General musing - how long would you expect modern appliances to last?

Well, it lasted its lifetime. What are you complaing about?

It is mostly down to upbringing. My father was rather like me, he would have a go at fixing absolutely anything. Uncles would bring me lots of scrap electrical and mechanical items as toys to explore. Things like altimeters from Lancaster bombers, those battery powered shockers, accordions. Toys would often be electrical or mechanical. What it taught me was to have an enquiring mind, to study things and have a desire to know how things work.

These days everyone has the massive advantage of the internet as a source of information, repair manuals, plus lots of forums some quite specialised, to seek help from others.

I now far exceed my father's abilities and capabilities, when he was alive.

I'd say it is going to depend on use. A washing machine for a large young family might be used several times a day. One for a single OAP, once a week?

Only thing that might just be time related only is a fridge - apart from wear on the door, etc.

on our local Nextdoor, people want someone to hang a picture ??

Rubbish. In our 32 year old kitchen, I've replaced dishwshwr, fridge and oven without the slightest difficulty.

There are some walls (and some pictures) where hanging them isn't straightforward.

I have a friend who tried to hang a picture and found an electric cable.

Such experiences can be off-putting to those of a nervous disposition.

Owain

'Built in' is the problem. The reason we've kept 35+ year old machines going is the particular flavour of built-in, being a control panel where the drawer front would go, and a fascia panel where the cupboard door underneath would go, is obsolete. These days 'built in' means the whole front is a door fascia panel. But of course we don't have any spare fronts so we'd have to go for a non-built-in machine, which would look ugly.

The moral of this story is to avoid built-in appliances and have a white kitchen, wherein 'white goods' should fit right in...

Theo

There's quite a bit of skill and experience that can go into knowing whether a job is simple, and when it isn't. If you don't have that background, any job can potentially get you into a pickle you don't have the skills to get out of.

(this is the reason I don't do plumbing)

Theo

Ease of access is a big thing. This dishwasher has the leak under the front shelf bit about 7" off the floor - although that seems to be the point where the water escapes; it could be coming from anywhere inside.

With my knees it was very hard to get down and up again to locate the leak.

Back in the day the white free standing stuff just wheeled out on castors and you could take all the panels up and see inside. You had to make sure that the water and waste pipes and the power lead were long enough for you to pull it out, of course. I haven't dared look at this one in detail so far but it should be the same general principle - slide it out on the adjustable feet and look for panes with screws.

I think a call for an estimate for a repair is in order, followed by a cost/benefit against a replacement.

I am less enthusiastic about repairs these days because life is too short and I could be out enjoying myself (in a limited and specific way, of course).

Cheers

Dave R

We've replaced our built-in dishwasher and fridge freezer and been able to use the original fascias.

I balked at Curry's charge to install the dishwasher (think it would have got me two bottles of malt whisky) and said I would do it myself. Great, said my wife, and promptly spent the saved money upgrading to a more expensive model :(

All my replaced appliances were built-in

Stumbled across this:

Suggests that 7 years is not a bad run.

Cheers

Dave R

Yep. Dismantling a million transistor CPU to replace the blown FET is a lot more expensive than a new chip.:-)

Theo pretended :

Which is where tackling the job yourself, makes it so worth while.

Both the upper and lower grill elements went in the X-years old Whirlpool double oven which was here when we moved in. That was after 5 years of our use.

What interests me is /why/ those elements failed. They have no moving parts and are effectively just wire resistances. Any idea why yours failed? It seems to me the elements must be designed that way; is there something they do to the (nichrome?) wire which almost guarantees it will fail after a few years?

No idea. The failed units sometimes have a bulge or a roughened patch where the failure is. I imagine it's a pretty hard life they get. I sometimes see it glowing bright red through the back panel.

We never use the conventional (non-fan) heating so their elements are still original.

Been thinking back, some appliances must have been questionable quality in the past - say from the 1950s to the 1960s. Or did we just not have materials of adequate resilience?

The Hoover man would visit houses to maintain vacuum cleaners. Replace the rubber band. Replace "headlamp", if needed. Clean it all out and, for good measure, pop a new bag in.

The Morphy Richards toaster got taken round to the local electrician's shop to have the element(s) replaced. Yet again.

The kettle had a new element from time to time.

The iron needed a new cable quite regularly.

No microwave, washing machine, or dishwasher, just a simple Kelvinator fridge, and old-style spiral element hob.

I assume it's the same reason lightbulbs fail. They run at high temperatures. Eventually the material ages (in the case of lightbulbs due to filament evaporation - not sure of the mechanism of a ceramic element but possibly some kind of migration into the substrate) and a positive feedback loop causes thermal runaway and catastrophic failure.

Theo

But oven grills run at a lowish temperature - a dull red heat (around