Robust kitchen stand mixer

Submitted by Riccma02 t3_12669q7 in BuyItForLife

I’m looking for stand mixer recommendations. I am largely assuming that this will need to be a vintage purchase. I have heard that basically all stand mixers on the market these days are crap; including some horror stories of very high end Cuisinarts with stripped and or plastic gears. I tend to be very rough on my appliances, so durability and repair ability are a priority. That said, it wouldn’t be a daily use thing, I live alone and would only be baking for myself.

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-Chris-V- t1_je82fin wrote

I know people love to hate them, but my KitchenAid has served me well, for almost a decade now. BUT I did opt for one of the ones that was marketed as professional grade (who knows) and I expected it would break within it's warranty period so I bought it at Costco to facilitate an easy return.

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axel_beer t1_je95mmv wrote

speak up! i cant hear you, my kitchenaid is running! its loud, its sturdy. currently kneading pizza dough. i live it!

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omw_to_valhalla t1_je8pqj1 wrote

Same here. I bought the 7 quart bowl lift. At the time, it was their largest home model.

I got it about 8 years ago. We've used it a couple times a week pretty much every week since then.

I've done zero maintenance on it besides cleaning the exterior and it still works perfectly.

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SillyCubensis t1_je7rm6w wrote

Ankarsrum. Truly BIFL.

Kitchen Aid is trash these days. I burned up an Artisan, rebuilt it, burned it up again, bought a pro-line, was well on my way to killing it, retired it to backup duty and bought an Ankarsrum. Couldn’t be happier.

Nobody even considers Cuisinart when talking stand mixers.

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IKnewThisYearsAgo t1_je7zoz7 wrote

>Ankarsrum

I have one, and it's unstoppable when using the metal bowl and the dough hook. But the setup for beating/whipping uses that flimsy plastic bowl and the beaters run on plastic gears. I slightly damaged the teeth when I tried to cream butter that was a little too hard.

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SirBinks t1_jea5803 wrote

I don't know about Cuisinart, but I know the first change to a plastic gear in KitchenAids was intentional to make it more durable.

They added it as a sacrificial part in case you jammed the mechanism. Without it, the motor would burn itself out, or multiple other parts could break; basically the whole machine was junk.

With the sacrificial gear, catastrophic failure could be fixed with a cheap, easily serviceable part.

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dinosaur-boner t1_jeba3lw wrote

Wish I could give this more TU. Serviceability matters when it comes to BIFL.

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psimian t1_jebjq83 wrote

Yeah, I think that happened in the early 70's?

There's a difference to having a single nylon worm gear, and having the entire drive train made of plastic.

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ChrisoftheW t1_je7ttwo wrote

After burning out two regular KitchenAid stand mixers we bought an 8 quart commercial grade KitchenAid stand mixer. We’ve had it since 2017 and haven’t had any problems with it so far other than the attachment cover falling off. We run our mixers hard and overworked the first two.

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mattmccord t1_je7vlo3 wrote

Ditto. Wife has the 8qt commercial deal for her cake business. It gets a lot of hours and handles it with ease.

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jmp242 t1_je7sdmm wrote

Bosch Universal Plus is another good choice. They are pretty hard to kill.

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Maltese_Vulcan t1_je81qoh wrote

Outperforms a non-Hobart KitchenAid hands down. It’s not as aesthetically pleasing, but it’s a solid workhorse and handles everything I throw at it

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Ganglar t1_je93lmq wrote

We bought a Kenwood Chef mixer in 2013, and use it mainly for kneading pasta dough, which is about as much abuse as you can dish out to a mixer. It is still going strong after a decade. It definitely has metal gears. Whether or not they still do, I don't know, but I thought you'd appreciate another brand to research. Not sure how easy they are to find outside of the UK either.

Edit: The only downside of our mixer is the amount of noise it makes.

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psimian t1_je9ltnr wrote

If you're willing to stalk Craigslist and yard/estate sales there are a lot of vintage kitchen aid mixers out there since they were a standard wedding gift for about half a century. Honestly, any stand mixer (regardless of brand) that looks like it came out of your grandmother's kitchen will probably be superior to most consumer mixers sold today.

Sunbeam, Frigidaire, and Kitchenaid all made really good mixers before about 1980.

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isarobs t1_je9nwal wrote

This is what I did. Craigslist KitchenAid mixer purchase, vintage but wow, what a work horse.

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Riccma02 OP t1_je9z5rs wrote

This is what I was really wondering about. Does anyone know the tricks for finding a “good” Kitchen Aid? Are their model numbers or construction details to look for?

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psimian t1_jebix07 wrote

Here's a page with some info about serial numbers <link>

My suggestion would be to look for something circa 1980 that appears lightly used. My rule of thumb is "If a boomer received it as a wedding present and never used it, it's probably worth buying." That seems to be the sweet spot for these sorts of appliances--lots of high quality items were being produced and sold, so they're easy to find in good condition, and relatively easy to find parts for.

With appliances in general I look for indications that it is user serviceable (housings held together with screws are a good sign). This isn't a guarantee of quality, but it's a good start. "Good" depends on what you want to use it for. Even a mint condition kitchenaid from the 70's might not stand up to daily use making stiff bread dough.

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my-dog-is-85pct-cat t1_jeauj8t wrote

I have a 70s sunbeam I found at an estate sale. Still had the instruction manual and everything! I more often use a kitchen aide from my husbands grandmother I’m not sure when it’s from but it’s and older model made in Troy Ohio so likely 1950s. It says on the label Hobart Troy Ohio so maybe look for that?

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arafella t1_jed78bl wrote

Well, if you're really tired of shit breaking and willing to spend $4k+ there's always the Hobart N50

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Character-Fondant-26 t1_je9o3vx wrote

14 years in on a Kitchen Aid 5 qt. No complaints, would buy again. Pick a neutral color, you will have this for a long time.

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SpeakerCareless t1_je9uvsz wrote

My kitchen aid is about 20 years old and I recently had it a minor repair on it. I don’t know what I would do if I had to replace it because the newer ones sent o be of lower quality. But vintage kitchenaid is good. My moms is from the 1960s.

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SuperYoshi19 t1_jebgdh1 wrote

My professional grade Kitchen Aid is almost 20 years old. It’s not the Artisan line - this is the larger, heavier model.

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