Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

The speed queen washing machine I had lasted 10 years, and it needs fixed now.  I liked it a lot because it was simple, it used a lot of water, and the clothes were clean. 

The GE Appliance repair man I know had a Speed Queen(actually his mom's washing machine that stopped short of 29 yrs. That was in  early-mid '90s. So ya they made them well to last until the 15-20 yrs

For me, they're all equally shit.  Doesn't matter the brand.  Samsung, I'm told by multiple people, is shit.  Whirlpool is OK, but 5-7 years they're toast.  Maytag is Whirlpool.  Kenmore is and always was made by about 3-4 different manufacturers.  The speed queen washing machine I had lasted 10 years, and it needs fixed now.  I liked it a lot because it was simple, it used a lot of water, and the clothes were clean. 

Question: how much would you value--i.e. how much extra would you be willing to pay--if a vendor offered you a 10 year warranty on an appliance?

Warranty offerings are a pretty simple economic calculation... Whether the seller can offer an extended warranty because they know they can shoulder the extra repair costs, or if they can offer an extended warranty because they built the product to a higher quality standard, it's just a cost. If a consumer is willing to pay more, there's no reason they can't do it. 

My argument is that consumers are NOT valuing it, and that's why the appliance makers are perhaps prioritizing other things (cost/features/etc) than reliability. 

----------------

As an aside. I have a Peloton Bike+. I got it when they were on sale for less than this, but the replacement price if I were to buy one new is $2495. I almost NEVER pay anything for extended warranties. However, at the end of my first year when the standard warranty was expiring. I took the option for $249 to extend the warranty out three more, to a total of four years. 

Why? Because I *don't* trust their quality/reliability, and because I want to protect the value of my investment from high-dollar replacement. They're a bespoke fitness company, not an experienced manufacturing company. I bought them for what the product DOES, not because I think it's the best-designed or best-built product on the market and because I trust their reliability. But I value the product so highly that I know I'd buy a replacement (or spend whatever I needed to fix it) because of what it's done in my life, so I know the cost of failure would be QUITE expensive. 

So clearly I'd be willing to pay 10% extra (albeit it's different emotionally when you're a year removed from the original purchase, and when you've spent a year falling in love with the product) for a 4-year warranty vs a 1-year warranty. 

On the basic GE I have little over 3 yrs old,you can hit pause for up to 24 hrs. Followed the techs advice start a normal cycle up let it splash around 3-4-5 minutes to distribute the detergent then hit pause . Depending on what I'm washing I'll soak for up to 2 hrs,then hit pause button again. Don't let the lid open because after 15 minutes it will drain. Wizzenheimers figure the washer was unattended and a baby could fall in - I'm guessing

that would be a breakthrough and a game changer

might save the planet

that would be a breakthrough and a game changer

might save the planet

$500,000 per car?

I think a PV "paint" could be a range extender but probably not a primary charger.

And that's sort of what the Mercedes article stated. In very sunny climates like LA, it might get you enough charge to be primary depending on your driving habits, but in most of the world it would just be a range extender. 

The thing to remember is that while it can't give you enough range, quickly enough, to road trip on, it can charge while you're NOT driving.

I.e. let's say you get up and do your morning commute. Let's say you drive 12 miles in ~30 minutes. While you're driving, it obviously can't replace 12 miles of range in 30 minutes, especially not during morning hours when the sun isn't in an optimal charging location. But then you park it in full sunlight in your parking lot at work, and suddenly you now have 8+ hours for it to replace that 12 miles of range (and maybe then some). And then you drive it home at the end of the work day and burn 12 more miles of range. Is it that hard to envision a world where you've gained 18 miles of range while you've burned 24? If you're typically at a ~6 mile daily deficit, you can probably go a month or more without actively "charging" anywhere. 

And note that the cost of that charging is... Free. Or, it's to say that you'll probably pay extra for the solar charging feature, so it'll depend on the payback period of "free" charging vs home or commercial charging. If you're only charging once a month, and you can do it on L2 or slower--i.e. cheaper than Superchargers--it could pay itself off quite quickly of the production cost of the feature is reasonable. 

To me, this could be the killer app for people who live in apartments or don't have garages and have to rely on on-street parking. You've pointed out that the economics of an EV are VERY different depending on whether you can charge at home or not. The economics are also very different if you have a solar option to charge for free, even if it is only a range extender. 

It remains to be seen if the economics work or if this is just a PR puff piece... It could be either. But IMHO, in theory even if it's "only" a range extender, it could be extremely useful if the economics work. 

and only wrote off a huge loss