4 years of trouble free use from a SQ analog set. Just 2 of us so 3.5 cu ft is plenty. Much faster than our Whirlpool cabriolet HE outfit that we sold with our last house. Both outfits cleaned clothes well but Speed Queen is hands down our choice.

No they suck ass, stay away at all costs.

I have this new, old school washer. Most cycles use are full of water and has 'normal' cycle for small loads. Only downside is the size, won't wash a king size comforter, and sometimes gets jammed on a queen, and requires restart of cycle.

Had a front loader, hated it. Always smelled funky no matter what we did. The top loaders have worked fine. I never heard of the vinegar idea but I use 20 mule team borax so my clothes always seem good to me.

I’m very happy with our SQ; several years of use. Capacity is smaller than prior Neptune but cleans well and built like a tank in USA. No issues with smell with Neptune or SQ. Use once or twice a week. Hot with bleach. Or medium with color safe bleach. Never cold water. Always with some kind of bleach.

quote:

Originally posted by tatortodd:
Yes, but with the following caveats:

I use Persil liquid which Consumer's Reports consistently rates #1 or #2 whenever they do head to head testing

I pour my Persil to the fill line (i.e. it's measured)

I switch the soil level from "normal" to "heavy"

I typically use the extra rinse feature (i.e. 2 rinses) to insure no residual detergent

I use vinegar instead of fabric softener. Been doing this for at least 7 years since a Sigforum thread got me to try it. No fats and scents clogging up the fabric (i.e. it's cleaner, none of my towels are water proof, and fire retardant clothing remains fire retardant), gets the yellow out (e.g. pit stains) and prevents yellowing of white shirts, and it's extremely economical at ~$3 per gallon which is 30 to 50 loads. The dryer gets out 100% of the vinegar smell.

BTW, my front loader is a 2016

Okay, my policy is exactly the same, with the exception of vinegar treatment.

Always bump to next level of soil. Try to load a bit looser than I would normally.

What Benable said about the time to wash. Holy crap, laundry is an all day ordeal with HE equipment. I will say stuff is nearly dry when it leaves the washer.
We are in transitional housing and the wash area isn't well segregated. The endless cycles really wear on me. Prefer to be out of the house when it's running.

I got new whirlpool washer/dryer from Costco recently. The washer is really good at putting micro wrinkles in all of my clothes. It’s almost as if the machine was designed to put in as many wrinkles as possible in clothing that don’t iron out well. Never had this problem with any of my previous washers. It’s weird.

I can only comment on one brand.

Few years back our Kenmore of 30+ years died and my wife wanted one of these low water usage front loader save the planet washers.... So, I went out and got her one.... not a high end one, I think it was around $500... Electrolux I think.

here is the deal, I work for a living... as a chimney sweep... it washes clothes that aren't dirty really well... not so with dirty clothes...
So, now we have two clothes washing machines... his and hers... mine is a heavy duty Kenmore top loader.

We just picked up a LG front loader. Love it. It replaced a Maytag Bravos top loader which didn't really clean the clothes all that well and left white residue on my uniform pants. It only lasted 8 years. The repairman told me that once the bearings in the motor go, it needs to be tossed.

Dumb question but somewhat related: for larger items, I go to a local laundromat that uses industrial front loaders. One uses SQ; the other uses some other brand that I'm not familiar with (but made in USA). They cleaned king size comforters well.

I would assume that laundromats choose front loaders not just for operating costs. But for durability, maintenance costs, reasonable cleaning levels, etc. If they didn't clean acceptably well and/or they suffered from smell issues, wouldn't they use something else - who would go to a laundromat where you pay a premium to clean something and it doesn't work well and/or smells?

Is it that for home use, top load agitators clean best but not practical for laundromats? Again, front loaders have not been an issue for me - work well. But I'll admit I don't clean clothes that have been subjected to construction, chimney sweeping, farming, and the like. Just normal outdoor recreational stuff.

Try the permanent press setting on the LG front loaders, seems to use the most water, (still way less than a top loader). I find this works best with most everything. Add to the soil level, or extra rinses as needed.

I always always always select the EXTRA RINSE option on my front loader. Np exception.

I'm happy with my Whirlpool front loader.
.

Back in March of last year I bought a Maytag high efficiency top loader with the agitator option.

It has been solid so far.

I shopped washers for weeks before buying the set for our new old house.

Front loaders were never an option because I'm not the kind of guy who will be happy leaving the door hanging open all the time in hopes of delaying the inevitable mildew that likes to grow in the seals.

Top loaders w/o the agitator quickly became a non-option as all I was reading about was how good they are at 1) going out of balance, which leads to automatic shutdown, which means you have to babysit the thing to make sure your clothes are getting washed, and 2) balling up your clothing due to the motion of the plate and high-speed cycles. Didn't want to have to untangle everything (and presume it was adequately laundered) every time.

Nope - I'm happy with my Whirlpool top loader w/ agitator. Call me old school, but it works.

-Rob

My wife said no to agitator. I like the agitator because it’s the only thing that keeps my son from trying to load every single item he owns into one load.

We have found, in nearly 50 years of marriage, that W&D have a half life. Our first set lasted 25 years, the second 12.5 years, the next 6 years, etc. hopefully this new set of LGs breaks the cycle.

We've had GE, Whirlpool and 2 sets of Maytags. The last set were Maytag top end front loaders. They didn't last very long considering we are older with white color jobs and no kids left at home.

tatortodd, Do you use white vinegar and how much per load?

quote:

Originally posted by tatortodd:
Yes, but with the following caveats:

I use Persil liquid which Consumer's Reports consistently rates #1 or #2 whenever they do head to head testing

I pour my Persil to the fill line (i.e. it's measured)

I switch the soil level from "normal" to "heavy"

I typically use the extra rinse feature (i.e. 2 rinses) to insure no residual detergent

I use vinegar instead of fabric softener. Been doing this for at least 7 years since a Sigforum thread got me to try it. No fats and scents clogging up the fabric (i.e. it's cleaner, none of my towels are water proof, and fire retardant clothing remains fire retardant), gets the yellow out (e.g. pit stains) and prevents yellowing of white shirts, and it's extremely economical at ~$3 per gallon which is 30 to 50 loads. The dryer gets out 100% of the vinegar smell.

BTW, my front loader is a 2016

quote:

Yes, they work fine.

Water passing through the fabric fibers is what causes the cleaning action.

Previously, you would fill up a tank of water and agitate the clothes through the water to get the water to pass through the fibers.

Now, instead of filling up a whole tank of water, the clothes are just agitated through a smaller amount of water. In the case of a front load HE washer, the clothes are lifted up and out of the water with each rotation, letting gravity help pull the water through the clothes.

The clothes fibers are wet, water passes through them. The clothes do not care of it is being agitated through 5 gallons of water or 50, so long as the detergent concentration is the same.

Perhaps that is true if the hardest use your clothing sees is a Sunday Brunch. I loathe HE washers, they take way to long to make a sorry ass attempt at getting your clothing clean.

It has been my experience that they also smell like hell because they never seem to get dry. Avoid at all costs.

quote:

Originally posted by Hangtime:
tatortodd, Do you use white vinegar and how much per load?

Yes, 5% distilled white vinegar. I buy the gallon jugs at the grocery store or big box store. When I lived in Alaska and Canada, Costco was the cheapest, but here in Texas my grocer, HEB, is just as inexpensive.

As a softener, some websites say 1/4 cup and other websites say 1/2 cup. I put it in the built-in softener dispenser and fill to max line. In Alaska, I had a top load and would put it in a downy ball.

Looks like I may be moving to something current sooner rather than later. The balance springs for my old washer have been discontinued and sold out everywhere. Looks like I just have to sell my wife on the old looking Speed Queen TC5 series. They sure don't look as nice as pretty much everything else on the market, but that's not really the important thing anyhow.