reply by theodocus struck me as coming from the desk of the ad agency of MTD. No mention of the actual operation that involves rolling over uneven terrain and jarring action from bumps and uneven spots and the fragile fabricated axles that bend and crack easily. Oh, there is also the bushings used in place of ball bearings: bushing use requires higher horsepower to move the newer units. The Deere has points and condenser; cost $5.00 and 9.00 respectively and the sears is a solid state igntion. Newer technology is wonderful as long as it is coupled with quality assemblage in a product. I have a 1968 Sears GARDEN tractor with a 12HP Tecumseh Heavy duty cast iron engine with ball bearings and cut with a 42 inch deck and also have a 1976 John Deere GARDEN tractor with a cast iron 10 HP engine with ball bearings and cut with a 42" deck and use both alternately for mowing two acres and for tilling and moving earth, etc.. Each has cast iron axles and mutli-speed hi-lo transmissions and EACH is used for plowing, snowblowing, tilling earth, hauling 1100 lb loads in attached large carts. EACH will run circles around the new 20 plus HP light LAWN tractors made today. Spend 5,000.00 and you will have a comparable heavy duty GARDEN tractor. By the way, good luck on getting even 10 years of use with the new wonders.

I bought a 1995 Acura Legend in 1998 with 32,000 miles on it. It was a 36-month lease turn-in and was literally in PERFECT condition. It sat unsold on the Acura dealerâs used lot because it was the least expensive model, the L 4-door, with cloth interior and 5-speed manual transmission. But it was exactly what I wanted, White with Taupe interior, Bose stereo, Power seats with memory and (the best part) the sweetest 200hp 3.2L V6 Iâve ever experienced! I paid $26,000 out-the-door, which felt like a fortune at the time (I was 23). I drove it 40-50k miles per year until I was t-boned by a commercial truck in August 2005. It had just turned 329,000 miles at the time and didnât burn a drop of oil (synthetic), the clutch had only been replaced once and the transmission shifted like new. Other than scheduled maintenance, the only thing I ever had to replace was the A/C compressor and two ABS sensors. The impact was so hard the passenger-side door panel ended up breaking my right hand and forearm (it was in the middle of the car). The rearview mirror broke loose during the crash and hit me in the head just above my right ear. It left most of the glass mirror fragments in my head and took 38 staples to close the wound! I also had damage to two discs in my cervical spine that required a 3-level c-spine fusion the following year. But I was able to recover from all of those injuries, which was pretty amazing considering how bad my poor Legend looked. I bought a 2006 Mazda3 Hatchback to replace it in December 2005. Eight years later, Iâm just past 190,000 miles and going strong!

Sorry I probably wasn't clear enough, my post was just talking about the convection ovens not the speed ovens, although Miele has the programs in both ovens. Electrolux and Bosch only have the programs in the speed oven, not the wall oven. I agree that the preprogrammed stuff on regular ovens is not necessary and I also would probably never use them. However, I think speed ovens are a different story. Most people can easily find recipes and program their ovens for the proper temperature and cooking time. But will they be able to program in the proper time proportions for microwave, convection, and thermal heating elements? I doubt it. No recipe I've ever seen has that information. It would require an awful lot of experimentation to figure out the right settings. Also, the only speed oven that even lets you do that manually is the Miele Chef series, not the Bosch. So as alerievay says you are locked into using those 9 programs if you want to speed cook with the Bosch. Otherwise you must use microwave or convection separately. I downloaded the manual for the Bosch speed oven which by the way is something you should always do before buying something. The 9 Autochef programs are: 1 - Chicken Breast 2 - Chicken Thighs 3 - Whole Poultry 4 - Beef Roast 5 - Pork Tenderloin 6 - Pork Chops 7 - Meatloaf 8 - Fish Fillets 9 - Brownies What if you want to cook something besides those things? I agree, I would find that very limiting. There is a frozen foods button but that does not use microwaves, only convection and thermal heat. There are pizza and auto defrost buttons too but the manual does not make it clear how they work.

cynic: Someone else mentioned the position of the heating elements in an electric water heater in explaining why the lower water temp at the bottom, where the cold water inlet is, can encourage bacteria growth. Perhaps electric tank design will change to a bottom-heating element as in gas heaters to address the bacteria growth issue? I can't help but wonder if there's more contaminants in our water today that is making this a problem now, or if it always existed but we simply didn't know about it? It seems like if this involved an automobile manufacturer, there would be a recall. There was a period when electricity rates were much lower and in low-demand situations (like mine), an electric heater cost less to operate than a gas model. This is because electricity is 100% efficient when used for heating purposes. Standby heat losses with an electric water heater are also much less than a gas model because it can be totally encapsulated with insulation where a gas heater requires exposure of the bottom surface for the flame to transfer heat to the water. A gas water heater loses some heat to room air from the flame and the exhaust as it is piped outdoors. This is "free" heat in the winter, but it increases the air conditioning load in the summer. The difference in cost per energy unit of gas vs electricity has widened considerably over the last thirty years. In fact, natural gas prices in my area have recently declined, while electricity rates have continued to soar. The electric water heater is the original one installed by the builder thirty years ago and it is still functioning problem-free. I know of several homeowners who have conventional gas water heaters that required replacement three times during this period. Tankless on-demand water heaters sound good in theory, but they don't achieve the energy savings originally claimed by manufacturers. In fact, those claims had to be modified in point-of-sale displays. Reliability issues and high repair costs merely add to their high initial purchase price. I closely monitor my energy consumption and utility bills (as you might have guessed). I have all my utility bills filed from when I purchased the house in 1986. A new rotary compressor refrigerator and an LED TV take credit for some of the reduction in hydro use. While electricity consumption has decreased, but the bills have not. If it weren't for all the extra fees, charges and taxes, the monthly bill would be closer to the $20/month I paid in 1986 and not the $50/month bill I receive today. On the brighter side, my phone bill dropped $10/month to $15 when I switched from a dial-up landline to a pre-pay voice only monthly cell phone. I have a roof antenna that receives 42 off-air TV signals, but what I save not paying for cable I pay for Internet (which didn't exist thirty years ago.) Water/sewer used to be flat-rate in the good ol'days with no restriction on consumption. Property taxes however, have increased far more than any utility where I am located. We used to be a small, efficiently-run town that amalgamated with a much larger city. My property taxes have increased from $2,000/year in 1986 to $10,000 this year (which doesn't include a huge increase in water rates). Policing, fire, social services, schools, garbage collection and public transit are responsible for most of the increase. There's also been some extremely wasteful spending/mismanagement reported by the local newspaper. Bigger is definitely not better, or more efficient, in this case!