[Peter J]

Neither am I, neither am I.

Though when we left Lowes two weeks ago she told me "just let them handle everything.  Don't waste your time on other ideas."   

Hmmm, sounds like there's some history there. My deviant mind says send a scan of the check and a picture of you with new audio gear, but I've been known to salt wounds, so take that FWIW 

[thunderbrick]

Trust me, I have 50 lb bags of salt in my inventory.....................and I even pointed out to her that I could have just kept quiet and bought a power cord or sumpin.'

Gets back to the "no good deed shall go unpunished" tome.   We do keep separate checkbooks and credit cards, but that's a whole other story............

[django11]

FWIW my own washer dumped on me today with similar symptoms.  The agitator won't move and it doesn't spin and there is a burned rubber smell.  I called my repair place told and him the symptoms and the fact that it is a 12 year old Whirlpool.  The guy told me it is probably only a 25$ coupling and would only take about 1/2 hour to fix and that if my washer was otherwise in good shape it would be worthwhile to repair...

[thunderbrick]

Yeah, if I hadn't been so busy in December I might SHOULD have tackled it.  If it hadn't been for the 2.8 zoom I bought last month I had planned to replace the machines anyway.  In putting off the repairs I only cost myself $125, the value of the old washer.  Just got the new ones delivered.  Seem sweeeeet!   

[cab]

Many times it is a cheap part but the labor is the killer.

[django11]

Again fwiw my repair guy came and fixed the machine as promised on the phone.  103$ including 15% tax. 

The machine is a 14 year old Whirlpool and he thinks we can get another 14 years out of it   Really?  We could get 28 years out of a modern appliance?  We bought this machine from the outfit where the repair guy works.  I like this company...

[JohnR]

My washing machine story...

Recently one of the power circuits went off. We unplugged everything and I dutifully braved the spiders and the rain to check the fuse box. One of the circuit breakers had tripped. Turned it back on and went back inside to try and see if I could figure out what had tripped it. What do you know - the washing machine had no lights on the panel when I turned it back on. WTF - my expensive German machine had kicked the bucket after only ten years of light service?! I went online and it was apparently a blown control board, cost a nice sum to fix and opinions suggesting that the best thing to do was just get a new one. I found someone selling parts from "a working machine" on eBay and for a few insane moments even considered buying the control board and trying to fix it myself...

Over the next couple of days we researched new machines. Front loader or top loader. The SO likes top loaders but in the end we don't have room for one but some of these new Korean front loader machines have the same capacity as top loaders, with a new machine costing not much more than the projected repair cost of the old machine, etc etc, etc... I couldn't stand the thought of having the old machine (that was supposed to last 20 years) taken away just like that so I hatched plans to sell it on ebay, shit it must be worth something.

This was all around Christmas so we couldn't do anything much about it anyway. Then something tickled me in the back of my brain one day and I went into the laundry and closed the door of the machine. The fucking lights on the panel came on!!! I was absolutely stunned - I've used this stupid machine every week for ten years and was about to give it away because I thought it was broken. So: two thumbs up for German reliability and ten thumbs down for their idiotic user interfaces. (FWIW I feel the same way about the dishwasher and oven.)

This reminds me of a cable thread we have going.

[drmike]

my story,
5 years ago the maytag finally died. the repair man (over 35 years in appliance repair) said it wasn't fixable. I asked him what he would recommend for a new machine. he told me most of the new ones were junk, touch pads were a major problem, he got me a used Kenmore delivered and the old one removed for $50.00. not one problem or service call since.
drmike

[ptmconsulting]

Our washer is also on the order of 15 years old. Ours is a Sears model that uses a gear mechanism to drive the drub rather than a belt. Last year the gear broke for the second time since we owned it, so we went shopping for a new one. The new washers don't seem to have that central agitator, and from all reports, don't clean as well as machines that have the agitator.

So we called the repairman again and for $75 he fixed the old machine. When asked how it is holding up he said "Don't even think abvout getting rid of this battle-ax. It will last another 15 years with occasional maintenance and nothing on the market today will work as well."

Of course, he has a vested interest in making repairs, but I also hear what he is saying.