Front loading washers

[xeney]

We are on our second front-loader and I wish I could feel the love. We had an older Kenmore (Frigidaire made, as someone above said) and it did a great job of cleaning the clothes ... but it broke all the time.

After three big repairs in six years we just replaced it with a Whirlpool Duet, and we hate it. It really seems to beat up the clothes a lot compared to the old Kenmore, and stuff just does not get very clean. We launder our own cloth diapers and the Kenmore was great for that, but with the Whirlpool they are getting stinky in spite of using very little detergent (the key to frontloaders) and rinsing with vinegar. Plus the wash cycles take forever, the default temperature is "warm" and so we've shrunk a couple of loads of clothes, and the button interface annoys me. It definitely does not feel like it was worth the money. (We did not bother with the $1,100 matching dryer, after I confirmed that it would not fold my clothes and put them away ... which for that price had better come standard.)

I am really aggravated about the whole thing.

[Eden]

huh.... maybe I'm just lucky cause I like low tech..

my washer is old enough that it still uses knobs instead of lcd panels... so if I forget to change the temp setting that's my goof...

I don't use powder detergent anymore, and I think that helps keep the machine from gumming up. I had to rinse out the detergent cups fairly often when I still used powdered.

I usually keep the door at least mostly closed to keep the cats out of the washer and I've never had a problem with stink smells.

I think we had a problem with it only once. Something was left in a pocket (don't remember exactly - something like a handful of washers?) that got stuck in the pump, but the hubby was able to take it apart and get them out. Other than that its been pretty much trouble free.