Sadly, brand names these days mean nothing or next to nothing. In many cases the only thing that's the same as the old products you remember fondly is that name on the nameplate. The actual parts are cheap crap from China, and in many cases the entire product is from China as well. The only American part is the name itself.
Case in point, there was a massive recall on dehumidifiers last year. It seems the cheap crap Chinese guts of the unit had a bad habit of losing the refrigerant/lubricant but not shutting itself down. Overheating and fires were the result, and they were eventually forced to recall millions of these things. Here's the best part; it wasn't just one "brand". They were all made by Gree of China, but sold under 13 different brand names in the US and Canada (Danby, De'Longhi, Fedders, Fellini, Frigidaire, GE, Gree, Kenmore, Norpole, Premiere, Seabreeze, SoleusAir and SuperClima). In other words, they were all the same crap with just a slightly different look to the outer cabinet and a different name on the nameplate.
Good luck these days finding a good appliance based on brand name. Even in cases where one model number of a particular brand is highly rated, that doesn't mean other models within that brand will be equally good, or even acceptable. Gotta love that globalization stuff.
Jerry
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Topic: Whirlpool sucks (Read 7104 times)