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Comment by supernova87a | Hacker News Reader

The advertising icon of the Maytag lonely repairman (because Maytag is so reliable, nothing to repair: https://thumbs.worthpoint.com/zoom/images1/1/1107/18/porcela...) was great, but is long gone now.

And a general statement:

If anything, many of our products have become more expensive to repair than throw away and buy new. Partly the rising cost of labor and time it takes to disassemble something, figure out what's wrong (takes some skilled labor), and put it all back together again, and partly because improvements in manufacturing have made it cheaper just to produce from scratch.

Our throwaway society at work.

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Working image url : https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/47/Maytag_repair...

The mechanics of something like a washing machine are still relatively simple (motor, belt, drum, pump), but when the PCB goes it seems to be game over as often the part costs nearly as much as a new machine.

Yeah that's game over. I repaired our washing machine when the rear cross piece broke after seven years: took it apart, found the fault (hard to miss of course; when these parts fail, they literally tear apart), ordered the spare part, bought some suitable stainless bolts, and repaired it.

At the ten year mark, the electronics just died. As that consists of one solid resin encased block of electronics (not a part available as spare), repairing it would only make sense if I had:

* Space to put it aside for a while and work out how to replace electronics

* Electrical engineering skills beyond what I have

* A replacement washing machine in the interim (we just had a baby at that point)

* Willingness to invest days in this project

I think I fall within the 5% (3%? 1%?) of people who can manage the first repair, but the latter is a one in ten thousand (optimistic estimate) kind of issue. Economically, it makes no sense to repair it, which is really unfortunate.

It might have been possible to take the electronics from a broken machine of the same type, but these cannot realistically be found here.

Well done on the first repair at least! That's a good point about needing time/a replacement in the interim. I suppose there are some things which can sit on a bench for a while waiting for time/parts, but appliances tend to be pretty important. You could wait 5 days for a part which _might_ fix the problem, or have a new machine installed tomorrow.

So is that basically the economics of modern washer/dryer purchasing then - spend just enough to get 10 years out of it? I feel like modern "smart" stoves are similar - once the logic board goes that it. Seems like also a 10 year lifespan.

If it has moving parts and/or gets very hot and cools over and over again, I assume it will break within 5 years.

I buy my appliances from Costco with a Costco credit card because that means the appliance has a 4 year warranty. The price premium to buy equivalent commercial quality appliances with 5 year warranties is high enough that I would rather just get a new appliance and restart the 4 year clock.

Wouldn't there be a market for 3rd party PCB and control panel kits for used machines?

Low volume market, having to sit on inventory for a long time and high upfront cost ? Sounds like a recipe for cheaper to buy new than repairing.

Interestingly enough, as soon as the price of replacing it goes up (because you have less to spend), and an abundance of second hand devices entering your country, this model of repair suddenly becomes feasible. In some African countries you can get your TV fixed if a certain part fails, because the local repairman takes all working boards from broken TV sets and keeps an inventory. It's a business model that is unsustainable in more 'developed' countries. Here repairs are only done on really high-end devices.

Beside that, there is the convenience factor. I can buy a new washing machine, and have it here tomorrow, where they take the old one away, and plug the new one in if I want to buy that option.

You can't get that level service from a repairman. They can't compete with this business model. And even if they could, the chance of them being able to fix it is not 100%, whereas the new one is all but guaranteed to work (for as long as that lasts).

It’s not unsustainable in Ohio. I bought my washer from a guy with a basement full of washers who was obviously repairing with parts from other machines.

Then we posted our broken washer for free and somebody came and took it. It was obviously going to be repaired and resold or used for parts.

>"with a basement full of washers who was obviously repairing with parts from other machines."

I really hope he has some sort of lift or elevator installed. His back is going to be destroyed in a few short years.

May be too late. He made it clear that he had a bad back and it would be my responsibility to bring somebody to help me get it up the stairs.

Yeah, I've received quotes for replacing the control board on a Whirlpool double oven that basically equalled getting a new (10 years newer) oven.

That's just for the part. I was willing and able to do the labor - would have been a fifteen minute job.

I mean eBay is full of sellers that deal in salvaged stuff. There are even sellers who offer rechargeable lipo batteries salvaged out of single use “disposable” vape pens.

If there is a market for something, no matter how small, somebody on eBay is catering to it.

You would think with proper diagrams you could replace the electronics with a raspberry pi

And either be looking for a new side project, or hope that someone out there felt like putting their time into writing open source washer firmware.

I'd guess it's power FETs that fail. You'd have to design a shield of sorts, manufacture it, and still bury it in a compound with the pi, since high-temp high-humidity environment will kill them in weeks. Of course, being buried in a brick of epoxy, both switching and the pi would have all sorts of cooling problems.

It can be done, but it's not that simple.

It’s funny how people will happily throw themselves into a hopelessly ambitious open source project but turn down a super impactful project that is relatively simple like this one.

RPi + an 8-10 channel relay board + some custom firmware?

I just had visions of explaining to my spouse that I need to debug the software on the washing machine… I don’t think that would fly.

It's not just this. Door sensors, dispensers, filter covers part counts are high

In talking with appliance repairmen (who are, unfortunately, frequent visitors to our home), your statement is spot on. Some brands are better than others (when it comes to dishwashers, they universally praise Bosch), but none of them are built to last. I’m replacing a Samsung dishwasher tomorrow that is not even 4 years old. The main board has failed, and the part isn’t even available any more.

It’s a shame to see so much waste.

I wouldn’t even mind as much if the replacements at least would have the same (or better) usability and quality (in terms of everyday performance, not necessarily longevity), but more often than not they are a downgrade.

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