Reminds me of a conversation I had with a refrigerator repairman. I asked him what fridge we should get to replace ours. His answer: “they’re all pieces of shit. Just get the one with features you want.” Talk about a $1000+ purchase you can’t get excited about.

Embrace the "progress"
Like a dozen people have told me in the last five months

I have a Kitchen Aid immersion blender that has been serving me well. Actually snagged it at Goodwill for a few bucks. New they are $150ish though.

Condoms are made poorly nowadays. This is not a good thing to poorly make.

Cheap fuckers!!!
.

Product Development Engineers have known about this a long time. Products are designed that way on purpose. The engineering term for it is MTBF (mean time between failures). They can almost tell you exactly how many times you can turn a light on before it burns out. Products and materials have a "use life".

They didn't want your stick mixer to last any longer. They want you to buy another one.

quote:

Originally posted by Rey HRH:
I had my Samsung TV delivered Feb 2, 2023.

Yesterday, when the tv is turned on, it can't connect to the wifi. The temporary fix is to unplug it, let it sit for a minute, then turn it back on. But I have to do it each time after I turn it off.

Called Samsung help. Rep talked me through resetting the tv. Talked me through updating the firmware via a USB stick. Nothing.

Called again. They have to send out a technician. This TV comes with a 1 year warranty. Good thing the TV came with a three year service plan from Costco.

My main gripe with Apple.
Had an iPhone 4s that was neutered by an iOS/firmware regular, kosher all the way, update.

The Wifi/BT chip took one in the back of the head. No warnings.
Allegedly. some batch of chips from a specific supplier were affected by this.
Apple, were present, would replace the phone without warranteing the replacement would not suffer the same issue.
Temp fix was to overheat or freeze the phone. No telling if or for how long it would work as the chip had to experience as severe temp change to reset.

Had one more iPhone after that until the current one. Can’t wait to go back to Android.

0-0

These fancy ass front loading clothes washers are a perfect example. I think I’m on the 5th one in 23 years here in this house. And they have cost from $800 to $1000 each. I’m saving a shitload of water though.

The Ford F150 has two engines that were basically designed to fail at 100,000 miles.

The Ecoboost 2.7 engine has a WET timing belt driving the oil pump. Note, the belt is basically composed of rubber with a polyester weave to provide strength and support. This belt will start shedding small bits of rubber at 100K which then clog up the pickup screen for the oil pump. That increases the load on the oil pump and that rubber cogged drive belt. Which they causes the belt to start shedding cogs and the oil pump to stop spinning. Which quickly causes connecting rods to seize and bend. The end result is you either scrap that F150 or spend well over 14,000 dollars replacing that engine.

The second engines that fails around 100,000 miles is the 3.5 V6, in all of it's iterations, turbo and non turbo. For this engine Ford decided that an internal water pump was the way to go. Ford's defense for this choice is a dual layer seal for the block/water pump juncture. If that seal starts to weep there is a bypass passage in the block that will weep antifreeze on the drivers side of the engine. The bad news here is that as anyone over 25 knows water pumps tend to leak at the shaft seal/bearing, not the mounting gasket. Fact is that in nearly 65 years of working on engines I have never seen a water pump leaking at the mounting gasket/seal. Every single time it's been the shaft seal that went bad and those leaks can empty a radiator if you don't replace them in a timely manner. Guess what happens when a nearly full radiator gets dumped into the oil pan. Oil pumps are designed to LIFT the oil to the pump, they are not designed to run submerged in a coolant/oil mix. In this case Ford uses a gear type pump that will go into hydraulic lock and the inner gear will shatter. Note, at early symptom of this water pump failing is a dipstick that brings up what appears to be a milkshake solution. At that point most dealers will state the engine needs to be replaced because the bearings will be shot and that is quite true. Ford dealers no longer provide the option of re-conditioning an engine. Heck, they won't even replace a blown head gasket. Cost for this engine will likely be north of 16,000 dollars.

So, what if owners get pro-active and replace that wet drive belt or the water pump while they are still fully functional, say at 80K miles. Servicing these items will require removing the front timing cover and camshaft drive chains off the engine. I'm guessing a bit here but I expect that will involve 12 to 20 hours of "shop time". If your dealer only charges 100 dollars per hour that's 1200 to 2000 dollars in labor. If they charge 200 dollars an hour you are looking at 2400-4000 dollars. In addition as anyone who has had to have the engine or transmission serviced will know there will be a waiting period on parts that could take as little as 6 weeks to get or up to a full year to get. So keep in mind you'll need something to drive during that waiting period and rentals today run about 80 dollars per day or more. Nowadays pro-active means that you purchase these parts the day you pick up one of these vehicles and keep them safe at your home.

Bottomline here is that if you purchase an F150 the only engine that will last is the V8. If you want a V6 then I would suggest you buy a Dodge or GM product. Oops. my USA made bias is showing, a Toyota product is also an excellent choice.

I'm in a unique position where I get products sent to me to test and review. 95% made in China. I have some stories about product quality far too many to list. My favorite saying these days when something stops working or comes with a operators manual so poorly written that it cannot be comprehended in English or is so poorly designed and cheaply made that it won't work out of the box I always tell the wife the China man is strong in this one.

I have gotten a few things designed and manufactured in the states. Always expensive but always damn solid.

I was at Walmart a couple of days ago. While waiting for Mrs DF to do her thing, I looked at a suspended screen with scrolling recall notices for products sold at Walmart. Some were fire hazards. Some were fall apart in your food hazards. Some were break and kill your kids hazards. There were at least fifty revolving notices. All recommended stop use and contact manufacturers for refund. What are the chances of getting a refund from Happi Wei products on the other side of the world? Walmart isn’t even trying to get involved.

quote:

Originally posted by Rey HRH:
I had my Samsung TV delivered Feb 2, 2023.

Yesterday, when the tv is turned on, it can't connect to the wifi. The temporary fix is to unplug it, let it sit for a minute, then turn it back on. But I have to do it each time after I turn it off.

Called Samsung help. Rep talked me through resetting the tv. Talked me through updating the firmware via a USB stick. Nothing.

Called again. They have to send out a technician. This TV comes with a 1 year warranty. Good thing the TV came with a three year service plan from Costco.

Do not call Samsung, Call the Costco Concierge service you get it with the warranty at Costco, they will contact Samsung and you'll have a call back and appointment from Samsung in 24 hours.

I dealt with Samsungs warranty department of techs from India or some foreign country no less than 3 times trying to fix problems to no avail.

Called the Concierge line and what had taken weeks to not get solved was done lickity split.

https://www.costco.com/connect...rvice-concierge.html

1-866-861-0450