The Home Appliance thread

[saket77]

Originally Posted by HillMan

I've had bad experiences with every Samsung products, so my opinion could be biased.

Same with me for LG. Now my home is LG free! I avoid both the Korean brands & prefer the Japs. However for Washing machines & Dishwashers, I would always prefer IFB for their service & spare parts availability.

PS: Have an IFB WM (14 Years) & IFB DW( slightly more than 1 year)

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by HillMan

The LG warranty is only on Motor. These seldom fail.



These are expensive equipments that should service us for at least 10years. I'll go with IFB for their reliability and availability of spare parts in long run.

I've had bad experiences with every Samsung products, so my opinion could be biased.

I have had 3 motor burn outs and a drum replacement in my IFB over a span of over 10 years. As the LG drum is direct drive the drum and its bearing are sealed extremely well, hence neither of them will go bad. I have opted for the extended warranty with LG which gives me parts and labour free for seven years for every thing.

I have had bad experience with Samsung service, hence shy away from their products.

[HillMan]

Originally Posted by Aroy

I have opted for the extended warranty with LG which gives me parts and labour free for seven years for every thing.

How much does the extended warranty cost?

Do you need to sign up at the time of purchase or something that can be bought at a later date?

IFB has AMC packages to choose. Starting with only free labour to various part types.

[coolclouds]

Originally Posted by Aroy

I would avoid both the brands

Originally Posted by HillMan

I'll go with IFB for their reliability and availability of spare parts in long run.

I've had bad experiences with every Samsung products, so my opinion could be biased.

Originally Posted by saket77

Same with me for LG. Now my home is LG free!

PS: Have an IFB WM (14 Years) & IFB DW( slightly more than 1 year)

Thank you everyone for your quick response.

I just purchased IFB ELITE SX 7KG 1200RPM from Reliance Mart and the price was Rs. 35,490. I didn't consider LG as my friend had very bad experience with their refrigerator.

Thank you once again!!

[RaguHolla]

Originally Posted by coolclouds

Thank you everyone for your quick response.

I just purchased IFB ELITE SX 7KG 1200RPM from Reliance Mart and the price was Rs. 35,490. I didn't consider LG as my friend had very bad experience with their refrigerator.

Thank you once again!!

As experience goes, I have extremely good experience with LG. Almost all electronics are LG in our home. I have no failures so far with LG. Our TV is 13 year old CRT, Refrigerator and Washing machine is 10 years no issues so far. Our Microwave is 3 years. We will continue with LG!

[saket77]

Originally Posted by RaguHolla

As experience goes, I have extremely good experience with LG. Almost all electronics are LG in our home. I have no failures so far with LG. Our TV is 13 year old CRT, Refrigerator and Washing machine is 10 years no issues so far. Our Microwave is 3 years. We will continue with LG!

That is a good record Ragu.

My opinion is that the products are not bad; but in my case, I was literally fed up of the LG service center and their excuses and finally telling me after a month or so, that if the product is more than 3-4 years old, then they do not have any responsibility to procure/ manufacture the spare parts. That is the company's 'policy' as per them. The product in question was a CRT monitor. Hence, even I made a 'policy'...never to have any LG product again. That was about at least 10 years ago and I hope & assume that LG service has changed for good as per so many posts here. But to each, his own!

Thankfully, all my home appliances are doing very good over years.

Originally Posted by coolclouds

Thank you everyone for your quick response.

I just purchased IFB ELITE SX 7KG 1200RPM from Reliance Mart and the price was Rs. 35,490. I didn't consider LG as my friend had very bad experience with their refrigerator.

Thank you once again!!

Congratulations on your purchase. Hope it serves you long & trouble free!

Regards,
Saket

[Aroy]

Irrespective of what the manufacturer claims,in general it is extremely rare to find motherboards and other PCB used in appliances after four or five years of their being phased out. For fast moving and large population of models there may be spares available, but in general, especially the higher end appliances spares mysteriously dry up once the model is changed.

[HillMan]

For all recent models IFB advertises 10 years spare parts warranty. I bank on it more than the service and warranty itself

[lurker]

Originally Posted by lurker

an update: The Pana refrigerator was not an auto defrost model, and yesterday while chipping away the resistant ice from the freezer, managed to poke a hole in the evaporator coil. A loud hissing sound was followed by a white cloud, which means the refrigerant has leaked and escaped from the closed loop, sealed system. Now this silly mistake on a non-autodefrost model usually means replacement of the entire fridge itself because the it isn't possible to solder the thin aluminium tubing inside the plastic insulation as found in cheaper model 190+ltr refrigerators and then recharge the gas to expect the system to not have any leaks, atleast sometime down the line, say in a month or two.

Enter the Panasonic service dude, who has promised to replace the whole freezer box itself since it is a base model refrigerator, the parts are easily available. And then recharge the gas. Total damages should be in tune of 3k or thereabouts. Service charge of Rs. 1600 will follow if I do not have physical possession of the warranty card and bill. At the moment searching for the same somewhere. But atleast the thing is repairable.

And guys moral of the story is please beware and do not poke the insides of the freezer with sharp objects to remove ice. The entire freezer area is enveloped with coils that has very thin plastic insulation and thus are not visible but even a slight poke at these ultra-sensitive areas can land one up in a lot of bother and totally unnecessary hassle.

Update: Repaired

Since I didn't have physical proof of warranty card, & I lost it somewhere while shifting, had to pay a service charge of 1600 which seems to be the standard service charge across the board if product is out of warranty in non-lcd/plasma products. Also 1200 for gas refill. Also I must say, only in India, in any other country, something like this, would mean a writeoff.

[coolclouds]

Originally Posted by HillMan

For all recent models IFB advertises 10 years spare parts warranty. I bank on it more than the service and warranty itself

Exactly this was one reason. 4 years 100% warranty and 10 years spare parts support.

[acroback]

IFB people have taken magnetron and transformer from my Microwave, and now it is more than 45 days. They refuse to either return them or repair the microwave.

Go figure, who is better.

All this with IFB factory/warehouse withing 10 kms of my house.

[S_U_N]

Originally Posted by Aroy

I have opted for the extended warranty with LG which gives me parts and labour free for seven years for every thing.

I have an LG washing machine (purchased a few months ago).

How do I opt for this seven year warranty?

Edit: After getting the washing machine, the electricity bill is roughly around Rs. 100-150 more per month.
Earlier I had mentioned that the break even period of the machine is about 3 years. Now, I would say, it is around 3.5 years. So, if there are no issues with the machine for 3.5 years, then I would say, from financial point of view, the money was well spent.
Yes, the convenience aspect, especially in rains and when we have guests or when you want to wash some heavy duty stuff is something that we cannot measure.

The best part is that we can schedule the wash upto 15 hours in advance, so that we can sync it with the time the corporation supplies water in the early morning. That keeps the missus happy. Now, that aspect alone is worth a million for me. :P

[condor]

Anybody in BLR have the ph num of the Panasonic service engineer ? (not the cust service number) ?
Need it for our Microwave ..

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by S_U_N

I have an LG washing machine (purchased a few months ago).

How do I opt for this seven year warranty?

We got it on installation, but you can call them up within the first year and they will come, explain and give the papers.

[aravind.anand]

I am planning to buy a geyser for bathing. Since I am living alone, and due to budget constraints, I have decided to get an Instant water heater of 3L capacity. I had zeroed in on AO Smith, as the sales person told me it is known to work well with hard water. But now since it is not in stock, they are asking me to go for either - Venus Lava 3L or V Guard Sprinhot Plus 3L costing 3650 and 3450 respectively. They also said that these models come with a copper tank thus wont rust in hard water too. I am still thinking if I should settle down for this, or hunt for the AO Smith elsewhere, please help me out.

Also, are instant heaters good enough to be used with the shower? I have always had a storage heater at my parent's house.