Hubby is obsessed to the point of being annoying (more so than normal) about buying a super energy rated washing machine but can anyone explain (in simple terms please) what the difference is between a 'tripple A' rated machine and AAB? Apart from £100 in price.

A for Energy Rating.
A for Wash Performance
B for Spin Performance

The B version probably only does 1,000 revs on the spin whereas the A will do say 1400.

In my recent experience the maker is more important than the cost or ratings.

We have just sent back a tumble dryer after 4 uses - a Hotpoint with 'Made in GB' stamped all over it. The engineer who inspected it said there were numerous serious problems with it (it was brand new, stamped as being made in August 2005) and we would be getting a refund.

After this experience of buying British we have replaced it with a Bosch costing £100 more, but after one use I can tell it's far better built than the Hotpoint was, it's much quieter and it dried a full load in 45 minutes (compared to 80 for the Hotpoint)

My advice for laundry products is go for Bosch, AEG or if you have deep pockets Miele.

Hi
I saw a John Lewis branded machine on their website which had free delivery & free 3 year guarantee, German technology, A+ rated and so on, at a giveaway price of £299. I don't know about the build quality, but since it's JL it should be good.

Is he actually planning to use it? Beware

quote:

Originally posted by Celia Fate:
Is he actually planning to use it? Beware

Thats why I buy all my clothes two sizes too big - he shrinks to fit.

Though this morning he did ask me why I was putting the tablets in the drawer. I think sometimes he pretends to be stupid so I'll save him!

Teknofish - great link. My new washing machine has been seeming to be unbalanced about half the time and I now realise that I've probably been underloading it because I was too paranoid about overloading it! I guess I was being too careful about the smaller drum in my new built-in machine compared to my old stand-alone one.

Karen1 - I think your best bet would be to ask at your local electrical store about the running costs of the different machines. When we bought our fridge-freezer I was curious about the new ratings and I vaguely remember that the difference between an A fridge-freezer and an AAA fridge freezer was something like £2 a year. I'm sure that this difference will be greater for a washing machine, but probably not by that much.

I have a Bosch machine and it is the best one I have ever had. I can't remember the rating but it spins to 1400 which is great. You can set it to start in the night and add things when it has started so that sock you find on the stairs does end up in limbo. It also has a child lock to stop my son adding the cat in mid cycle.

Hope this helps.

I have a Miele, 1400 spin and it's quiet and brilliant. Got a 10 yr guarantee with it too, but I think that may have been a promotion.

I've got one that cost 120 quid. I expect it to pack in about 3 months after the guarantee runs out. In which case I'll get another one of the same.
If I buy 3 of these that will cost me 360 quid and will last approx 4 years.
That's better value than my 700 quid Zanussi that lasted 14 months... Well 16 months after I spent another 250 getting it fixed.
My current one only spins at 1200. But on the plus side it doesn't rip my shirts to shreds.

After an experience with Hotpoint that I can honestly sayed disrupted my life for months and reduced me to tears (hours on hold to ring them, refused to exchange 3 month old dud machine, replaced EVERY part, visited 5 times with no set appointment time meaning I had to take 5 days holiday, begrudgingly gave me a new one and fitted the hot pipe to the cold water source and vice versa...) I'd either pay for a very expensive machine (Miele or Bosch) or a very cheap machine that I'd be happy to replace. Admittedly this was about 5 years ago but I swore then that I would never buy another Hotpoint product - I only chose them as they made the machine in Britain.

My hubby thinks along the lines of greatestdancer, he refuses to get the extended guarentees, and he says if you pay £100 odd quid for it and lasts over a year, he will go out and buy another one.

A few years ago we bought a state of the art one, which had a computer chip thingy inside, it could everything barr whistling dixie lol, but did it give us grief, if the electric tripped, or work were going on near our home the 'chip would fail, so we had to get someone in every 4 months or so, so in the end we went for a cheaper model, less complicated, and a lower spin, as the spin cycle was high and that too would knock it out.

Touch wood and all that

quote:

Originally posted by ReenyMc:
After an experience with Hotpoint that I can honestly sayed disrupted my life for months and reduced me to tears (hours on hold to ring them, refused to exchange 3 month old dud machine, replaced EVERY part, visited 5 times with no set appointment time meaning I had to take 5 days holiday, begrudgingly gave me a new one and fitted the hot pipe to the cold water source and vice versa...) I'd either pay for a very expensive machine (Miele or Bosch) or a very cheap machine that I'd be happy to replace. Admittedly this was about 5 years ago but I swore then that I would never buy another Hotpoint product - I only chose them as they made the machine in Britain.

I bought a Hotpoint a few years back and I had a similar experience - never again.

Subsequently I have done what you say reeny - first of all we bought the cheapest Which? best buy, a Candy, which was great and lasted many years. Then a year or two ago we bought one of the more expensive Which? recommendations, a Bosch, which again has given no problems. I would only buy Bosch or Miele now.

My friend raised neighbourhood eyebrows by haing the Servis engineer almost permanently parked outside her house while her husband was at work. It was a rubbish washing machine, of course. Not fit engineer.

Wasnt there a story in the national papers a couple years ago?, where the lady of the house was so fed up calling them in to fix it,and refusing her a new one, she handcuffed the engineer and locked him him her house, got onto head office and told them she would only let him go when they sent her a new one, they did

My daughter's Zanussi machine had to be replaced after it totally collapsed. Comet delivered and fitted the new machine, but every time she used it, it shook like mad, walked half way across the kitchen, and made horrible noises.

She called out the engineer, who calmly demonstrated that nobody had removed the bolts and polystyrene packing. He said it was always happening.

Great fixers eh?