Appliance Week for Bushman & Hui-Chen
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UPDATE: Hui-Chen pointed out that I misspelled “Applicane” in the title! I’m a dumbass!
Hui-Chen and I bought some new home appliances this week. Our blog is read primarily by viewers who reside outside of Taiwan, so naturally we like to talk about life and living here. This includes things about our home and standard of living, etc. Today I decided to tell you about our new appliances because they are a bit different than those you would buy in other countries outside of Asia.
We also got a Whirlpool GDR7053 7KG dryer. It runs on 110 volts and doesn’t require any gas. Dryers are small and not very popular in Taiwan (in fact, in most places in Asia) where line-drying is preferable. Our home does not have a large area for hanging up laundry, so we purchased this dryer to go along with our washing machine. The 7KG capacity is a limiting factor, however it is an unavoidable one. Even those machines that wash and dry the clothes in the same device always have a weight limit on the drying capacity that is lower than the washing capacity. It doesn’t make sense to me, but apparently people wash 12 KG of clothes and then take some out and dry them 6KG per load. Our 7KG dryer is the largest size that makes practical sense. 8KG and 8.2KG dryers are significantly more expensive, believe it or not. This dryer works very well with our previously air dried clothing right from the washer. Running the washer’s air dry cycle for longer time means less time spent in the dryer. I believe that we are not really saving time, but we are saving energy as it costs less to run the cool air dry cycle in the washing machine for the same given time in the dryer.
technorati tags:Taiwan, Whirlpool, Panasonic, Frigidare, Japanese washing machine Blogged with Flock
I couldn’t find a photo of it on the web easily, so here is a shot I took of our new “icebox” - a US brand Frigidaire FRT-199AN. This is a monster 525 liter model that is quite large for Taiwan. I’m not saying its the largest, I’m just saying that its on the upper end of the size scale. I like the configurable storage (its all configurable, not just the main shelves), and the extras like the thingy in the freezer that supposedly keeps it from smelling bad, and also the cool blue UV light oxygen generator in the main compartment. As you can see, its so big that I couldn’t get far enough away from it to get a good photo (sharp eyed readers will catch the bottle of Suntory whisky).
The next item we purchased is this very cool Panasonic NA-130MB washing machine, made in Japan. 13 KG capacity, and with some cool programs, plus Neuro/Fuzzy logic, this machine does the job and then some. I’ve been around the block a few times and this machine impresses the hell out of me. The motion control is awesome, and the standard of manufacture is Japanese world-class. Fully programmable of course, but designed to be a “one touch” washing machine, this thing is smooth and rock solid. This model has a light in the tub so you can load it up at night, and a unique “Air Dry” system that reduces the amount of retained water in the clothing down to 30%. The first time I used this machine, I washed some T-shirts. I set the timer on the air dry for 60 minutes and when I removed the shirts from the washing machine, they actually had dry spots on them. This machine can significantly reduce the amount of drying time for all your washed items. I hung those T-shirts up to air dry, and it only took an hour. 
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October 21st, 2006 at 3:30 pm
Hi,
Awesome blog and as u have mentioned people outside your country like me (India) reads your blog. It was too informative.
Thanku and keep writing.
October 21st, 2006 at 3:38 pm
Thanks Ponnarasi! we appreciate hearing from our readers around the world. feel free to comment on any of our posts and please take care!