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We’re so done with Samsung appliances…

We presently own three Samsung appliances: The 8700 series washer and dryer, and a French door freezer-on-bottom refrigerator. I can say with complete confidence that these are the last three Samsung appliances we will ever own.

Granted, none are brand new—the fridge was bought in 2012, and the washer/dryer pair in 2015. But that's not old in the world of appliances. And while you might expect a few minor issues as appliances age, we've recently had two major things pop up: One in the washer, one in the fridge. What bugs me most is not that these issues occurred, but that they are apparently very well known to Samsung, and yet they've done very little in the way of making owners aware of and/or fixing the problems.

In the case of the washing machine, my wife noticed some brown "gunk" appearing at the bottom of the washer after running a load of clothes—and then found the same gunk on the clothes that had just been washed. A tiny bit of work with a search engine—samsung washer brown gunk—led to tons of matches. This one in particular goes on for 10 screens, and implies that there's no known fix. (All of this is on top of a recall to fix a top that might come flying off!)

On our fridge, there are two ice makers, because of the bottom-located freezer: One fills an ice tray in the freezer, the other is used for the in-door ice dispenser. I noticed that this top ice maker wasn't working, and was making some really ugly sounds when I tried to dispense the ice. I pushed the button to pop out the dispensing rack, so I could see what's going on. The first thing I noticed was that the rack was nearly impossible to pull out—it took a very large amount of effort to get it out.

Once out, the problem was obvious: Pretty much any free space inside the ice maker was taken up by chunks of solid ice. Once again, a simple search—samsung ice maker totally frozen pointed me to a revealing page: How to defrost a Samsung ice maker. The page explains how to get into service mode to start an ice-maker-only defrost, which will temporarily fix the problem—though the fridge beeps twice a second while it's defrosting, which took 30 minutes on my first run through!

But it also links to another page that explains that this is a known issue, covered by a Samsung service bulletin, with up to four separate repairs/replacements that need to be done to the ice maker. So now I'm either out the cost of parts and a service call, or I'll be disassembling our ice maker and trying to do the repair myself.

So enough's enough—no more Samsung for us. I'll probably tackle the fridge repairs myself, then we'll use it and the dryer until they expire (probably not very long, given their history), and replace them with something not Samsung.

5 thoughts on “We’re so done with Samsung appliances…”

  1. Agree about Samsung. We had a brand-new dishwasher that had plastic parts break in the racks. They replaced them a few times under warranty. Then the logic board went out not long after the warranty expired. We ditched it rather than face hundreds in repairs.

  2. I vowed that I wouldn't add any Samsung devices to my home after they had a series of exploding devices. Phones and then I think a washer or dryer or something. Just not a trustworthy or reliable brand at all.

    1. Yep, we had (until this weekend) the exploding washing machine. We replaced it with an LG model, after perusing both Consumer Reports and Wirecutter to find the top-rated models.

      -rob.

  3. I purchased a Samsung washing machine in May of 2015. After 3 loads the electronic panel was broken and the machine was stuck on the spin cycle. It took 3 months to get the electric panel replaced and machine fixed, but right after few months it again broke, now we have decided not to get back to Samsung appliances.

  4. I’ve owned many Sh##sung appliances now, along with a few smartphones. I’ve noticed a familiar pattern and it’s ugly. They make nice looking stuff that simply doesn’t hold up well compared to older, pre “energy star” era stuff. To be fair many brands have similar problems. Part of the problem is the energy star requirements and according manufacturer building. I don’t remember the exact reasons but a google search will show this is a common issue with modern energy star stuff. It’s made them more energy efficient but less reliable. Hence the “don’t build em like they used to” adage. Back to Samsung. I’ve got a front load washer dryer set that I bought new in 2017. Already had numerous issues with the washer including repairs. It now shakes violently regardless of balancing or adjustments. It also leaks water occasionally. I have had two Sam TVs that both died after less than 3 years. I hope they clean up their act. I won’t buy them again unless the price is so cheap I can throw in a multi year extended warranty for about the same price as the next brands price on a similar appliance. Their refrigerators seem extremely prone to issues, I’ve read endless reports of complaints online about them. Refrigerators! The things that back when could routinely last longer than a humans lifespan. This planned obsolescence world has to change.

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