Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

UPDATE: I dropped my initial rating of 3-star down to 1-star, because of attitude of Zojirushi USA. They've been informed with my below detailed experience. Their response was nothing short of humiliating / chastising. To them (in summary) they never heard such problem - so it's got to be me not knowing what I'm doing. Yeah, right. Take your attitude together with your ill-designed machine. Now for last 6-months I'm a happy user of Breville BBM800XL Bread Maker. Breville BBM800XL Custom Loaf Bread Maker Guess what; Breville's paddle notch is machined all the way thru it's full thickness (not a ridiculous 1/8" as Zojirushi preferred to make it). It's also made out of denser metal. One can see that Breville's paddle is certainly not designed to fail quickly (as Zojirushi's is). It also nicely folds / gets out of the way during baking. If you're a typical bread machine user (seldomly making light textured breads from white flour) you are not likely to face the problem described below. But if you are in to "real whole-wheat" bread and use your bread machine couple times a week; then simply don't waste your money on Zojurishi. Go with Breville. You need a company who appreciates and listen to their customers (instead of humiliating them). -------------------------------------------------- I thought that this was the best bread machine out there. Here is the reason why I only gave 3 stars : We completely ceased using "modern wheat" 15 months ago. We did not buy any bread or wheat product from store since then. We buy einkorn wheat berries only. We grind them and make our wonderful simplistic einkorn bread using our Zojirushi Virtuoso. So it's been in use (at least once every 3-4 days)during last 15 months. We liked our bread machine a lot. It has two blades and a strong motor / mechanism. It's very flexible with all available programs and user memories. Last week one of the paddles (or "kneading blade" - in Zojirushi terms) stopped rotating while kneading. I removed the paddle and noticed that it's notch completely worn out. So the rotation of shaft was not transferring to paddle any longer. The other paddle was also just about to loose the connection as well. If you look at my attached picture; you'll see that 15 months old paddle next to a brand new one. You'll see the notch on the new paddle. Thickness of it is about 1/8". That tiny notch is the only contact point where the strong torque of powerful 100W motor is transferred to paddle. While the rotating shaft is made out of machined stainless steel, paddles feels like cast from some aluminum compound (it's very light and soft). So within time and under heavy pounding of rotating shaft; that paddle notch wears out by means of aluminum shavings. So what happens to that metal shavings? It's simple : you eat them in your bread! Your healthy bread - fortified with minute amount of aluminum dust... A huge shame for Zojirushi - for that poor design. So in essence; those paddles are consumable parts which have a limited life time. If you rarely use your bread machine (like most users) chances are you might never come to see that worn-out paddle phase. But if you use it regularly; it won't last you even 2 years. So (leave aside the negative health concern) does Zojirushi ever mention that their paddle has a limited life time? Absolutely not. Let's take a closer look at that poor design : 1- While rotating shaft is made of machined stainless steel, why not the paddles? (at least coated steel) In theory there can only be two reasons: a) It's intentionally made out of soft metal. So you have to replace them every once in a while. Therefore extra revenue stream for Zojirushi from spare parts. b) It's certainly much cheaper to manufacture a compound cast metal part (versus precisely machined steel). There would be huge difference on both material and manufacturing cost. Zojirushi BB-PAC20 is the most expensive bread machine out there. If your customer is willing to shell out $300 for best available bread machine - how clever is it to use such cheap paddles in your product? (not to mention forcing your customers to eat metal shavings). Isn't this like selling a premium car with cheapest tires on it? Zojirushi sells replacement paddles (part no: 8-BBP-P070) for $7.25 each. So about $15 replacement cost in a $300 machine is not something major. Selling those extra few paddles certainly won't make Zojirushi rich (specially considering the attracted negative publicity due to health concerns). Personally I rather pay upfront $40 each for a coated steel paddle (versus that poor $7.25 soft metal one). Then you'd have both healthy and indefinite service life from those paddles. 2) Rotating shafts are about 1" long. Why Zojirushi keep that paddle notch at only 1/8" thickness and not the full length of that shaft? Then the pounding impact would have much larger surface to transfer - hence much less (even totally eliminated) abrasion on the paddle. That point also makes you wonder if the current design of that tiny notch is intentional to limit paddle's lifetime. Bottom line is; I'm not happy with that poor design. I might contact CPSC (Consumer Product Safety Commission) about this. If Zojirushi ever comments on that point; I'll update my review.