 5 years, the circuit board it needed cost $15 more than we paid for the microwave, not counting labor.
I am hearing from more and more service people that all the electronics on appliances that are designed to save energy, are prone to fail, usually at a cost that far exceeds the energy they save and either parts are expensive or unavailable.

 

[bluezy]

In the last three months we have had to replace the stove and the dishwasher, luckily the dryer was a quick fix by DH. I found appliance shopping annoying because it seemed there weren't a lot of options when you really dug into them, particularly the dishwasher.

We went from smoothtop electric to a gas range. The pans on your smoothtop are important. The bottoms of the pans need to be perfectly smooth or flat, no embossed brand name or it will affect the burners on your range over time because they will develop hot spots.

Take a good look at your plates or take one with you when you shop for your dishwasher. DH saw that recommended by Consumer Reports and thought it was nuts until we got into the store and I realized I could not buy the Bosch I planned on because our plates will not fit in their racks, which are the same throughout their entire line. Their racks will only accommodate very flat plates, not those with a curved rim like ours. Not sure when Bosch changed their racks to this design, but IMO it is dumb. We went back to a Kitchenaid Dishwasher and are happy with it two months in.

Ugh. They must have changed that in the last year or so...maybe even less. My dinner plates are definitely not even close to flat and they fit with plenty of room to spare in my 2-year old Bosch. I can even easily load soup bowls in the same row with the dinner plates. I know it was still this way last summer when I was helping a friend look for a new dishwasher. <sigh>

 

[cabanafrau]

Ugh. They must have changed that in the last year or so...maybe even less. My dinner plates are definitely not even close to flat and they fit with plenty of room to spare in my 2-year old Bosch. I can even easily load soup bowls in the same row with the dinner plates. I know it was still this way last summer when I was helping a friend look for a new dishwasher. <sigh>

It was irritating because I went into the store with the intention of getting a specific Bosch and quickly realized I could not. Both of my close friends with Bosch dishwashers were surprised when I told them about it because theirs are definitely not the same as the current racks available in every Bosch on the market. I wonder how many people won't realize the issue until they get the thing home and installed.

 

[ZachnElli]

We replaced our oven, microwave, and dishwasher in March 2015, so over a year ago. We got all LG appliances. The microwave and dishwasher are fine, do their job. The oven however, doesn't keep its heat well, particularly if you a baking cookies or something where you have to open the door alot. I mean a temperature difference of over 100 degrees. I know there will be a temperature drop, but this is ridiculous. I've never experienced this and we've moved 10 times in 24 years of marriage.
Also, the smooth top cook top doesn't respond very quickly either. If something is boiling and you turn it down it takes at least 10 seconds for it to respond. So it does work, just not quite like I would like. I'll also second that Samsung refrigerators are crap, I have one of those too and it has had many problems.

 

[pumpkinmomma]

I hate, hate, hate my GE dishwasher. I'm going to replace it with a Bosch soon.

Don't go for matching if one of the appliances does not have the features you want or has consistently bad reviews. The rebates are nice and all but if you hate the appliance, the money saved won't be worth it.

I like my GE microwave, it's 5 yrs old and works great.

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

It was irritating because I went into the store with the intention of getting a specific Bosch and quickly realized I could not. Both of my close friends with Bosch dishwashers were surprised when I told them about it because theirs are definitely not the same as the current racks available in every Bosch on the market. I wonder how many people won't realize the issue until they get the thing home and installed.

I just got a new Bosch and I was really surprised by how close together the tines in the racks actually are. Luckily, my flat dishes fit fine, but there is not a whole lot of space between them, that's for sure!

 

[The Mystery Machine]

I'm not worried about the cookware. What I have is old, starting to show wear, and not something I can't replace if needed. I have read different things about the types of cookware, though, so thanks for pointing that out!

My "old" cookware scratched my glass stovetop. Grrr...

Look on the bottoms of your pots and pans. If you see pits and dents, do not use it on your new glass cooktop.

Oh and do not put foil on the bottom of the oven if you get a convection oven. (Yes I melted foil in my oven.)

 

[CPanther95]

Oh and do not put foil on the bottom of the oven if you get a convection oven. (Yes I melted foil in my oven.)

You should never let aluminum foil contact the porcelain interior of any oven - even a conventional oven.

 

[The Mystery Machine]

You should never let aluminum foil contact the porcelain interior of any oven - even a conventional oven.

Yes. My sister removed her foil in her oven the next day.