I have owned a KitchenAid mixer for years. A couple years ago I upgraded my first one to the Professional 600 series for its improved power for kneading doughs. While I only occasionally make bread with the mixer, I frequently use it to make fresh pasta. Fresh pasta is a staple meal for small groups of guests that love to drink wine and chat around the kitchen.
When I moved to Singapore I purchased a converter to allow my 110v appliances to work on my home’s 220v power. I remember palming this eight ounce hunk of plastic in the hardware store and wondering if it was what I needed. My fading memories from college electronics surfaced notions that thick iron bars and scores of copper wire turns were needed for voltage conversion at even moderate amperage. Transformers should be heavy, right?
But, shit!, surely this $40 converter would blow a fuse before doing something catastrophic to my mixer, right? Two hours later I knew this to be untrue. When I connected the 575w mixer through my piece-of-shit converter and flipped the switch, I soon heard something like a 22 caliber pistol going off in my kitchen. From that moment on neither the mixer nor the POS converter worked. I eventually purchased a S$150, 5kg converter that has succeeded for other appliances with the POS version failed. But the mixer was dead.
I found one KitchenAid reseller (Tang’s at the intersection of Orchard and Scotts) in Singapore and they referred me to their repairman. For weeks I tried to convince him to take a shot at fixing the mixer. But he was convinced that parts for the US model were unobtainable in the region. After eight months of looking at my broken mixer I considered buying a new one at the local reseller. But the mixer that originally cost me only $350USD sold for the local equivalent of $960USD. To hell with that.
One night inspiration hit me and I decided to take the screws off the mixer and look at its innards. What a stroke of genius that was. It took me two minutes to realize why the device failed. See if you can see the problem with the circuit board in this picture.
I only had to remove two screws and unplug five wires to disconnect this board. The board’s serial number is printed in the lower right. I typed that into Google and found, via Amazon.com, an appliance supplies store in Florida that would ship me a new one for $29USD plus $6USD shipping My God, the Internet is awesome!
The part arrived today and I just finished its installation. It was all of five minutes work. I have resurrected this mixer and am already dreaming of the fresh pasta I will be making with it soon.
I just bought the same model from US and was wondering how to use it in Singapore. Any recommendation?
Hey, Naz, I bought at Selffix an FC-1000 by Winstar. It still has the price tag on it from many years ago: S$170. But it worked (and in Hong Kong still works) great.
BTW, that device is a 1000W power transformer. If they don’t have that model they buy something else. But as I recall the mixer can use about 500W. Don’t get one rated less than that!
Thks????
I means thks;)
I’m planning to bring my US kitchenaid to spore too. Which transformer are you currently using? Should I get it from spore and how much will it cost?
Lee, see comment #2 above to Naz. I bought mine at Selfix, which is a chain of hardware stores in Singapore that you can find at many malls. The model and price are above.
Hi,
I had bought the same kitchen aid from US . Got a transformer, it comes with 3 plucks. 2 white and 1 red, which one do I pluck in?
super blog thanks for writing this!