Decent microwave ovens

[Dave Baker]

The day I moved into the new house 18 months ago I bought a microwave from Tesco (only the third I've ever bought) because A) it was cheap and B) I was already in there and couldn't be arsed to shop around. I just wanted to get the kitchen set up quick and have something I could make a meal in that evening. What a mistake that turned out to be. The platter revolves on a plastic thing about 6 inches in diameter with three tiny wheels. Within a few months those had started to wear through the paint on the bottom of the oven. Fucking stupid bit of design if you ask me which never had a chance of lasting very long. Paint is not renowned in the engineering world as a good bearing material! I should have dug out the receipt and taken it back but by the time I'd found that just over 12 months had gone by and I was out of time.

In the end I scraped all the paint on the bottom out because it was just flaking off everywhere and now have a lovely rusty bare metal bottom to the microwave which I suspect would seriously freak out any female who tried to heat anything in it but fortunately there are none of those chez moi and I don't really give a stuff if it looks like shit inside as long as it cooks stuff. I also ditched the plastic thingy so the whole weight of the platter and food rests on the central axle that turns it. That can't be doing the motor underneath much good and it grinds and squeaks a bit but still carries on working. It's also already seriously rusty everywhere else inside, not just on the bottom where the paint got worn through.

I'm a twat and should have known better because the previous microwave was also from Tesco, had the same design flaws and went exactly the same way. In fact within 2 years that one had rusted right through the bottom panel in several places so you could see the counter top underneath!

So firstly to anyone thinking of buying a microwave from Tesco - DON'T. They are unmitigated crap. The Ford Fiesta XR2i of the microwave oven world. You might buy cheap but you'll pay dearly in the long run when you have to replace it in a couple of years.

Now the first microwave of the three I've owned which I bought back in the

1990s lasted 20 years and looked as good when it died as when it was new. I can't remember which make it was. Something electrical inside it broke and wasn't worth fixing. So clearly they can be designed to last a decent length of time.

So is it just a matter of avoiding the awful awful awful s**te that Tesco sells and buying anything else at all or do more reputable brands also suffer from these sorts of problem?

[Tim+]

FWIW, we're still using the same Toshiba that we bought 33 years ago.

Tim

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Tesco also sell decent ones at a higher price - you do tend to get what you pay for. Next time look out for one with a stainless steel interior.

[Roger Mills]

We had a Panasonic microwave which lasted about 30 years. We only got rid of it because we were having a new kitchen with built-in microwave. The Panasonic was still working ok except that the internal light no longer worked - and I couldn't find out how to replace it.

Having said that, the fact that models bought 30 years ago lasted for 30 years is no guarantee that current models from the same stables would do the same!

Our current one is a Bosch built-in combi (microwave/grill) jobbie. That's been ok so far (about 4 years) was was stupidly expensive.

[Sam Plusnet]

One of the most important aims of the "Continuous Design Improvement" process is to reduce the cost of manufacture - how much can we remove, pare off, substitute cheaper materials etc.

Anything that lasts 30 years is grossly over-engineered.

[Tim+]

Hence my "FWIW". ;-)

Tim

[stuart noble]

Like our Sharp Carousel Two

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Try Lidl. Most of their stuff has a 3 year warranty.

[Gordon Henderson]

From my own experiences, what happens is that it collects moisture/condensation from the cooking food which collects in the groove the 3 wheely thing runs round and it doesn't actually wear through the paint, but causes it to crack, (heating/cooling of the water gathered there?) then the moisture gets under the paint and it rusts.

This has happened to all the microwaves I've had where I've been somewhat sloppy about drying them/cleaning them - the trick is to leave the door open after cooking, or take the glass plate, etc out and wipe it down.

Current microwave is stainless steel, and it has a nice feature that keeps the light on when the door is open (like most), but after 5 minutes it turns the light off - so I don't wory about closing the door immediately after use.

Just get a stainelss steel one.

Gordon

[Sam Plusnet]

Or our Curry's own-brand one that's been running for around 30 years. It's supposed to be 600W but I suspect it's actually a fair bit less than that.

[Sam Plusnet]

Colour me ignorant... but why's that?

[Dave Liquorice]

Hasn't happened on our Sharp, painted, microwave and we don't wipe anything down after use. Not sure how old it is, I suspect getting on for 14 years as previous microwaves would have been too physically big for the old kitchen.

[John Rumm]

FWIW, our Panasonic with stainless interior is still going strong 20 years on...

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

I have a thirty year old Zanussi which only needs a door latch microswitch replaced/adjusted and never get around to doing it. Apart from that, it's fine, but in the past decade (after the Zanussi started giving a bit of trouble) there have been five other microwaves of varying prices and standards - all of them shit, it must be said. Only one of them reached three years old, the rest just gasped past their guarantee period then went toes-up.

[Brian Gaff]

Well Magnetrons do age of course, and become less efficient. In the old days you could swap them but I think not any more, you just throw the machine and get another. I wonder if anyone has thought of making the microwave in two bits, IE the guts that produces the microwave and its control buttons, and the cavity for the food with turntable? Brian

[whisky-dave]

Have you tried measuring the power ?.

You can reasonable easily check this.

[Roger Mills]

I hope not! I'm 71 and still going strong!

[RobertL]

We recently bought a Siemens microwave. It does not have a turntable; it's just a stainless steel box. it's not a feature I looked for but I have been surprised at how much more convenient it is to not have a turntable.

Robert

[Andrew Gabriel]

Much harder to clean burned food off than stay-clean oven liners.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Early microwaves didn't either. You had to keep stopping it and turning the food around by hand. Actaully, until relatively recently, you often still found microwave cooking instructions telling you to do this.