A concept that never made sense to me was the concept of a dryer that used energy to heat the air, and exhausted that hot air out of the house. Thing about it… On a cold February Canadian day, you’re first paying to heat the air inside the dryer, and when it gets exhausted, replacement air has to enter the house to balance the air pressure, and you’re paying a second time to heat the frigid outside air that ultimately winds its way into the house.
In many parts of the world, a combination washer and condensing dryer was very common, but yet the selection in the US and Canada can be counted with two hands. Since our choice was limited, and based on prior good experience with an earlier LG model, we chose to purchase two LG WM3987HW for the house, one to put in the laundry room, and a second to put in the upstairs semi-ensuite.
The LG combination washer/dryer unit has several benefits. For one, you don’t need an exhaust, simplifying the installation and most importantly, much more energy efficient. All it requires is a water supply, a drain, and a standard 15A 110V receptacle, instead of the 30A 220V that a typical dryer requires. That’s 1/4 the maximum potential draw of electricity. Sure, the machine takes longer to dry the clothes, and as such the energy savings might not be 75%, but it is much more efficient nonetheless.
The lack of exhaust allowed us to install one in the upstairs bathroom by tying into existing plumbing, and allowed us to have a second floor laundry within the common washroom, a major convenience as we did not need to carry the laundry up and down the stairs.
The general common complaint on these all-in-one washer/dryer is that it takes a very long time to complete a cycle (3 hours 30 minutes average from start of wash to completion of dry), but we have adapted our laundry washing to be done overnight by setting the delay function on the unit to start around 4am, and in the morning we have clean clothes ready to go or ready to be folded. The other common complaint is that the clothes coming out has a very slight smidgen of dampness as a result of the condensing drying method, but usually it evaporates by the time we are done folding the clothes.
A pet peeve: LG is proverbially raping the Canadian public on this unit. When we bought this unit in 2011, the Canadian MSRP was CAD$2600, and the US MSRP was USD$1679, and we ended up purchasing two units in Buffalo for USD$1300 each, so even after the NY state tax and the trailer rental, we were WAY WAY ahead than buying in Toronto. I understand the Canadian market is a smaller market, but the price difference was just outrageous with the exchange rate factored in. I contacted LG Canada in 2011 regarding their price discrepancy in the two markets, and their reply was:
“Thanks for contacting LG customer service. The reason why prices are lower in the U.S is because of the bigger market. That is the same for almost every product sold their. Have a great day.”LG, this is SHAMEFUL. You have a great product, but the way you treat your Canadian customers is atrocious.
Hi! I’m interested in buying this model. When you brought it back across the border from Buffalo, did you have to pay duty? Was that a hassle? Do you remember how much?
Thanks so much. I’ve been looking at this item at The Bay and the price is crazy.
No duty, just the HST, and no hassles at all bringing back it if you can transport it. We paid just over $1300USD at the time, as some stores had a sale on. If you search online now you’ll see it closer to $1400, but it’s still a far cry from Canadian pricing, so well worth the trip.
What I did was called an LG dealer near Buffalo and asked them to price match the online price. Because I bought it in the state that I was picking it up in, I paid the NY state tax as well. If you see an online retailer with free shipping, you can use a service like CBI (http://www.cbiusa.com) where they can receive and hold the product for you before you go and pick it up if you want to order it from a store out-of-state and ship it to Buffalo.
How about a warranty? As far as I know if you buy something in USA it’s not covered by manufacturer warranty in Canada. And even though it’s definitely almost half of the price compare to Canada but still it’s a lot of money and 0 protection…is it worth the hassle?
Nope, no warranty. It is a lot of money and no protection, but you have to weigh for yourself the savings vs the risk and the hassle. At that point, I had the time for a Buffalo round trip, so it wasn’t an inconvenience for me. As far as the warranty goes, $1000 goes a long way to pay for repairs, as parts are readily available in Toronto.
In fact, because of where we had placed the washing machine, we just so happened to have the power inverter inside the washer right next to the coils on a freezer that sat next to it, which after a few months caused an overheating condition on the power inverter inside the washer. We ended up spending $60CAD including shipping and had the part next day delivered from Mississauga, and replaced it on our own. The machine didn’t break because it wasn’t reliable, it was our own fault for putting it with zero clearance next to another heat source (the freezer), and even without warranty we did just fine. Had you have to pay for a technician to repair it, it still would not have cost more than a few hundred dollars, which means I’m still way ahead on the savings.
Remember that there probably isn’t a repair that is going to cost more than the savings you’ll realize on purchasing it south of the border.