[Shiny]

Originally Posted by Chris65LeMans

Christmas lights, those were.

Farther down the food chain than Christmas lights. New GE in 2010 made it about 7 yrs before puking. I expect my LED Christmas lights to last at least 10 yrs.

We moved last year and just replaced the 19-yr old Kitchenaid cause it was ugly and falling apart but it worked great. We bought an LG despite reputation for compressor fails. Happy with it SO FAR! Salesperson said they fixed the compressor design and LG has caused them less trouble than others (early failures) in the last few years. They also warrant the compressor for 10 yrs on some models. We were told to stay away from Samsung by 3 retailers.

We started paying for 5-yr extended warranties on major appliances about 15 yrs ago after a very bad washer/dryer experience.

I just retired from reliability engineering and experienced a wide variety of corporate warranty/durability philosophies. My guess is fridge sales are hurt most by "early fails" (defect-driven fails) and there is little motivation to build anything to last more than about 5 yrs. For consumer electronics with low margins, early fail rates of 3% can be "good enough" for a new product. I can imagine higher numbers being OK for large appliances since I expect the profit margins to be higher. Net: listen to the salespeople!

[fyrffytr1]

Thanks for all the replies. After reading them I decided to have a repairman come out to check my refrigerator out. If it can be repaired I will keep it for the time being. He is coming Monday, I'll let you all know what the verdict is.

[gtohunter]

Amazing how things are designed to fail these days...I have a 1950 Crosley "Shelvador" fridge that sits in my garage as a "beer fridge", and you have to listen closely to even hear it running. Upright freezer comes on, that sits next to it, and will drown out the Crosley!
I got the fridge in 1980 off a friend, whose wife wanted a new fridge, and it's been my go to fridge when two fridges and two freezers failed since then !!

[PunchT37]

Originally Posted by gtohunter

Amazing how things are designed to fail these days...I have a 1950 Crosley "Shelvador" fridge that sits in my garage as a "beer fridge", and you have to listen closely to even hear it running. Upright freezer comes on, that sits next to it, and will drown out the Crosley!
I got the fridge in 1980 off a friend, whose wife wanted a new fridge, and it's been my go to fridge when two fridges and two freezers failed since then !!

Yep. My buddy has a late 40’s Crosley at his shop to this day. Beer fridge. Ice cold at that. It shocks you at times when you grab the door latch. He just wrapped it in electrical tape. Doesn’t shock now.

[gtohunter]

Originally Posted by PunchT37

Yep. My buddy has a late 40’s Crosley at his shop to this day. Beer fridge. Ice cold at that. It shocks you at times when you grab the door latch. He just wrapped it in electrical tape. Doesn’t shock now.

This thing even has a butter compartment on the door with a thermostatically controlled warmer to keep the butter soft for spreading! lol (and it works)

[SRR]

Originally Posted by Chief of the 60's

Uh....

Oh man! I consider myself a pretty good proof reader.

[NeighborsComplaint]

I bought a complete Frigidaire Gallery suite when I remodeled my kitchen 6 months ago. I wanted a counter depth, side by side and Frigidaire ticked all the right boxes with reasonably priced, feature-rich products. The only downside is the refrigerator is especially noisy making a constant low pitched whine and the noisiest icemaker I've ever heard. The on-line reviews mentioned both but I took it with a grain of salt as all the brands pretty much perform the same with one notable exception, GE Profile. Unless you enjoy being on a first name basis with your repairman, buy something else. All the others are about the same with no more than an 7-10 year service life,

[68ragtop]

Originally Posted by fyrffytr1

Thanks for all the replies. After reading them I decided to have a repairman come out to check my refrigerator out. If it can be repaired I will keep it for the time being. He is coming Monday, I'll let you all know what the verdict is.

Did you try running it for a while apart? Does it start to ice up, or freeze just at the top where the thinner freon line comes in, or does it get fairly cool across the entire evaporator coil? Sadly you might have a freon leak, or a failing compressor. They all ice up, but its supposed to be somewhat distributed across the entire evaporator & then the heating element melts that off in the defrost cycles. But if its not cooling correctly the ice can build up thicker on the inlet side of the evaporator coil and then the defrost cycle can't melt it all off like its supposed to & the air flow starts to get blocked as well. I used to work in appliance repair while going to tech school many years ago. The systems have changed some & definitely cheapened up, but I believe they still work pretty much the same way they have since the era of frost free refrigerators came into market.

[nas t eh]

Our 7 year old Bosch stuff is pretty good so far. The dishwasher is great and really cleans the dishes well( we have soft water so that helps a lot), the induction cook top is excellent, the wall oven/microwave combo has had a repair when the built in microwave died. the fridge has been great so far too, but one of the door trays had a trim piece come loose and so I glued it. My Wife loves our 3 yr old LG washer and dryer, they were top rated in consumer reports and have lived up to it.

[Chief of the 60's]

Originally Posted by NeighborsComplaint

I bought a complete Frigidaire Gallery suite when I remodeled my kitchen 6 months ago. I wanted a counter depth, side by side and Frigidaire ticked all the right boxes with reasonably priced, feature-rich products. The only downside is the refrigerator is especially noisy making a constant low pitched whine and the noisiest icemaker I've ever heard. The on-line reviews mentioned both but I took it with a grain of salt as all the brands pretty much perform the same with one notable exception, GE Profile. Unless you enjoy being on a first name basis with your repairman, buy something else. All the others are about the same with no more than an 7-10 year service life,

So did ours. Even the tech said, "its what they do because of crappy engineering design". After 4 tries at fixing it Frigidaire "Lemon Law" it and sent us a new one. The replacement, I was told, is redesigned and does not have that ice maker noise.

[Sidponcho]

Just did all new appliances. The nice (and local) sales/service company told me the #1 reason for fridge service is all of the available fancy door and drawer arrangements. Makes sense. Went with a counter depth side by side with filter, and water/ice thru the door.

[fyrffytr1]

Well, the verdict is in. There is a leak in the upper coolant section. My refrigerator has separate cooling systems for the bottom freezer and top refrigerator. When the repair tech saw the picture I took he said it was a coolant leak. If the whole coil had been iced up he would lean towards a bad circuit board or defrost heater. Repairs would cost $875 and would include a new compressor and upper coil among other things. I already have about $220.00 invested with the service call and upper panel that would have to be replaced. And, the upper panel that cost $139 cannot be returned per Samsung! So, do I spend the $875 for repairs or do I spend $2.00-$3,000 on a new fridge?

[Chief of the 60's]

Its a roll of the dice. Do you want to invest another $1000.00 to get another 1 to 3 years out of it? I was in the same position at the same cost to repair. I opted for new.

[fyrffytr1]

Originally Posted by Chief of the 60's

Its a roll of the dice. Do you want to invest another $1000.00 to get another 1 to 3 years out of it? I was in the same position at the same cost to repair. I opted for new.

I think we are going to get a new one as well. We have just about settled on a Whirlpool.

[fyrffytr1]

Originally Posted by 68ragtop

Did you try running it for a while apart? Does it start to ice up, or freeze just at the top where the thinner freon line comes in, or does it get fairly cool across the entire evaporator coil? Sadly you might have a freon leak, or a failing compressor. They all ice up, but its supposed to be somewhat distributed across the entire evaporator & then the heating element melts that off in the defrost cycles. But if its not cooling correctly the ice can build up thicker on the inlet side of the evaporator coil and then the defrost cycle can't melt it all off like its supposed to & the air flow starts to get blocked as well. I used to work in appliance repair while going to tech school many years ago. The systems have changed some & definitely cheapened up, but I believe they still work pretty much the same way they have since the era of frost free refrigerators came into market.

I missed your post. No, I didn't try running it while the panel was off. There are two parts in the panel that plug into the back of the fridge. One is the fan and I think the other one was called a thermister or something like that. I posted two replies above this one about what the repair tech told me. And, I am 99% sure we are going to get a new Whirlpool in the next day or two.

[Heybuck]

As my heading says, the only refrigerator I'd buy today is a Miele.

We have had more than 25 years hard use on our Miele Dishwasher and my parents have had a Miele refrigerator for just on 26 years. It was a super high end unit when they bought their house - they bought the fridge from the previous owner so it is maybe 28+ years old now.

The ONLY failure on it has been the internal light needing replacement. Still looks like a new one today. Based on my parents refrigerator and our dishwasher, I'd only buy Miele today.

[TAKerry]

Originally Posted by fyrffytr1

Well, the verdict is in. There is a leak in the upper coolant section. My refrigerator has separate cooling systems for the bottom freezer and top refrigerator. When the repair tech saw the picture I took he said it was a coolant leak. If the whole coil had been iced up he would lean towards a bad circuit board or defrost heater. Repairs would cost $875 and would include a new compressor and upper coil among other things. I already have about $220.00 invested with the service call and upper panel that would have to be replaced. And, the upper panel that cost $139 cannot be returned per Samsung! So, do I spend the $875 for repairs or do I spend $2.00-$3,000 on a new fridge?

Big problem with new appliances. I truly think they price things right at the 'sweet spot'. We had a clothes dryer that was 2 yrs old and the circuit board went up. A new dryer was only going to be something like $200 more, so we went that route (and it only lasted 3 years!). I hated to throw away something that literally looked brand new, I even offered it to the appliance repair guy, thinking he could fix it cheaper than my cost, and he refused it.

[Chief of the 60's]

Because I paid alot for my Jenn-Air I asked the repair guy if it were him, knowing he gets parts at cost and can fix it for free, would he fix it? He said no which blew my mind because not only that he wouldn't fix it if it was his but he talked himself out of a job. No wonder why the Maytag repair man is bored.

[sdbob]

Local Maytag store told me big box stores appliances designed for 6 yrs then to dump.. We have been getting rebuilt Maytag units from them, latest is a commercial dryer approximately $325 exchange. One of the owners his father Maytag repairman, retired does repairs for cash. Our basement GE fridge ,our first new appliance
is about 35 yrs old still works,seals ok, lower shelf broke. But it works.

[bird72]

Need a new one also. Looking at a Fisher and Paykel. Need counter depth. I like the square design. Spill contain shelves, No handles in way. I am still researching, but that caught eye.