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A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

mstdn.social

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Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#151

Post by distances »

mbg721 wrote: post #136
distances wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does everyone keep their veggies in the fridge, do you buy them in bulk? Basic veggies like onions, tomatoes, cucumber I eat fast enough to just keep on shelves and in regular rotation, and all more special plants are anyway bought for a certain meal in mind so they're used within a day or two. My fridge does have a veggie section but I use that for beer.

To keep the bugs off of them. I know in theory you're supposed to keep tomatoes out, but they attract fruit flies.

Somehow doesn't happen to my tomatoes. Maybe the organic trash bin is just a juicier target for my flies.

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#152

Post by bern4444 »

ethbr0 wrote: post #113
idlewords wrote: post #8

My girlfriend's mom has a teaching oven (used in home economics classes) from the 1950s. The 'teaching' part mostly means it has a more accurate and detailed temperature gauge. This gas oven is so heavy that light in the kitchen gravitationally lenses around it, but it's still going strong and the best oven I ever used.

I have a Sunbeam Radiant Control toaster that still works flawlessly. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1OfxlSG6q5Y They used a shielded bimetalic thermostat to measure the radiant heat coming from the toast surface , instead of a timer, to establish doneness (consistently toasting despite heating element variance) and implemented the mechanical lowering & raising of toast without a single motor (which is why 60+ year ol…

What if you only want 1 piece of toast and not two? Will it still automatically go down?

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#153

Post by bombcar »

jwells89 wrote: post #116
taeric wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quality of power supply to your house will almost certainly be one of the bigger factors in how long things last. Combined with standard stochastic behavior, I'd expect anecdotes of both kinds.

I suspect that a great many problems with electronics, lifespan related and otherwise, are rooted in power quality issues. The newer apartments and house I’ve lived in as an adult have been decent in that regard, probably because they’re closer to being up to spec electrically and have newer lines running to them thanks to being in urban areas, but one of my childhood homes out in the countryside which is now approac…

A whole-home surge protector is something everyone should install, just out of general principles.

And if you have appliances/computers die, you should get your electricity monitored to see if it's out of bounds.

In fact, anytime an appliance dies you should do a post-mortem to try to identify if something about the house may have contributed to it (hard water, electrical spikes, etc).

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#154

Post by pfdietz »

dragontamer wrote: post #132
jrochkind1 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, in general, things we buy today are a lot more "affordable" while being lower quality. Googling says the average cost of a refrigerator in 1950 was $250 to $400 (for 10 cubic feet -- a fridge today is 20 to 30 ft^3), which would be $3K to $5K in 2023 dollars. If you pay $3K to $5K for a fridge today (for a fridge 2-3x as big as the 1950 fridge), do you get a better longer-lasting one? I'm not sure.

Refrigerators might be a bad example because we got rid of highly effective refrigerants on purpose to patch a hole in the ozone layer. Or perhaps more accurately, to stop poking a giant hole in the ozone layer.

Today's refrigerators are much more efficient.

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#155

Post by rascul »

robin_reala wrote: post #77
imchillyb wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no real world comparison between air travel in the 50’s with anything else, except perhaps rampant enshitification. Double decker airframes, a standing lounge, smoking on board, unrestrained pets at the lounge… Nothing compares to the removal of these standards on all domestic flights. No industry did the consumer as dirty.

I’m old enough to remember smoking on board flights (and trains), and I’m extremely happy that those days are behind us.

I'm a smoker and I'm also glad we don't allow smoking on flights and trains.

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#156

Post by bombcar »

faitswulff wrote: post #12
rascul wrote: post #4

A lot of those features are available in today's fridges. Also, they use less power today. And you really don't have to get one with wifi and a touchscreen.

I just really want that vegetable box. Any recommendations?

The vegetable box on mine makes things last a long time with a filter for ethylene gas, perhaps something like these could help: https://www.amazon.com/ethylene-gas-absorber-fridge/

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#157

Post by amluto »

Levitz wrote: post #24
starbugs wrote: post #3

> Thing is, producing crappy, cookie-cutter, uninspired, overpriced junk that falls apart within 5 years (generously speaking) pays more to the shareholders. That's how we got from there to here. This summarizes it quite well for me.

It's also a consequence of constant R&D improvements. We can make appliances that last for 20 years or more, sure, but then when 20 years pass you have an appliance that is 20 years old and doesn't have any of that new stuff that came out in the last 20 years.

> new stuff that came out in the last 20 years.

There isn’t really that much of this. Let’s consider an oven:

Good temperature control: accurate, precise and reliable temperature sensors (e.g. thermocouples) have been around for a long time, as have switching devices that are plenty high speed to make an excellent oven. PID control would be easy with 1980 technology or current technology. Ovens with good temperature control are nonetheless rare.

Forced convection (aka a fan): no new technology required. And they’ve been around for years.

Direct outdoor exhaust: this was available in the 80s and 90s. Not sure where it went.

Good insulation: nothing fancy here. Mineral wool and fiberglass have been around for a long time. Even silicone rubber gaskets that tolerate oven temperature are not particularly new.

Touch screens: most of them are still worse than the old analogue controls.

Steam with good controls: this is pretty new and very rare.

I suspect most of what’s going on is that fancy appliance makers try to keep BOM cost very low and that helps and whistles sell appliances. (Compare a $1500 induction cooktop to a $7k fancy brand gas cooktop. I suspect the BOM cost on the induction unit is rather higher. The gas unit has some cheap brass or bronze castings (I think I read somewhere that those burners cost under $20), a potentially shiny piece of stainless steel sheet, and really cheap controls. The obvious safety mechanism to turn off the gas if the burner isn’t lit? Nonexistent. The only thing $7k buys you is a nice brand name and maybe slightly more solid construction than a much cheaper unit.)

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#158

Post by picadores »

jrochkind1 wrote: post #101
starbugs wrote: post #3

> Thing is, producing crappy, cookie-cutter, uninspired, overpriced junk that falls apart within 5 years (generously speaking) pays more to the shareholders. That's how we got from there to here. This summarizes it quite well for me.

I mean, in general, things we buy today are a lot more "affordable" while being lower quality. Googling says the average cost of a refrigerator in 1950 was $250 to $400 (for 10 cubic feet -- a fridge today is 20 to 30 ft^3), which would be $3K to $5K in 2023 dollars. If you pay $3K to $5K for a fridge today (for a fridge 2-3x as big as the 1950 fridge), do you get a better longer-lasting one? I'm not sure.

With the service per lifetime measurment stick, its still increddibly cheap. We are definatly poorer if you take the Terry Pratchet boot economics yardstick.

Re: A fridge from 70 years ago has better features than the fridge I own now

#160

Post by seer »

A side not I always wondered why don't we have refrigerator models that are "split system" as we have with ACs.

As it stands now it's a heat pump that pumps the heat from your refrigerator into your home. Wouldn't it be possible to create way more energy efficient model that has an outside body? Or even better connects to the AC body you already have outside? Like in the summer it would "help" the AC by being another AC itself, and in the winter it would effectively be "free" as it got its cold from the outside.

I'm sure there's a reason nobody has attempted this (complexity / price) but was just wondering what the data point on something like this would be? Presumably with modern buildings this could be reduced accommodated, especially with geothermal AC being on the rise right now, would be cool to have all your heat pump systems connected to a single loop, sharing efficiency.

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