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Comment by cfeduke | Hacker News Reader

I have fixed numerous home appliances over the past two decades almost entirely thanks to YouTube and eBay, and a willingness to apply myself. If the YouTube video has no intro and its subject is about your problem, you can be almost certain you're about to find out how to fix the problem.

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YT is a great resource for fixing things like appliances, but the devices themselves have gotten (1) shittier, (2) harder to repair and (3) more expensive custom parts - that are themselves less durable. Example: the slide-out for the top rack of my dishwasher exploded, sending ball-bearings everywhere. The replacement part (mostly plastic) cost > $50 and to replace required I disconnect the water & power, uninstall the unit and access the 2 screws on the outside. Great for speeding up assembly in a factory, but ridiculous for any other purpose.

This is the saddest part, a friend has two wash machines, one is an old top loader and one is a newer front loader; the front loader has been replaced three times whereas the top loader keeps running.

It had a control knob burn out and it was $50 or so to get a new one, one of the front loaders had a control board fail and it was $450 for a whole new front panel, which of course means nope.

To play the Devil's advocate, this might just be survival bias manifesting. The old top loader might have accidentally had top 0.0001 quality (tighter-than-average tolerances, etc).

Nah, it broke "about" as often as the others (making allowances for complications and design differences), it's just that when it broke, it was fixable for a reasonable amount because there was no computer board in it.

A similar but later top loader that I had died almost the same way, but required an entire control board replacement similar to the front loader; too expensive to bother with.

(Now an enterprising person could likely have repaired the control board itself, but that's beyond my "remove and swap" competencies.)

I spent way too much on my LG front door washer/dryer combo that when it breaks down I am going to replace it with a laundromat style Speed Queen.

These PCBs (and I suppose more specifically whatever parts are on them) seem to be made of literal garbage — and yet they cost a mint. Had a wall oven with an “error code” - diagnosis: replace board, part cost $400, internet says there has been no revision of the board so the new board will likely fail the same way, and only the part would be warranted so the other $500 in labor cost to fix it could be incurred again next month or next year. Ended up throwing away the whole double oven.

Meanwhile I know a PCB and a few boring ICs and resistors actually cost like $30 max so I know that we are being scammed.

I think I have watched every video on how to fix my ice maker from freezing on my Samsung refrigerator and still can’t resolve the issue. I haven’t replaced any parts yet but I am dubious that it will solve it long term. It turns out that putting an ice maker inside the door/refrigerator compartment is a fundamentally flawed design.

That or they melt if the seals break...

Honestly, all upgrades and additional functions in a fridge/freezer are fundamentally flawed. Large partitioned box that gets cold, compressor system to make that so, some seals and a defrost circuit. That's all a fridge should be. No ice maker, no water dispenser, no french doors, no drawers.

Same thing happened to us. Apparently the year model after ours has a defroster.

We just bought a standalone GE ice machine. It's a pain to clean but I'm never taking the 2ft flathead screwdriver to the refrigerator ever again.

It was interesting seeing this from the other side as well. I have what I thought was an obsolete motorized awning with an obscure failure. I couldn't find anything about it so when I managed to fix it, I decided on a lark to grab my phone and record a short video. I didn't expect it would be of much use to anyone.

Now it has 80k views and dozens of comments thanking me for helping them fix their awning. (https://youtu.be/qae0XM4Dn4U)

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