Kitchen Appliances News

We publish up to date news stories from the world of kitchen appliances. Recent bad news from the US includes the news that Whirlpool corporation are to close its manufacturing facilities in LaVergne, TN, U.S. and Reynosa, Mexico.

Production of built-in refrigerators currently manufactured at the LaVergne facility will be moved to the company's Fort Smith, AR facility, and production of side-by-side refrigerators made at Reynosa will shift to Whirlpool's Ramos Arizpe, Mexico site. At LaVergne, approximately 500 jobs will be eliminated, while at Reynosa, an estimated 750 jobs will be affected. The Fort Smith plant expects to add approximately 275 jobs by December, and the Ramos Arizpe facility plans to add an estimated 600 employees by mid-year.

Like wise in the UK, wher The Electrolux Group has announced that it is to close its loss-making cooker factory in Spennymoor towards the end of next year and consolidate production into an existing cooker plant in Poland. The Spennymoor factory manufactures AEG, Electrolux, and Zanussi cooking appliances - mainly free standing cookers – plus a smaller number of built-in ovens, for the UK and Irish markets and has approximately 500 employees.

“This development, in combination with a shift in consumer preferences from free-standing cookers to built-in cookers, has eroded the competitiveness of our Spennymoor factory. Running a loss-making factory is not sustainable which is why we have decided to consolidate our UK cooker manufacturing into our factory in Swidnica in Poland.” said Magnus Yngen, head of Electrolux Major Appliances Europe.

The closure of the Electrolux cooking appliance factory at Spennymoor means that cooker production in Britain will be limited to range cooker production plus a handful of niche built-in manufacturers. This is seen by many in the industry as an inevitable outcome due to the lower production costs from producing appliances in the far east.

Also in this article we ask the question on Induction hobs - how does induction work?! Induction hobs deliver heat to the pan using a magnetic field. The electric current passes through a coil which creates a very strong magnetic field under the ceramic plate. This field creates an induction current, which generates heat and is drawn upwards into the ferrous pan. The induction currents heat the pan instantly, which then passes its heat on to the food it contains.

Safety - the temperature of the glass top remains low. With an induction hob, the heat necessary for cooking the food is produced directly inside the pan; the vitro-ceramic glass hardly heats up at all, as it only receives the heat from the pan placed on it. If there is no saucepan on the hob but the power is on, the surface will not heat up until a suitable saucepan is placed on the hob.

Precision cooking control - these cooking zones are so accurate that it is possible to create a constant low temperature for long periods of time, so that soups and casseroles can simmer away without the likelihood of them sticking to the bottom of the pan. Induction hobs are also extremely fast – being capable of reduced cooking times, and because there is no heat wasted, they use considerably less energy than other hobs.