Our toaster is playing up. It's been awkward for some time. You put a piece of bread in it and it takes ages to actually brown the bread sufficiently. You turn up the thing up so it makes a darker colour of the bread, but then it burns. You await the popping of the toast, and it takes what seems an eternity. Sometimes the slices of bread you put in get stuck, which also leads to more incineration. You have to make sure the kitchen door is closed into the hallway, where the smoke detector is (is it a smoke detector? I'm not sure.) If you forget to close the door and you accidentally allow the toaster to burn the bread within it, the alarm goes off with an ear-piercing shriek. I know it's not much use if it's not loud, for example, in the middle of the night, when you are deep in the land of nod, it has to be loud to waken you. But during the day? Alfie will bark. Is it to tell you to sort the gadget out, to stop it shrieking? To stop it, you wave a teatowel or a newspaper under it, to cause a draught which will stop the thing making a noise. Or press the button in the centre of the thing, which is impossible to reach unless you stand on a stool or a chair to reach it. More inconvenience. The toaster will only really work properly if you use slices from a nicely pre-sliced loaf, such as Sunblest. Or Hovis. I prefer the multi-seeded variety. Sliced white is just too processed and mush. If you buy a proper loaf, from a bakers, and then slice it yourself, you have to ensure that the slices are not to thick otherwise they stick in the toaster, leading to more smoke and chaos from the smoke detector thingy in the hall.
We had a microwave oven, which sat on the kitchen work-surface, but it took up a lot of space. It didn't wear very well. It wasn't that old, but it got very rusty inside. I took it to the tidy-tip to be (hopefully) recycled. We didn't use it so much, and to be honest, we don't miss it. The space is more important. If you have a microwave you have to keep it clean. When you get spills it's important to deal with them otherwise it just adds to the decaying process. Also, if you use them to cook meals which have a strong smell, such as curry, this smell tends to linger. You just can't get rid of it. Not pleasant. I think the problem with this particular model was, because it was quite cheap, it wasn't made of very durable materials, hence the fact it rusted quickly, leading to it's demise.
We live in a rented property. There were various electrical items in situ when we moved in, a washing machine, a fridge/freezer and an electric cooker. When it came to replacing the cooker the landlord was reluctant to replace it, but it eventually buy a new one. Unfortunately it didn't last long. The new one wasn't much better. I came down to make tea early one morning and was almost electrocuted by the thing. There were sparks coming out of the electric point where it was wired in. We bought the next one ourselves, when the landlord refused. It didn't wear very well. It rusted badly and the oven gave up so we couldn't cook anything in it. So we bought the latest one through our Very account. It is reasonably good, has a ceramic hob, which the old one had. They are a good deal easier to keep clean than a conventional one as it's a totally flat surface to keep wiped. It does it's job well enough.
The fridge/freezer gave up when it just didn't freeze anymore. We'd been out for the day and came home to find it had defrosted and we lost a lot of food which was in the freezer compartment. We replaced this with one from Very. It has more freezer capacity, an extra drawer than the previous model.
Then we had to replace the washing machine. The old model was a cheap Bush, from Argos. I think I've described in a lot of detail how the landlord got someone he knew, who had absolutely no knowledge about installing washing machines, to fit it in for us. They didn't remove the restraining bolts which held the drum in transit, so when I put it on, when the machine got to 'spin' the machine nearly took off across the kitchen floor. Well, it would, wouldn't it? The drum would have been fixed with those bolts, so no wonder it caused so much damage, not just to the floor, but pulled the pipes out of the wall where it was plumbed in. This caused a lot of water damage, which we had to get repaired. We bought the current washing machine, a Kenwood, which we got from Curry's. A much better machine, which has an economy setting which means you can have a load of laundry done in around 45 minutes. The old machine seemed to take forever to wash a load.
We had an electric kettle which we'd bought in Argos. It went wrong. The lid was opened by pressing a sort of lever, but it stopped functioning, so it made the kettle virtually impossible to use properly. So it became somewhat impossible to use. We took it back and got a replacement, a Russell Hobbs model which has a Brita water filter inside it. You top the kettle up as you would normally, but, because it has a filter in it, the water is purified as it would be in a standard Brita water filter. The kettle has a device on the top which shows how long the filter has been in the kettle (four weeks.). It has a series of four 'bars' which represent the weeks, and when you insert a new filter, you press this device and as the weeks go by, each of the four 'bars' disappears until the last one disappears and you then replace the filer with a new one. The kettle is fine, except it's wearing badly, particularly around the lid. The body of the kettle is made of a plastic substance and it has a blue light within the kettle which shows when the kettle is boiling. This is very useful but really serves no real purpose. It doesn't make the kettle any more efficient. Also, the Maxtra filters are quite expensive and if you forget to replace them, then the filter capability is of no use. I suppose if it does have a purpose it is that it prevents the kettle from furring up with limescale because the water in this area is quite hard and without some sort of treatment things like kettles are soon full of limescale.
We have a coffee machine. One that takes pods. It's a Dolce Gusto. It has worked very well and you can make a range of drinks, mostly coffee. You put a milk pod in first, let the hot water filter through, then a coffee pod, to make latte or cappuccino. The only problem is, the water container is very difficult to clean. It has developed some green algae in it and there's no way you can get a brush in it to clean this gunk off. The plastic tank is just an awkward shape and there seems no way you can clean this out. A poor design fault. A lot of kitchen gadgets seem extremely difficult to clean. I had a food processor. It did it's job well enough, but it was a real fiddle to clean properly. Also, you have the problem with storage. With more and more kitchen appliances, mixers, blenders, processors, coffee makers, where do you store them when they're not in use? Most can obviously be left on the work-surface of your kitchen, but the rest? We have limited space.
My conclusion of all this discussion is that, generally, household appliances are not made to be very robust, and to not have a very long life and need replacing very frequently. Probably we use our kitchen gadgets a fair amount. The microwave wasn't used a great deal, but it soon got extremely rusty which is why it had to be recycled.
We had a microwave oven, which sat on the kitchen work-surface, but it took up a lot of space. It didn't wear very well. It wasn't that old, but it got very rusty inside. I took it to the tidy-tip to be (hopefully) recycled. We didn't use it so much, and to be honest, we don't miss it. The space is more important. If you have a microwave you have to keep it clean. When you get spills it's important to deal with them otherwise it just adds to the decaying process. Also, if you use them to cook meals which have a strong smell, such as curry, this smell tends to linger. You just can't get rid of it. Not pleasant. I think the problem with this particular model was, because it was quite cheap, it wasn't made of very durable materials, hence the fact it rusted quickly, leading to it's demise.
We live in a rented property. There were various electrical items in situ when we moved in, a washing machine, a fridge/freezer and an electric cooker. When it came to replacing the cooker the landlord was reluctant to replace it, but it eventually buy a new one. Unfortunately it didn't last long. The new one wasn't much better. I came down to make tea early one morning and was almost electrocuted by the thing. There were sparks coming out of the electric point where it was wired in. We bought the next one ourselves, when the landlord refused. It didn't wear very well. It rusted badly and the oven gave up so we couldn't cook anything in it. So we bought the latest one through our Very account. It is reasonably good, has a ceramic hob, which the old one had. They are a good deal easier to keep clean than a conventional one as it's a totally flat surface to keep wiped. It does it's job well enough.
The fridge/freezer gave up when it just didn't freeze anymore. We'd been out for the day and came home to find it had defrosted and we lost a lot of food which was in the freezer compartment. We replaced this with one from Very. It has more freezer capacity, an extra drawer than the previous model.
Then we had to replace the washing machine. The old model was a cheap Bush, from Argos. I think I've described in a lot of detail how the landlord got someone he knew, who had absolutely no knowledge about installing washing machines, to fit it in for us. They didn't remove the restraining bolts which held the drum in transit, so when I put it on, when the machine got to 'spin' the machine nearly took off across the kitchen floor. Well, it would, wouldn't it? The drum would have been fixed with those bolts, so no wonder it caused so much damage, not just to the floor, but pulled the pipes out of the wall where it was plumbed in. This caused a lot of water damage, which we had to get repaired. We bought the current washing machine, a Kenwood, which we got from Curry's. A much better machine, which has an economy setting which means you can have a load of laundry done in around 45 minutes. The old machine seemed to take forever to wash a load.
We had an electric kettle which we'd bought in Argos. It went wrong. The lid was opened by pressing a sort of lever, but it stopped functioning, so it made the kettle virtually impossible to use properly. So it became somewhat impossible to use. We took it back and got a replacement, a Russell Hobbs model which has a Brita water filter inside it. You top the kettle up as you would normally, but, because it has a filter in it, the water is purified as it would be in a standard Brita water filter. The kettle has a device on the top which shows how long the filter has been in the kettle (four weeks.). It has a series of four 'bars' which represent the weeks, and when you insert a new filter, you press this device and as the weeks go by, each of the four 'bars' disappears until the last one disappears and you then replace the filer with a new one. The kettle is fine, except it's wearing badly, particularly around the lid. The body of the kettle is made of a plastic substance and it has a blue light within the kettle which shows when the kettle is boiling. This is very useful but really serves no real purpose. It doesn't make the kettle any more efficient. Also, the Maxtra filters are quite expensive and if you forget to replace them, then the filter capability is of no use. I suppose if it does have a purpose it is that it prevents the kettle from furring up with limescale because the water in this area is quite hard and without some sort of treatment things like kettles are soon full of limescale.
We have a coffee machine. One that takes pods. It's a Dolce Gusto. It has worked very well and you can make a range of drinks, mostly coffee. You put a milk pod in first, let the hot water filter through, then a coffee pod, to make latte or cappuccino. The only problem is, the water container is very difficult to clean. It has developed some green algae in it and there's no way you can get a brush in it to clean this gunk off. The plastic tank is just an awkward shape and there seems no way you can clean this out. A poor design fault. A lot of kitchen gadgets seem extremely difficult to clean. I had a food processor. It did it's job well enough, but it was a real fiddle to clean properly. Also, you have the problem with storage. With more and more kitchen appliances, mixers, blenders, processors, coffee makers, where do you store them when they're not in use? Most can obviously be left on the work-surface of your kitchen, but the rest? We have limited space.
My conclusion of all this discussion is that, generally, household appliances are not made to be very robust, and to not have a very long life and need replacing very frequently. Probably we use our kitchen gadgets a fair amount. The microwave wasn't used a great deal, but it soon got extremely rusty which is why it had to be recycled.
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