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Generation Junk

walterkirn.substack.com

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Re: Generation Junk

#321

Post by bob1029 »

LiquidPolymer wrote: post #106

We have friends that just laid out $3000 for a new washer drier set and washer is already leaking from the front door. Pursuing warranty repair has been a major hassle. My wife and I use a washer and drier set from the late 90's that are nothing to look at but work really well. They appear to be designed with service in mind and changing components is usually extremely easy - something I have done infrequently. These…

I can strongly recommend the speed queen TC5 if you are getting tired of taking delivery of defective washing machines. It fills up all the way to the top, and you can open the lid whenever the hell you please. It's loud as hell but it cleans very well and quickly.

Front loading is a fundamental engineering mistake if you are seeking trouble free, no maintenance operation for years on end.

Re: Generation Junk

#322

Post by psadri »

im_down_w_otp wrote: post #68

I’ve had to buy a lot of furniture and other things for my new house this year, and one of the things that really sticks out to me is that practically every category of product seems to be split into a bimodal distribution: cheap crap & luxury boutique. There are practically no entries occupying the middle of the market that are on the basic end regarding features & frills but also high-quality. It’s incredibly annoy…

The problem in being in the middle ground - what do you optimize for in a way that is easily marketable? The easiest answers are: cheapest (quality be damned) or best quality (affordability be damned). It’s hard to communicate a compromise between value and quality and that’s why that zone is empty. I believe this is a by product of online shopping where brands only get seconds to communicate their value prop.

Re: Generation Junk

#323

Post by hooby »

CaptainZapp wrote: post #267
hooby wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the sockets - I'm talking of the plugs that you put into the sockets. I haven't seen a plug with screws in ages. They all are a single molded piece now, aren't they? See: https://www.kulthifi.de/WebRoot/Store19/Shops/80012341/5E84/... for example.

Yes, they usually are. But you can - if you're so inclined - buy plugs with screws and replace the molded ones by cutting the cable.

And the cut off molded ones still end up in a landfill.

And that's my point - in my granddads time, all devices came with plugs that could be repaired and re-used (and my granddad never threw them away) - and today, all devices come with plugs that can only be cut off and thrown away.

I fully believe that the molded ones are actually both cheaper AND more durable (will last longer without needing repair). But they are neither repairable nor reusable, and thus still end up in a landfill sooner than the old ones, when those old ones do get repaired and reused.

And the same is true for most other components of any device.

Re: Generation Junk

#324

Post by denton-scratch »

woopwoop wrote: post #92
eduction wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally irrelevant links — the assertion was about hybrid cars, those links speak to cars overall. The Toyota Prius debuted in the US in 2000. I’d argue 23 years is simply not sufficient to make an argument about long term reliability—particularly given that sales took a while to ramp, and any issues in, say, the first 10 years are likely to be dismissed as teething problems.

The article was about consumer goods in general, so data about cars overall is more relevant than a single brand. Nonetheless, the Toyota Prius is, by reputation, a very reliable car. Here a used car website used it's data to estimate car model's lifespan, finding that a Toyota Prius has a potential lifespan of 250000 miles, much greater than anything from the 1980s. https://www.thestreet.com/personal-finance/cars-th…

In the UK, the Prius seems to be used very widely by taxi companies. In fact most of the Prius's I see are in taxi company livery. To get the best out of a Prius (or, I guess, any hybrid) you should drive it non-aggressively, avoiding steep accelleration and braking. That may have something to do with the longevity of the Prius.

I've owned two Toyotas, neither ever broke down, and one of them saved my life (in a crash). If I were in the market for a car, I'd get a Toyota.

Re: Generation Junk

#325

Post by mikrotikker »

woopwoop wrote: post #12

So this article implies that a number of things that we buy previously were built to last longer, and indeed did last longer. The first few examples are kitchen appliances. In this case I don't really know, but I'm at least willing to listen. Ultimately the evidence is people responding to a thread on Twitter where he solicited complaints. Not so compelling. But then he mentions a "hybrid sedan". Here I'm aware of th…

> Here I'm aware of the data. It's not close. Modern cars are much, much more reliable and durable than ones built at any time in the past

Is... Is this a joke? My 1991 vehicle made before planned obsolescence has a few questions...

Re: Generation Junk

#326

Post by sveitly »

ip26 wrote: post #194
edrxty wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On average they didn't (oh no, that repair costs more than the "car is worth" as if that's a metric that actually means anything) but it was far easier to keep one running indefinitely. You could take an engine to a small machine shop and get the head and block resurfaced, valves reamed and cylinders lapped. Without any electronics to fail it was just a block of metal that was slowly losing material and a quick hit w…

It’s the old fuel injection vs carburetor debate. Do you want something that usually runs for 200k miles without a single problem, but takes a fancy shop to fix? Or do you want something that needs a complete rebuild every three months and needs to be retuned for your ski trip, but can be repaired by a high school boy with a tongue depressor, a q-tip, and a hammer? The rapid exodus of carburetors shocked and dismayed…

IMO the reason we need better right-to-repair laws is because it's pretty hard to think about repairability at buy-time instead of at "when-it-fails"-time. Even more since companies that used to be good in the repairability front aren't necessarily still.

Re: Generation Junk

#327

Post by akvadrako »

CobaltFire wrote: post #197
LiquidPolymer wrote: post #106

We have friends that just laid out $3000 for a new washer drier set and washer is already leaking from the front door. Pursuing warranty repair has been a major hassle. My wife and I use a washer and drier set from the late 90's that are nothing to look at but work really well. They appear to be designed with service in mind and changing components is usually extremely easy - something I have done infrequently. These…

There are brands built to super high standards, but no-one wants to pay for them or deal with their compromises. We have been buying Miele appliances, and have nothing but excellent experiences. They aren't cheap, but the general opinion I've seen online is that they are one of the few brands that build quality modern appliances. My experiences would tend to back that up. Specific to the Miele washer and dryer, we ha…

Miele for most stuff is unfortunately no longer better than the competition. They only come with 2 year warranties and the you can find lots of complaints on the internet of their appliances failing within a few years.

Re: Generation Junk

#328

Post by mikrotikker »

ghusto wrote: post #290
bouk wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course the old cars you can still buy now are the reliable ones, because the unreliable ones have long been scrapped

That, is an excellent point. However, the very reason I buy in them in the first place is that they proved themselves to me _at the time_. Believe it or not, what I'm saying is I never had a bad experience with cars from the 90s, in the 90s.

The prices for 80s-90s 4wds like the Toyota LandCruiser and Nissan Patrols are climbing like crazy... Nissan even still make the 1990 model Patrol (GQ/Y60 frame) for the UN and Saudi Arabia.

Re: Generation Junk

#329

Post by denton-scratch »

CobaltFire wrote: post #197
LiquidPolymer wrote: post #106

We have friends that just laid out $3000 for a new washer drier set and washer is already leaking from the front door. Pursuing warranty repair has been a major hassle. My wife and I use a washer and drier set from the late 90's that are nothing to look at but work really well. They appear to be designed with service in mind and changing components is usually extremely easy - something I have done infrequently. These…

There are brands built to super high standards, but no-one wants to pay for them or deal with their compromises. We have been buying Miele appliances, and have nothing but excellent experiences. They aren't cheap, but the general opinion I've seen online is that they are one of the few brands that build quality modern appliances. My experiences would tend to back that up. Specific to the Miele washer and dryer, we ha…

Miele and Bosch are the only brands I'll rely on for "white goods". As far as I can tell, most other (european) brands are owned by Electrolux, and all built to fail the day after the warranty expires.

My toaster is a Dualit - pricey, but very reliable, and very repairable.

My coffee grinder is a manually-cranked burr grinder made of aluminium. There's nothing to fail (and I don't mind cranking for a minute in the morning).

My flat-screen is a Panasonic that used to belong to my father; it must be 15 years old. It's never failed.

I don't own a food processor; that would be me with a chef's knife, a grater, and a pestle-and-mortar.

The presence of an LCD display on a product is a big warning sign.

Re: Generation Junk

#330

Post by sandworm101 »

woopwoop wrote: post #12

So this article implies that a number of things that we buy previously were built to last longer, and indeed did last longer. The first few examples are kitchen appliances. In this case I don't really know, but I'm at least willing to listen. Ultimately the evidence is people responding to a thread on Twitter where he solicited complaints. Not so compelling. But then he mentions a "hybrid sedan". Here I'm aware of th…

Survivorship bias. People look at old things today and say stuff biult long ago lasted longer. But that is only because all the junk from then isnt around anymore. What we have now is only the most durable stuff. Want to see what stuff was like in the past? Try working with knives made without stainless steel, when not cleaning your kitchen knife immediately meant a rust blade the next day. All those classic cars still around today? We forget all the horrible junk cars that nobody ever bothered to preserve.
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