Kitchen Aid Appliances

14 years ago

My husband & I are looking at purchasing Kitchen Aid appliances tomorrow from Sears to take advantage of some savings. Most are from the Architect Series II. Looking at a double oven w/convection, 5 burner drop in cooktop, french door fridge, dishwaser and hood. I can't seem to find any reviews on Kitchen Aid appliances online (Consumer Reports has pretty much nothing on Kitchen Aid) but was told by the sales lady they are top of the line. Any reviews on any Kitchen Aid appliances purchased in the last year or so would be greatly appreciated ASAP. Thank you.

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Comments (12)

weissman
14 years ago
KA makes good fridges and DWs - I had those for over 6 years now without any problems. KA ovens have had problems in the recent past - self-clean burning out the control board and the top element coming on during baking and burning things - don't know if these issues have been fixed. You don't need to buy all KA appliances - many of us on this forum mix and match brands - you end up with better choices that way.
wade_clara
14 years ago
Isn't KA made by Whirlpool? I do think it is a good idea to mix brands. A manufacturer may do one appliance well but not another. After reading reviews we decided on Bosch for our dishwasher. We have decided to stay away from all LG appliances. I'm in the process doing research on our kitchen remodel and it is a long process. I'm still stuck on hood options. It seems as though Kobe, Futuro, and Zephyr have good reputations for the style of hood we are getting.
Wade
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I am suffering some of your dilemma. I have decided to mix and match appliances to get the best of each. That's the most important thing to me. Based on my budget, much advice, and lots of reviews, I think I've settled on a LG fridge. You can't beat a Bosch DW, IMHO. I will probably keep the one I have. As to cooking, I have a current KA range, only 7 years old, and it has been a piece of junk. I swore never again, and yet . . . I keep looking at their wall ovens. All the local appliance shops recommend them. But AJMadison shows few reviews for KA. Reviews for Electrolux Wave Touch ovens are glowing and plentiful. KA styling is flatter and more integrated into the cabinetry, perhaps. It is bland in a good way. Elux is much more distinctive. Well, not much help here, but some things to think about. Good luck with your choices.
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A few thoughts... Stuff never lasted forever in the good old days...but in college in the 1990s one of my apartments had a fridge from the 1960s that was still working. Nowadays, things aren't made to last very long at all. The ROHS no-lead initiative, though a nice idea on paper, was probably a clever form of planned obsolescence. Superficial testing says it is ok. But no long term testing has proven that lead-free solder won't eventually form tin whiskers...little connections between circuit traces that cause the destruction of the boards. Moist environments like kitchens will hasten this kind of demise. Companies see repairs as money making opportunities. I had an outboard effects unit that was about 10 years old die on me. Harman Audio at the time wanted $500 to even -start- to diagnose the problem. Because it was a pro piece of equipment with XLR outputs...you're a pro, you must be rich and be able to expense everything. I looked into it myself. The power supply was dead - it turns out most serious electronics made since the mid 90s have sets of standardized switching power supplies with matching pin outs and board standoffs. It took a while to track and x-ref various manufacturer codes, but I found a power supply board that fit in the exact same spot and had leads with the exact same voltages. It was $50 from Mouser. Harman would surely have marked up this power supply so repair costs would have been 500+100+(30x2) for UPS shipping both ways...probably $630. Likewise I needed some opamp ICs on a mixer swapped out. After many, many hours of searching, I found a guy in Baltimore who does such replacements, he did about 15 chips for something like $75. Did an excellent job, you would not even recognize it had been resoldered. Point is, SOMEONE out there would know how to fix almost ANYTHING you might own, ALMOST all of the time. Sure, sometimes rare or custom ICs die and there's no replacing them, but 80-90% of the time its capacitors or simpler discrete components. Though a fridge compressor can die, more often it's the thermal switch or some other replaceable part. The challenge is you may never be able to find the good ones who will actually do this kind of work well, and correctly. I'm not even that into appliances but I've read many threads like this one, on various websites, so the experience is far from unique. When I replaced my fridge last year, I spent hours reading online reviews. It seems these days you are either lucky and get one that really passed all its QC checks or you get a lemon that the manufacturer let slip out the door.
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I have a KA dishwasher bought just last year - model KUDS35FXSS5 - and I am NOT impressed. Loved it at first and of course had no problems until the warranty ran out a few months ago. Since then, it's been no end of grief. I wonder if they built in a timer for things to go wrong once the warranty had expired??? Specifically: first, the top rack broke. Literally, the plastic piece that holds the rack onto the rail broke, and so the rack itself was hanging on only one side. We had to order new side rails and replace them, which was easy - but I expected it should've lasted longer than that. Now for the last month or two it just doesn't clean things. Sometimes it "runs" but clearly no water has gone through. Sometimes the things on the bottom rack are clean but not on the top. Sometimes it's fine. In the last week, though, it's been working about 20% of the time ... and then, not well (unless I run it on the Heavy Duty cycle, but that ticks me off because it isn't energy efficient and I shouldn't have to do that). I think it's a problem with getting water into the unit, but I can't figure it out yet. Time to call the repairman ... again. My sister-in-law has the same washer and says it only works for her if she always turns on both Heavy Duty and ProScrub options, which - again - is a ridiculous and energy-wasting solution. Needless to say, I'd go with the Bosch.
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I don't have one myself but my friend had the freestanding induction range by KA. She bought it 2 1/2 years ago, so don't know if there have been changes since. If there haven't been, I would stay away from it. She had nothing but problems that no-one could ever resolve. It was the oven, not the cooktop. She bakes a lot and every month or two, in the middle of baking , it would quit working. The breaker switch hadn't gone but by flipping the breaker off and on would get it going again. She had repairmen out 3 times replacing expensive boards (under warranty). They also came out and did diagnostics but didn't seem to be enlightened. She documented everything very carefully and the store owner told her she wasn't the only one with these KA problems. Even if they are willing to replace boards and you can flip a switch and get it back working, you don't always notice it has quit and she was getting annoyed with having to always check her oven and worry about ruining something in it. She wanted them to take it away and replace with a different brand since in the end KA or Whirlpool who makes them admitted they had a problem and had not figured out how to resolve it yet. She went nearly a year before they finally agreed to let the appliance store give her money back towards the purchase of a different range. She got a Samsung instead and is very happy. Says she even thinks the quality is better than the KA. I don't want to bash KA if they have found the flaw and dealt with it, but I would check it out very carefully. I have a GE Profile slide in induction range for 2 years now and am very happy with it.
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sayde
14 years ago
Have been looking at KA ovens and noticed that there are very specific installation instructions regarding separate circuits and other electrical requirements. I'm wondering if some of the problems with the self-clean had to do with electrical service and the installation. Have read that very often the apparent problem with an appliance has to do with something not happening correctly with the installation. I don't know whether KA has "fixed" the problem by changing the oven itself or by specifying certain specific requirements in the electrical at installation. Would love to hear if anyone knows . . .
weissman
14 years ago
While it's true that installation issues can cause problems, a circuit board frying during self-clean would not be due to the oven not being on it's own circuit - at worst you would pop the circuit breaker.
springbaysf
14 years ago
I have the KA Architect Series II oven and mw/convection combo for about a 1 1/2 yrs. I really love the combo unit and the oven. Very versatile and love the steam function for veggies. I have not had one problem so far and I bake alot. I too was concerned bc of the reviews of past but this was a great purchase. I say go for it!
ebse
14 years ago
I have a KA architect II side by side counter depth fridge. I like it, haven't had any problems.
positano
14 years ago
I have a FD CD stainless fridge, dishwasher and wine fridge by Kitchenaid.I've had the dishwasher for a year and a half, the two fridges since Jan. The only problem I have is with the wine fridge being loud, other than that everything works perfectly. The regular fridge is very quiet.
msgreatdeals
14 years ago
I just remodeled and got the KA 30" gas 5 burner cooktop and love it! I also got a KA dishwasher and it's pretty quiet and cleans well. I think if I had shopped around I could have done better for the money I paid for the KA.
cat_mom
14 years ago
We got a KA built-in fridge two years ago and like it very much. We've had two Whirlpool refrigerators prior to this fridge (one is now in our garage), and were very happy with them. Since Whirlpool doesn't make built-ins, we figured this was the next best thing. Didn't want to pay the premium for the Thermador (same fridge, slightly different cosmetics, at a higher price), or for a SZ.
andreanewengland
14 years ago
I would never buy another KitchenAid anything. I bought an Architect series DW several years ago. Couldn't stand it. It was a pain to load, things tipped over. It did clean adequately. I got EXPO to take it back and bought my Bosch, LOVED IT. Sold that house a year ago and in the remodel we are currently doing in our "new" Victorian house, we just put in our second Bosch. Both of mine were the top of the line hidden-control type.

My double KA convection ovens. Didn't like them because they kept overbrowning things on the top because of how they were designed to have both elements on at certain times. I know it's that's not compelling; but it was five years ago and i can't recall the details.

I also had the 50 lb icemaker which broke so many times under warranty that they extended the warranty for a couple of years for us. What a pain.
chas045
14 years ago
I have had the double KA convection and microwave/convection oven for 2 years. It has been ok. I was worried about the fuse failure issue and have only used the cleaning routine 2 or 3 times. I just had a service guy out just to do a check up on it and have found that you can't really calibrate the temps, so there isn't really much to adjust. But it may be similar on other modern ovens. The service guy did say that he had replaced a lot of fuses on the KA units. KA has issued a bulletin on some of their models and will install an alternate fuse and stronger fan, so perhaps the problem is now solved.
sunschyn
14 years ago
We just got KA counter depth french door fridge which I love. I would highly recommend it. Very quiet, great layout. We also got a dishwasher, which I've used only 3 times but seems to be fine (we had a KA dishwasher before it and thought it was great). We also got the double wall oven with the convection/microwave on top. I'd read about the burnout of the circuitry with the self-clean feature but that issue has been resolved and I saw somewhere a website that listed all the model numbers that were affected and the newer ones (that would currently be in stores) were not on the list. I haven't used the ovens enough to comment on them one way or another. The microwave feature works just fine, though.

Kitchen Aid Appliances

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weissman

wade_clara

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sayde

weissman

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