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The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

wsj.com

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Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#91

Post by brigandish »

karlshea wrote: post #39
theyeenzbeanz wrote: post #6

It’s not just appliances, it’s even common household items too. Someone disassembled a portable toothbrush that died within some months vs the many years of the one that died before. The original one had what looked like a custom/in house engineered motor with a solid structure and beefy battery. The new one had those cheap toy motors that cost a few pennies each along with a flimsy frame and tiny battery to match.

I have a Sonicare that rattled the head off within a half year of buying it. I took it apart and it was due to a screw with no thread lock being the only thing holding everything together. On a vibrating part. Put some thread lock on it and it’s been totally fine since, but that seems like it’s intentionally planned to fail. Good job, Philips.

I had the same problem. Sent it back to them and they fixed it, but perhaps I should have a look inside. They did imply I'd dropped it when I'd done nothing of the sort.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#92

Post by stinos »

fshbbdssbbgdd wrote: post #20
martinky24 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? Cars are lasting, on average, longer than they ever have.

Is there a good source of data on this? On the one hand, I could believe that newer cars have better engineering which makes many components more reliable. On the other hand, crumple zones and expensive bodywork mean that modern cars are Fabregé eggs that can be easily totaled in minor accidents. And increases in the complexity and scope of what cars do can increase the cost of maintenance and make them go obsolete f…

Is there a good source of data on this?

This. It's not that I don't believe the article per se, but it doesn't come much further than 'technician says' which I find hard to consider as evidence for various reasons. Moreover, and that's the major flaw imo, it talks about 'appliances' as one big group as if all are alike and all brands and price ranges behave the same, and gives examples like fridges with icemakers which is a thing which is fairly new in e.g. Europe and I wouldn't buy anyway because I have no need for it.

Would be interesting to see how a plain fridge holds up, how long current 'normal' diswashers and washing machines etc last compared to the past, and that split up per brand/model group/price category. Also because anecdotally I haven't encountered issues, but that could just as well be because my expectation is different or I just had luck or I just happened to buy the right thing. I mean, I have several examples, but just to name one: my expensive cordless drill is now about 17 years old and I got a new battery for it recently making it again as powerful as it used to be. It has had zero issues and I renovated 2 houses with it. Is that expected? Did I just get lucky? I don't know, but price divided by hours of usage this thing costs close to nothing yet works great and for what I'd consider a pretty long time.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#93

Post by bryanrasmussen »

larsrc wrote: post #77
quatrefoil wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you honestly tried? Product reviews were never the right place to look, because they don't get published after 10 years of use. But unlike in the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s, you are one search away from appliance repairman forums that lay it bare. I confess to not having done this when I first bought my LG appliances, but that's on me. And then when they broke and I called a number of SF Bay Area appliance repair sh…

I always try to research my appliance purchases, but longevity info is decidedly not at my fingertips. Had not considered appliance repairman forums, that's a nice idea (until it gets commonly known and then abused).

although my new business spams appliance repairman forums with bogus information to drive up value of crap products sounds like a surefire service to sell Samsung etc. perhaps these forums being mainly old school internet would be better protected against this kind of abuse than say Facebook or other engagement algorithm gameable sites.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#94

Post by alkonaut »

This has a very simple reason: the cost of manufacturing has shrunk and the cost of repair has not. Because repairs require expensive people and manufacturing can take place with automation or cheap labor.

The worst offenders aren't large appliances, it's the cheap crap. If a store sells me an electric toothbrush for $79 and it breaks after a month shouln't just be required to replace it, it has to be worse than that to make products where even 1/1000 fail. And the result of such action would be that electric tooth brushes soon cost $200 instead of $79. But that's a good thing.

When I browse appliances or electronics, I want to know the lifespan. Not just the warranty. I want to know how long people actually use this particular product. And it can't just be based on some Amazon review system, it needs to be reliable and cover every seller. Like car mileage I need to have a decent idea about what to expect. And even if just 10% of product have this rating - that's also a good thing. It would mean less churn because manufacturers would be reluctant to replace an officially labeled product with a new one.

So we'd have longer lasting, rarely replaced models, more expensive products. Which is what we need.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#95

Post by lotsofpulp »

jacknews wrote: post #71
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's hard to maintain a revenue stream Appliance manufacturers survived most of the 20th century making reliable products for a smaller global population. On the other hand, it's hard to have never ending quarterly profit growth without planned obsolescence to create extra demand that normally wouldn't exist.

Indeed, the root of the problem is financialization.

Where are the 8% annual returns for old people’s pensions going to come from? Because the fertility rates of the last few decades surely is not going to result in growth like it did for previous generations.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#96

Post by XorNot »

ptek wrote: post #37

The annoying thing is that you see arcticles in paper and clips on tv that you have to upgrade all your old equipment from the 60s so you can "save energy". Who wants some iFridge/iOven when the equipment made in the 60s was built to survive two zombies apocalypse and one nuclear war and won't connect to the internet for a firmware update. Also the CIA can't hack your fridge so you get salmonella from your chicken be…

It's always weird that this example includes the idea that all current products have an un-removeable IoT integration of some sort.

Most of my appliances were bought recently, none has anything like this.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#97

Post by stdbrouw »

iio7 wrote: post #51

I have a friend who works in production. I cannot remember exactly what his education is, but it's a type of engineer. If you want something produced that you have invented, he can get it done. He has mentioned that they have software that can calculate the average lifespan of the finished product by entering the different components that goes into the product (like this piece has this amount of iron, this amount of…

That's one way to put it. Another would be to say that an appliance is (or should be) designed to last for approximately the amount of time it is likely to be in use, as people often upgrade old machines that haven't failed because the new ones are more energy efficient, faster, quieter, more convenient or clean better. There is no point in designing a washing machine to last 50 years, it only adds to the cost and nobody will use it for that long.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#98

Post by XorNot »

moandcompany wrote: post #25
fshbbdssbbgdd wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a good source of data on this? On the one hand, I could believe that newer cars have better engineering which makes many components more reliable. On the other hand, crumple zones and expensive bodywork mean that modern cars are Fabregé eggs that can be easily totaled in minor accidents. And increases in the complexity and scope of what cars do can increase the cost of maintenance and make them go obsolete f…

While many individual components may be better, or the chassis may be stronger and more rigid due to manufacturing improvements, materials, adhesives, etc, a lot of newer cars seem to have far more subsystems, arguably more complexity, and accordingly more failure modes.

Having more potential failure modes is not the same as being more likely to fail. In fact in a car it's not even clear that it makes the unusable.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#99

Post by saiya-jin »

moandcompany wrote: post #14

It's hard to maintain a revenue stream if your product is good enough to last, so the products are engineered to either be part of a subscription, to be replaced far sooner than necessary, or both. They're worried more about their revenue sustainability than they are actual product "sustainability." The "buy-it-for-life" brands ran into this problem because once you sell someone the classic product, they aren't going…

I don't agree, its like saying Victorinox/Wenger ran out of business because everybody eventually got that small pocket knife of theirs and due to its quality nobody is replacing those.

Yet reality is more like - completely new markets are opening, new rich people look for quality good brands, or father happy with his knife for 20 years will buy another one for his son. Or Miele, brand completely built on just its perceived reliability. They cost 2-3x more compared to even Bosch/Siemens, without any unique features apart from this.

The problem is, as almost everywhere in corporations - C-suite bonus incentives. Quick milking without care about long term strategies or brand name is the name of the game.

Re: The lifespan of large appliances is shrinking

#100

Post by stdbrouw »

> A spokeswoman for the Association for Home Appliance Manufacturers says [...] data last updated in 2019 shows that the average life of an appliance has “not substantially shifted over the past two decades.”

So, unless she is lying, there is actually no story?

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