The Best Washer EVER to Buy May not be What You Think!

washing machines are probably one of the most underrated inventions of the 20th Century Laundry used to take an average of four hours to do but the automatic washing machine changed that number just to 41 minutes saving households and Housewives a lot of time better spent uh elsewhere that is until your washing machine breaks and you're forced to either wait for a repairman to come out or buy a new machine and while you weigh your left with stinky clothes having to go somewhere uh like a laundromat to take care of your clean clothes now not every laundromat is a great place to hang out some are really gross and nasty not every laundromat is like uh let's say dirty dungarees which has a music venue bar and laundry place that lets you mosh and wash at the same time let's be honest though washing machines available today they just aren't built like your parents or grandparents washing machine gone are the days of the Maytag Man advertisements about washing machines lasting forever today most manufacturers are designing their machines just to last maybe six or eight years before something breaks which are the best washing machines that you can get on the market if you want to buy something new something that will break the cycle of bad machines and if there's any tricks to making your washing machine last longer than that six to eight years first off let's talk about front loads or top load washing machines is there any style that's more reliable than another 20 years ago most techs would have told you that the top load washing machine was super mega reliable and it was the best in the US but just like new metal things have changed in what used to be really good advice isn't anymore in 2023 front load washing machines are actually slightly better and more reliable than top load machines generally for most brands and style so on average front load washing machines run a little bit better but if you don't believe me a fat man in a costume let's look at other companies like Yale appliances repair who sell and repair tens of thousands of machines a year according to their most recent research from their own technicians and sales new top load washing machines fail more often under warranty however the slight difference may or may not be enough for you to change your mind if you want to top load or a front load washing machine but what has a greater sway on reliability is the brands and avoiding things that can kill your washing machine prematurely and make sure you stay to the end when I reveal which Brand's other techs trust based on a poll that I took we had about 160 170 different technicians of course we're going to Deep dive into which washing machine brands are the worst first though since I'm American we're going to talk about top load washing machines these account for over 70 percent of all washing machine sales in the US whether we like it or not and if you're not in the US that may sound shocking but generally most houses have dedicated areas for laundry equipment leading them to be much much larger washing machines much like our love of Buffets the two main styles of traditional washing machines are the versions with agitators and then the newer high efficiency styles that just have the wash plates in them with no agitator which one's really better for reliability honestly in my experience there's very little difference in reliability between either your top load with or without the agitators other than the fact that the actual agitator may be less likely to fail than the wash plate itself but other than that one piece between both machines they usually have identical fail rates washing machines with either style of agitation typically have the exact same sort of drivetrain in them as long as it's the same manufacturer usually they come off even of the exact same assembly lines but one catch is that it's easier to overload a unit with a wash plate since there's more natural room in that unit rather than say a Speed Queen that has an agitator there are other trade also between the two styles to consider though the wash plates were designed with higher efficiency in mind they tend to clean clothes better when using lower water than their full agitator counterparts since 2012 the U.S government mandates with acquirement on how much water it takes that a washing machine can use at least in a residential setting which basically means that an agitator isn't going to be utilized with a full tub of water using an automatic sensing mode which is why agitators have always been a fantastic way of cleaning extremely dirty clothes quickly at least pre-2012 if you insist on buying a machine with an agitator make sure to look for one that has any sort of deep wash mode on it these are the options that manufacturers have added to circumvent the mandated low water usage mode since the requirements are based on automatic dispensing modes which always use the minimum amount of water which really means it won't clean your clothes you usually the best in a washing machine with an agitator however if you want to use less water and electricity the washing machines with wash plates will do a much better job on average using the automatic water level which again is really low wash plates have a larger surface area that they can clean clothes with and they tend to work much more effectively with the lower rate of water at least in my experience what brands though and models make the best top loaders well let's put it this way when I ask technicians which brands had the best top loading washing machines on the market I had to specifically not include speed Queens because otherwise 95 99 of technicians in the United States would say that Speed Queen washers are the most reliable machine in the US they are not available in every single store however if you want to buy a reliable top load machine with an agitator Speed Queen is in far way the most reliable machine on the market and I have some market research that I'm going to show later on in the video just how much more reliable they are than the other brands in terms of failure rates they're the only brand in the US that comes with a five-year standard warranty and some models even come with a 7 or 10 year warranty During certain promotions there's a reason that a laundromat like this uses speed Queens they are built to last a whole lot longer these machines here are actually about 15 to 20 years old and they've been used about three times a day every day for many many years however there are some drawbacks with this type of machine they are horribly inefficient both in water and electrical usage compared to Modern high efficiency machines additionally the wash tub in these is about the smallest you're ever going to find on the market with a 3.2 cubic foot capacity you may have to do more than one load of laundry before you get all your clothes done but by God this machine is going to last a very long period of time there are a few Speed Queen models available engine really the main difference between each of the models is the control system the TC3 and the tc5 series are favored quite a bit over the TR series units which actually have gotten a lot of flack Lately from washer Fanboys when it came out even Maytag started taking pot shots at Speed Queen for that one now on the affordable end of washing machines I still like the plain Amana ntw4516fw3 it is the cheapest washing machine the whirlpool makes it has a water level switch in it and it's a 3.5 cubic foot model with an agitator so it is larger than a Speed Queen and it's less than half the price some locations may even have an upgraded model that's the ntw4519jw and that's worth looking at too as it has a 3.9 cubic inch tub so a little bit larger and it's very affordable now neither of those models are going to be as reliable as a Speed Queen top load washing machine but the parts on those whirlpools are easy to replace and easy to purchase now if you absolutely have to have something with an agitator that has the largest capacity tub the GE Profile PTW 605bsrws is something to consider you have to be very cautious though on the ge's because the profile washing machines are totally different they have a better warranty than other GE non-profile units the warranty on GE profile washing machines covers certain key components that are four and even five years for many parts which is pretty rare most techs to think that the profile line Stacks up pretty well whereas their basic all-white models are made differently which is to say that in my experience they're garbage finally for agitator units mingtag makes a residential version of their coin op laundry unit in the new nvwp 586gw this is similar to that Amana I mentioned but all the possible failure points have been re-engineered into a more reliable machine I did a video on one of the older models of that Maytag commercial unit tearing it apart to show you some of the differences I do like the machine but you do have to count the fact that it's still based off of the BMW transmission which is only okay you want to be very cautious though on the warranty on that machine though when I did the review big box stores will actually scam you out of the factory five-year warranty and replace it just with a one year warranty and you won't accept any substitutes Maytag includes what it matters as an extended warranty for free check the description of this video and I will have a link to Appliance Connections listing for that unit and many others in the description so you can see what the real warranty should look like which again is a five year res residential warranty now on top load washing machines that I would suggest to avoid even though I just mentioned maytag's commercial unit what you absolutely do not want to buy is they're similarly labeled unit that says commercial grain and usually has a model label of mbwc they've left more women unhappy than Googling how old do you have to be to date Leonardo DiCaprio they tend to have a lot of failures with the wash plates the agitators and the tubs for some reason it seems like that specific Maytag model Series has a lot of issues now if you want a washing machine with an impeller or a wash plate I've been a fan of LG for as long as I've been repairing appliances they're five cubic foot wt-7150cw it seems like it's a pretty good machine that it is in fact available in most big box stores I loathe bed box stores but LG's tend to be an easy to find brand that seems to personally have decent quality and most technicians to think that their laundry is pretty decent on average now the kitchen stuff is a totally different story which we talked about in my refrigerator video GE also makes a monstrous 5.4 cubic foot impeller washing machine in the PTW 900 that again comes with a limited four and five year warranty on important parts they're basically the only brand that I'm aware that has a high efficiency top load washing machine that has anything past a one year warranty from what I've seen they do make smaller versions as well that are smaller than that 5.4 cubic foot so if you want a machine that's so large it makes even doctor now sweat that would be the machine to consider to buy for the most basic unit that has a wash plate the whirlpool wtw 4950hw is a decent choice but it's not great it's a decent choice for the price though other brands are styles to avoid for the impeller style washing machines would definitely be Samsung they wash great and they work real really really well under warranty but they just love to have expensive problems in my experience and just outside of warranty and the quality has actually improved on Samsung washing machines over the past few years but they've gone from absolutely the worst ever to still the worst but not by much another one that I typically avoid which I kind of mentioned earlier are GE and Hotpoint top load washing machines that kind of look like knock off whirlpools they are very basic on the low end and I would prefer the Amana or a Whirlpool for the same price also I'm not honestly a fan of whirlpool's high-end top load washing machines they're very expensive and we'd wrestled with so many of the high-end Whirlpool machines they end up having expensive control board problems or tub issues and I just can't seem to recommend America's top manufacturer for the high-end Styles at least two other major brands to avoid that are starting to really show up in the US are my idea and Insignia both are bad for different reasons my ideal washers are actually okay but acquiring the right parts to fix them either from a technician or for yourself as a DIY is very difficult as they are a newer brand in the US my idea is a Chinese Corporation that's super massive and I imagine over the next few years they're going to get better on Parts but right now in 2023 they are very suspect now let's talk about front load washing machines for a few minutes for our load washing machines generally get a bad reputation in the U.S but they can actually make for great units arguably they do a better job cleaning your clothes especially when it comes to water usage then the wash plate driven units which I think is a huge plus if you really want to save on water and electricity but still get your clothes clean I think a front load is going to be a much better choice in all honesty even though people do hate front loads at least where I live they all set though on the front load washing machine is that it does take longer for a typical cycle to run the same amount of clothes though although in a laundromat like this it tends to be pretty fast with a large enough machine another advantage of a front load washing machine is it's much easier to spend the clothes on the horizontal axis meaning that a front load washing machine on average can run a way higher RPM drying the clothes better in the washing machine commercial units like these Dexter washing machines can run up to 400 G's almost making the dryer useless but reliability wise again they're only slightly improved but there is a higher initial price tag with most front load washing machines the price shouldn't dissuade you because again they tend to be quite a bit more efficient on electricity and water all things considered is actually a bit in your favor anymore versus any top load washing machine if you're willing to wait a few extra minutes for your clothes to be clean the extra 400 series in the background 24 minutes to clean everything on front load washing machines let's be honest then get whatever features you want any Bell or whistle but absolutely avoid any unit that has more than one tub where it's a top load and a front load combo both Samsung and LG offer these types of units that have a wash tub integrated and they do laundry in two Styles at the same time guess what that means it's twice the breakdowns and usually what happens is it's far more expensive because the parts they're using are non-standardized pieces for Tech that I've seen constantly complain about having to condemn such washing machines that are combos because what would make for a normal routine failure on another machine has very difficult parts to get a hold of because there's only a minute number of models in the U.S again when it comes to the specific models Speed Queen is the best on the market they are extremely expensive though because they're ff7 washer is insanely well built and it's identical to the Speed Queen washing machines here at this laundromat now for me I personally prefer ff6 or tactics over ff7 but that's because I grew up in a very poor household and never owned a PlayStation Oh wait we're talking about washing machines yeah Speed Queen ff7 is the best to go in running my appliance store LG has actually made one of the most consistently good front load washing machines on the market other than the Speed Queen and I know that's probably surprising to most people they're quite visually similar to Samsung washing machines but it seems like the build quality in an LG tends to to be one or two notches above the other brands on the market that isn't saying much though because it seems like pretty much all brands are garbage compared to the quality of a front load or a top load washing machine 15 years ago but I can't really change that I can only recommend brands or styles that are slightly better than the other ones on the market for exact washing machines the lgw m3670 is a good choice we've actually sold quite a few of these machines and never had warranty calls on them and we've had to repair some of the older Styles even 10 years ago and they seem to run great the WM 3470 is different on design and that's another really good one too now the drain pumps on LG's tend to break down kind of often so you want to make sure to clean the coin traps out often and make sure to remove everything from your pockets those style front loaders will last a lot longer now at this point it probably makes sense for me to recommend the sponsor of this video field pulse and if you are a technician or a owner of a business fuel pulse makes a lot lot of sense if you're trying to manage fixing things whether it's appliances Plumbing electrical HVAC time is money and it's very important to have your dispatching invoicing customer estimates and all kinds of other features in one exact place and field pulse is a great tool in order to integrate everything together so if you ever find the need for something to help you save a lot of time in that career field field pulse is a great company to look at and consider using for all your customer and technician management software now I've been yelled at by a lot of Europeans in my videos for failing to mention European Brands so that's where I fix this I believe it's pronounced me love here's the thing about Miele units we do see them in the United States but between their build quality and their absolute lack of selling locations in the US it's hard to remember them when I make a video on recommending things at least on this side of the pond the only time that American technicians tend to talk about those types of Miele units is when they're cursing the Germans out that design those God forsaken machines because they're very very hard or difficult to tear apart and take care of but again the reliability wise they're really really good if you're in the United Kingdom I would definitely look into a manufacturer called ebac it is a domestic British designed washing machine that is basically the greatest use of British steel since Judas Priest was breaking the law in 1980. I'm not going to tell you that I've had some sort of Miracle experience with those machines because I'm in the U.S but I will tell you that Paul from how torepair.com has and was allowed to have personal input on ebac machines and the reality is that most manufacturers do not put technicians in the loop of building and designing washing machines and the fact that they even did that for a machine in the UK speaks a lot to their build quality and it's very very important I've talked to Appliance engineers in private and they may hate Appliance companies more than I do or other technicians about how they build machines to build so when a company actually talks to technicians it tells me a lot about their willingness to make a product as good as possible and shockingly ebacs are not that expensive and I wish that they were a lot more like Iron Man and actually came and toward the U.S a few times because I love me some Iron Maiden other overseas companies to speak of Electrolux generally has a pretty good reputation of products it seems like in the U.S they are not as popular as well known as they work under their U.S branded frigid Airline frigidaires were legendary 10 to 15 years ago for front loaders they're still recommended pretty well as a decent model Bosch is also very reputable and reliable in the rare instances that we've dealt with them you do not see boss units that frequently so I can't speak a whole lot about them but when you do see them it's because they finally needed repaired usually way into their lifespan but that's kind of a good thing they end up lasting a very long period of time but finding their parts and documentation for Bosch it's a bad thing so be cautious and make sure if you have a Bosch washing machine to find someone that can actually service them if you do find someone that had in service Bosch the wat28400 UC is probably one of the best choices for a reliable but compact 24-inch front loading washing machine on the market now let's talk about a few things that you can do to make your existing or new washing machine last longer here are some major things that you want to do and trust me making sure that you maintain a washing machine is going to matter a lot more even than the brand maker model so a bad machine can be made pretty decent if you take care of it first thing you want to do is use the tub wash cycle make sure to clean your wash at least once a month one of the most important things to avoid is a failure involving the spin basket degrading over time which is from either soap scum laundry detergent over cleaning and that washing clean cycle is going to take care of that and get rid of the gunk and make sure to use hot water you may want to even consider something like a fresh wash bomb or some sort of other thing that is a washing machine cleaner and it will take care of the inner and outer tub on either your front load or your top load washing machine to make sure they last a whole lot longer now if your machine has a drain pump filter which is especially on front loaders make sure to clean clean that drain pump filter every three months not every unit has one which is a real Sheen but drain pump Replacements can cost hundreds of dollars if you don't do it yourself and you get a technician to do it but when you clean that trap out every few months you can prevent particulate buildup coins or anything else that can destroy the drain pump over time if you have a washing machine that is high efficiency especially anything the modern make sure to use he labeled detergent due to how well they wash they can kick up a lot of Suds from the Legacy detergents the older Styles and that will kill Modern Electric drain pumps due to them having to work harder to remove the water and the suds especially at a laundromat like this we've had to fix a lot of drain pumps because people didn't use AG detergent HE detergent clings just the same but it doesn't Suds up as much now if you do end up having a lot of Suds issues use a tablespoon of fabric softener along with a half gallon of water in any sort of detergent dispenser and it will take care of a lot of the Sun ads next don't overload your washing machine I've already mentioned this earlier but I'll say it again don't overload your washing machine for a top load washing machine with an agitator you generally don't want to load the clothes above the agitator cap and for a unit with a wash plate you can usually load it to about three quarters of the way full anything higher than that is a huge problem for a front loader three quarters the way full is about as much as you want to get before it'd be considered overloaded and if you manage to not overload the machine it will last way longer overloaded machines can degrade the life cycle by anywhere from 70 to 80 percent meaning a 5 000 life cycle machine could get dropped to a thousand Cycles which will be disastrous for you finally make sure the machine is leveled wherever it's at get a level and every year or so just make sure to re-level it in case there are any shifts from operation a unit that is unlevel will have to adjust itself during the operation and this could cause the suspension system to wear prematurely just like if your car wasn't aligned properly next let's go go ahead and talk about stackable washing machine centers usually in the US we call them laundry centers for the most part of my career the best brand has always been Frigidaire or their Kenmore label units but ever since he units became the standard on the market about 10 to 11 years ago it seems like everything got redesigned and quite frankly they're all terrible brands in my opinion it seems that the redesigned systems primarily even the electronics are much worse off because the control systems are now having to operate two things the washer and the dryer causing the reliability to essentially be cut in half so I tend to avoid or suggest avoiding most of the stackable one-piece laundry centers I would avoid GE Frigidaire Kenmore whatever Brands honestly what I would do is suggest just buying a pair of front load washing machines a washer and dryer and just stack them with a proper stacking kit this way you're not married to one single unit you can swap out a failed dryer or washer if you need to just do technicians a favor and make sure that the stackable you even if it's a one piece is accessible without any fancy or dumb dressing that could make it very difficult to access the units for repair or replacement because we will charge you extra money even a few hundred extra dollars if we have to deal with that bull crap during a service call now for one piece units if you're going to demand that I give you an answer LG does make a nice stacked one-piece wash system in their wash Tower the wkex 100 and 200 series it's essentially just a front load washer dryer set one signal control most technicians that deal with those units are very surprised how well they operate and that they seem to be built pretty well now if I had to choose a one-piece stack unit the closest thing I'd give you to a recommendation is the whirlpool wed4 or wgt4 model which is either a 24 or 27 inch unit it's essentially a Whirlpool top load BMW that's stacked with a dryer and they have at least solid documentation on how to fix them when they invariably break now let's talk about what techs think about which brands are the best on the market and the other research I did on the reliability of Brands as well I was able to get answers from about 160 technicians that reported and they said that LG was the most reliable brand on the market by a pretty decent margin about 50 to 60 percent of Tech's preferred LG and next in line with scroll pool Maytag around 25 percent but that's after we remove Speed Queen washers from their choices because again if Speed Queen was an option 90 to 95 maybe even 98 would have chosen Speed Queen but one super interesting thing that the technicians commented on they all tended to gravitate towards front loaders saying that even if they were going to choose a top load or a front load they would choose the front load every time unless it was specifically a Speed Queen top load washing machine so if it's a top upload they said that they won't even recommend Whirlpool algae or anyone but for front loaders they said even Samsungs are more decent than some of the top loads on the market which is pretty crazy but it is what it is but for my own research I turned to Google and I decided to inspect the internet search history for each of the major brands I looked at the number of searches made per month from each of Brand's washing machines I then flagged every instance of the top 100 results where the search was because the washing machine failed they were looking on the internet to see how they could fix a problem with their washing machine whether it was an error code for example like if the washing machine wasn't spinning or if there was a particular replacement part that it needed since every brain had a different volume of people searching for it rather than just reporting saying well one brand had the most number of failures we're only looking at the ratio of searches involving the codes or failures for each of the different brands on the market and that way I think we can determine which brands are more or less unreliable than others but if you think there's a better way of demonstrating the values you know make sure to leave a comment and I will include a link to that Source material and I'll try to update the spreadsheet as I get views on this video and work on it anyway here's the nine manufacturers I looked at that had over 10 000 searches when I ran this style of test in last place pretty much is expected Samsung was the worst rated machine with 36 percent of every single search for a Samsung washing machine involving a particular failure or code surprisingly the second to last place was Whirlpool that had 32.8 percent of its top 100 searches as failures next and third place was LG at 27.8 percent Which is higher than I expected but LG does have pretty good documentation on the error codes and a lot of the searches were for simplistic error codes like suds but I'm being transparent here in sixth place Maytag had a search rate of 25.3 percent of its searches involving failure note that these terms are in irrespective of washing machine age whether it's a top load or whether it's a front load so there's an asterisk mark on the exact numbers because of the Legacy machines like the old super durable maytags at any rate GE ranked fifth at 25 which was just slightly better than Maytag at fourth place was Kenmore at 20.5 percent now the thing with kenmore's is you have to have an Astra smark on them because Kenmore doesn't even make washing machines Whirlpool LG and Samsung have historically made washing machines for Kenmore and the older models are almost entirely Whirlpool but depending on the year and model you know it varies based on the manufacturer but they had tons of searches so I thought well I'll include them in the information from here there's now a major drop in likelihoods of failures Bosch drops that number to third place at eight percent of all search results being a failure another surprisingly popular one or a reliable one was Frigidaire Electrolux in second place it had about five percent one ashes mark that I would make though on the Electrolux frigid air machines is they don't have a lot of error tracking on them so it's hard to guess the presence of error tracking how much that impacts the list but I want to be as transparent as possible and finally in first place or last place depend on how you look at it is Speed Queen with 1.7 percent of all search results having a failure inquiry it was less than one quarter of the second place results I know that this isn't a perfect way of looking at things but it does demonstrate the huge difference in people looking at failures for the appliances that are likely to buy versus the number of times people are looking at those machines and I think this may be a good way of looking at the reliability but you should come and let me know finally to close the video out I know I've had a lot of people ask me about washer dryer combo units and honestly I don't have a lot of experience with them as a tech because they're actually kind of rare here in the United States and outside the US there's going to be way more manufacturers that have better experience with that and I'm probably not the most qualified to make judgments on the combo units but with the experience that I have I would say I've really had good luck with LG trom washer dryer units they've been excellent when we've dealt with them and we've been able to repair a vast majority of the ones we've had and from the text that I know that have dealt with European companies Bosh and me layer definitely highly recommended and they have way more models in the European market for those condensing washer dryer combo units I recognize there are a few companies that I haven't mentioned yet and it's either because they are sub brands of other major companies like Roper Hotpoint Crossley Mabe I do have a video discussing all the other sub brands that the different companies make and that would be a good video to watch if you want to educate yourself about some of the other sub Brands there are other foreign brands that I don't see very much in the US that I really want to comment on and look like an idiot sharp Panasonic Hoover Baco ASCO defy or a few others that I get comments from viewers on and I can't provide you any real insights at this time but I'm sure that when I will I will add them to the list with any research and knowledge that I have for you it's likely that their Appliance Techs in your own country that may have videos that you can use to research and support them in their YouTube channels on their suggestions and finally as a consideration is if you do a lot of laundry if you are a large family that is so large you can do your own reality TV show or run a business that washes clothes professionally or very frequently like a hair salon Pet Salon hotel motel or Holiday Inn what should you choose well this if you really truly absolutely want the best type of long-lasting washing machine get something that a longer mat uses like a Dexter T400 which is the one I have right here where the gargantuan new s975 commercial laundry machines are actually designed to operate with a 10-year commercial warranty which means three washes per day every day now if you're a resident or a lighter use that could mean 40 to 50 years for an average household have you ever seen a laundromat use Samsung LG or Whirlpool washing machines no well it's probably because a brand new one will last more than a week or two and laundromats have to be able to sell washes and make money on each and every then cycle that means simply that they have to have the most reliable units and the most efficient units possible which is why you only see Dexter Speed Queen an alliance type laundry systems make sure to check my description for links on how to buy the longest lasting systems whether they're commercial or residential that are available on the market but do expect to pay a lot of money for something like this finally I know I'm going to get the question what kind of washer dryer do I use well the truth is I've lived in an apartment for 13 years I don't even own a washer or dryer but we are moving to a house very soon and what I'm going to do is go to my local mom and pop independent retailer and find something that they have and actually I've already done this in between shooting the first parts of this video and now and come to find out that the local Maytag store has a lot of very fascinating things in it the local Maytag Store actually has multiple units that have a five-year warranty even outside of the commercial unit the mvwp 685 they have the nvw 6230rhw and that has a built-in five-year warranty so I'm considering that I'm going to go buy that one and then tear it apart and test and see if it really is Gonna Last that for that five year warranty so make sure to check out that video in the near future didn't talk much about dryers and the reason I didn't talk about dryers is they're all generally about the same quality as the washer so just buy whatever matches so now at the end of the video I'm going to go ahead and take my Nintendo wallet down to the local independent retailer and go see if I can buy myself a washer dryer set and I hope you have a great day bye

Channel: Bens Appliances and Junk

Views: 412,065

Keywords: best washers and dryers, best washing machine 2022, best washing machine 2023, washer dryer combo

Id: jmtLeB4ZplU

Length: 34min 34sec (2074 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 23 2023

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